This past July I went on a council trip to Florida for 10 days. There were 10 girls and 2 adults. This was a good sized number for this type of trip, not too big and not too small. Betty Lou Cox and her daughter Kelly Ann were the adults on the trip, and many of the girls I remembered from my trip to Arizona 2 years ago. There was also one other girl from my troop-Laura (who also happens to be my cousin).
Our plane landed in Tampa and after going to our hotel, we went to a water park. We knew it was supposed to rain but we still went. We only got to go on about 3 different water rides and then we had a light hail which turned into a downpour. We tried to wait it out, but it started thundering and lightening so we left. We all were so drenched that we got the seats of the van soaking wet and it smelled for days! We stayed around the hotel for the rest of the night doing things like playing pool and we rented movies. The next day we went to Busch Gardens. We all agreed that our favorite ride was Montu which is rated the #3 top steel roller coaster in the world.
The next morning we got in the van and drove 5 hours from Tampa to Miami. It was a very long boring ride! When we finally got to Miami we drove right past our hotel because we were all looking at a huge realistic 3D mural on the wall of a building, so we had to drive all the way around again to find it. We were only in Miami for that night. We got to walk around a little and found a really good Italian restaurant for dinner.
Our next stop was the Marine Lab in Key Largo. We spent 3 days in bunk beds all 12 of us in one room. In our spare time we played volleyball, either just us or against some of the other groups staying there. We went to classes on a big houseboat that was tied up at the dock. We learned about sea grass, coral and mangrove trees. Then right after the class, we would go out on a boat for a field trip where we went snorkeling to see first hand what we had just learned about. One time we all took rocks covered with sea grass out of their tank and put them in a new tank of water. When we swished the rocks around, it was surprising how many sea creatures like water spiders and small squid came out of hiding from the cracks of the rock . We also went out on a night trip . We were far enough out in the bay to not be bothered by the lights from shore. The stars were beautiful! We learned about the constellations, and how the sailors used the North Star and others to navigate. On the way back we did a plankton tow. We dragged a net behind us in the water, and when we pulled it up, we all got in a tight circle around it to block off the light and we could see millions of little specks glowing. It was so amazing. I really enjoyed the time at the Marine Lab and could have stayed longer.
Our next stop was Key West which was very touristy. We stopped by Jimmy Buffet's Cafe, "Margaritaville", and most of us ate the famous "Cheeseburger in Paradise". While we were there we also toured Ernest Hemingway's house and posed for pictures at the marker for the southernmost point in the US. We stayed for the sunset celebration. There were a lot of street performers like unicycle-tightrope riders, jugglers, and fire eaters for about an hour before sundown. But then everyone gathered around at the shore for the beautiful sunset.
The one part of the trip that wasn't fun was when we all had to travel together in the van. It was a 15 passenger van but when we were all inside along with the luggage it was not fun. It was an art to get back into the van all the time. We actually had a map of the way the suitcases all had to fit in. If we didn't do it a certain way there wouldn't be enough room for all of us to fit in !
My favorite part of the trip was when we went back to Key Largo for the swim with the dolphins. Even though it was raining, they told us it was no problem because the dolphins liked the rain. First we had a class in how to behave around the dolphins and then we got in the lagoon. Two of us at a time got to spend about 45 minutes with the dolphins. Gizmo, Dinky & DJ were the names of our dolphins-two of them were mother and son. First we just held our arms out, and they swam by and touched us, so they could get used to us. It's important that they know that we wouldn't harm them. Then we started to play with them. We held onto their fins and they gave us a ride, we floated on our stomachs and they pushed us around by our feet, we threw a toy and they fetched it. They also gave us "kisses" to our hands, waved hello and goodbye, splashed our faces on purpose, and jumped through a hoop which we held up. I'll never forget my time with the dolphins. All too soon it was time to get back in the van and drive to Fort Lauderdale. There we went to a science museum and saw an IMAX movie on of all things, dolphins!
Even though it rained quite a bit on our trip, it really didn't stop us from doing very much. We never really got to go to a beach to go swimming which we wanted to do, and we had to leave the water park early, but otherwise we really had a good time, and I would recommend a council trip like this to other girls. Just get a bigger van!
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