Marco Island to Everglades City

We leave Marco Island on Holy Saturday and head to Everglades City. We opt to leave the way of Goodland and save mileage by avoiding the Cape Romano Shoals in the Gulf of Mexico.

The water becomes brown from the plant tannins, but it is still crystal clear and clean. The Everglades is a wide expanse of freshwater marshes, once 4000 square miles (from Lake Okeechobee south to the tip), but now is roughly less than half. The region is unique by relying on the flow of sheet water from Lake O; a subject that opens a can of worms regarding environmental impacts of this stoppage of freshwater flow into the Florida Bay and beyond. The Everglades are beautifully serene.

We arrive to our marina, which is primarily a RV resort, Everglades Isle Luxury Motorcoach Retreat is the proper name. They do mean luxury! All motor coaches must be approved, class A or Super C, less than 12 years old and at least 36 feet long. It is a beautiful retreat, that just so happens to have docks.

We celebrate Easter on Sunday at the local Catholic Church. It is a nice small service with a very welcoming crowd.

Afterwards, the choices for lunch are the Gun and Rod Club, or the Gun and Rod Club. As you step into the Gun and Rod Club, you travel back in time to the late 1800’s. The original furniture still remains from the days when the Rod and Gun Club was the playground for the world’s wealthiest people. Its past boasts of visits from Presidents Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Hoover and Nixon along with celebrities John Wayne, Ernest Hemingway, Burt Reynolds, Sally Field and numerous more. It has since lost its luster as a luxury retreat, but is still operational today as an inn and restaurant (cash only please). We ate on the screened in porch and the food was surprisingly good and the staff friendly. The inside is quite dark and filled with all kinds of eccentricities.

We enjoyed our brief step back into time in Everglades City. The 352 people who live there (in 2020) are a hardy group! As there are over 7 billion mosquitos in the Everglades, these are not cowardly individuals. I raised the white flag on day 3. While we complain about the nasty little bugs, they are an important part of the Everglades ecosytem. It is only the humans that they become a nuisance to, and those are only from the female mosquitos. The males are happy with flower nectar, but the females seek out protein to develop their eggs. The females then lay their eggs in the water and the larvae become a food source for fish, turtles, frogs, birds and other insects. Therefore, the rainy season, from March through October, is mosquito season. We quickly realized everything needs to be screened in, and that doesn’t always help. Best for us to bug out!

Thanks for following us to this new blog! It took a while to set up, but has more advanced options. Many thanks to our son Evan for all his computer expertise!