Key Largo, FL
All good things must come to an end and so it is with a sigh that we have our third and final breakfast at the Banana Cafe, where we are greeted as regulars by the friendly owners. The heat and humidity of the past few days has noticeably dropped and there's a bit of a chill in the air as we load the car and check out of the hotel.
By midday we've left Key West behind and are heading north, retracing our drive back up through the Keys. The sun is shining high in the sky and for some reason the journey proves much more scenic in reverse. Perhaps it's our mood or some trick of the light, but what had proved disappointing on the way down seems pretty and charming on the way back.
After three hours we arrive at Key Largo and pull into our final hotel of the trip, the Hilton Grande Resort. It's a vast, somewhat unlovely collection of buildings on a man-made beach with serviceable amenities but an utter lack of character. Sher, who checks us in, informs us that as Hilton Honours members we're invited to a sunset cheese and wine party in their Treetops Restaurant at 5pm. Considering there is precisely nothing else to do, we accept.
With a couple of hours still to kill we sit by the pool and munch on a bad turkey sandwich trying to ignore the NFL game blaring away at the poolside bar, and then a quick little exploration of the beach area reinforces our gratitude that we opted for just one night here rather than the two suggested by Virgin. I can't imagine why anyone would think of this as a 'resort hotel'. Compared to Hawks Cay which we stayed at on our way down the Keys, this is like a Travelodge, rather than the paradise it pretends to be.
Up at Treetops Restaurant - a concrete balcony above some overgrown bushes - Lisa, a middle-aged blonde with the evangelical fervour of a born-again wino, is doing her best to interest the ageing clientele of loyalty card members in the local viticulture.
A cheese platter is being swiftly devoured by the OAPs so we grab a plastic plate and join the queue, ending up in front of Lisa who pours us a coconut and avocado wine to go with it. We sip politely, consider the mango, passionfruit, banana and guava wines she's also punting, and then choose to get stuck into the Californian sauvignon blanc she's hiding under the table instead.
As the sun sets we notice she's also got a merlot stashed away so we take it in turns to go up for refills until, as soon as the sun disappears below the horizon, she quickly grabs all her bottles and scurries for the exit. Happily, by this point we don't care that the rest of the Treetops Restaurant is full of flanelette wearing retirees who are all watching yet more American Football and loudly cheering on their teams. Perhaps their hearing aids have packed up...
By the time we return for dinner most of them have zimmered to bed so we tuck in to conch chowder, Macedamia nut crusted mahi mahi, chimichurri steak tenders and another bottle of merlot undisturbed and then crash out and dream of work. Amazing how reality's tendrils start snaking back into your head.
With the car loaded and check out done, next morning we leave the Keys altogether and head for the airport. But there's just enough time for a detour to the Everglades, so we swing off Highway 1 and drive down Royal Palm until we get to the stop off for the Anhinga Trail; a boardwalk through the swamps taking in alligators basking in the sun, herons diving for fish and a whole variety of flora and fauna laid out in tourist-friendly ways.
Unfortunately, it being a bank holiday weekend (tomorrow is Martin Luther King Day), the whole place is thronged by families with children running around like mad things, so peaceful contemplation of a natural idyll is not possible. We take great care not to accidentally elbow the noisy darlings into the alligators as we push them out of shot, but hey accidents happen and there's probably a few happy reptiles there today...
A little further along the desolate road we come to a stop marked Pa-Hay-Okee, which is a lookout over the true Everglade vistas populated by mangroves, cypress trees, hardwood giants and sawgrass prairie, with a sign telling us this is the largest wilderness east of the Mississippi River. As far as the eye can see is just uninhabited swampland.
This is as far as we have time to go, so we turn around and get back on the main road towards the Florida Turnpike and Miami airport. A shack at the side of the road announces Gator Grill, with the slogan "You've seen the gators, now taste them!" but we opt for refreshments instead at Roberts juice bar, which is crowded with customers all slugging back milkshakes the size of wine coolers.
And then forty minutes later we're pulling into the airport and handing over the keys to our hire car and checking in our luggage ready for the journey home. Outside it's 30 degrees while the weather forecast for London tells us it's barely above freezing.
Our visit to the Sunshine State has come to an end - and we've loved every minute. But as we wait in line for security, a message comes through from our friend Jon asking us when we arrive back in the UK. He wants to talk to us about a plan for going away on holiday together. We'll raise a glass to that on the plane. Here's to a new adventure....
