Day 8 - Everglades City, FL

When we woke up, the sky was black but there was no rain. By the time we left Key West, it was starting to pour. The weather front followed us all the way up the Keys, sometimes just in front of us causing driving to be difficult with poor visibility and surface water and sometimes just behind. By the time we got back to the Everglades National Park, it was on top of us and we had a full blown storm.

Our first planned stopped was another Everglades entrance and visitors center, Shark Valley. This was a different part to the Everglades compared to where we had been before. As we arrived, the storm passed and the sun came out. At this part of the park, there is a 8 mile path you can bike down or get a guided tour on a tram which runs parallel to one of the Everglades waterways and ends at an observation tower. After all this American food, we biked of course to burn some calories.

We made couple more stops off along the way at Big Cypress Swamp National Preserve visitors center (The Oasis Visitors Center), which has a couple of interesting displays about the Florida Panthers and a broad walk to see some more Allies.

We tried to stop off at a recommendation from Steph How called Joanne’s Blue Crab Cafe but it was closed until the weekend. It’s a shame because it looked like an awesome place.

We ended our day in a hotel in Everglades City where we ate gator nuggets and fish tacos for dinner. I'd heard that gator is supposed to taste like chicken, it doesn’t, it’s more like very tender calamari and was not chewy at all.

Here is a video of our day: