Holy Alligators Batman!!!! (Florida pt one)

So I just got back from Florida. It was really amazing. In Part one I'll discuss the amazingness of the Everglades. This was just a day trip but it was BY FAR one of the best parts of the trip. The day started out rainy and really quite terrible. The car ride down to Everglades City from Marco Island was about an hour long and the rain was pouring. I got really discouraged, thinking we wouldn't get to see any of the Alligators. Me and my dad got to Everglades City and figured if we couldn't see any Alligators we'd at least spend the day in the small town and just hang out and see the sights. We first went to the town "museum". I put museum in quotes because it was only one room with a couple of panels on the wall. However, it was PACKED with people trying to get out of the rain. After about 45 minutes of looking around, we went to the Rod and Gun Club, which was a restaurant that had a lot of history in it. It was apparently where a lot of service men stayed during WW2. It was a pretty neat little place.

This is a picture of me in front of the Rod and Gun Club. My hair's a mess but I usually wear a hat.

After we ate the clouds began to clear up and we decided to try our luck at taking an airboat ride in the Everglades. We asked the waitress where the best place was to go and she told us they were all about the same. However, I'm glad that we went to the one that we did. It was a place called Jungle Erv's. When I heard the name I thought for sure it'd be a pile you in and give you a generic experience kind of place. It was the BEST airboat ride I have ever been on. We saw an 11 foot gator right by the place where we boarded the airboats.

I got a picture of him. He was just hanging out underneath the porch they had.

Then We headed out on the airboats. Because of the rain we were the first one's to go out for the day and we were on one of the smaller boats which was nice. We had an interesting collection of visitors who joined us on our boat. There was a couple from Holland. The husband spoke amazing English but the wife didn't seem to speak any at all. However, the guy had a lot of trouble trying to understand our guide, I think mainly because of his heavy, southern accent. The second couple was from Minnesota.... I think. I don't really remember but they were a really nice couple. The woman was a nurse and the guy never really said what he did. I actually thought he was gonna be a huge jerk, mainly because he looked like one of those UFC fighters. In reality he was really nice and friendly, as was the woman.

Here's a picture of the airboats.

The trip started out slow. We saw a couple of birds and some snakes in the lava rock surrounding the everglades area.

Then we saw the 8 foot gator. He got REALLY close to the boat. In fact, he got under the boat, as you can see here.

He was really awesome and I got a bunch of photos of him. He loves the marshmallows. Our guide told us that the Alligator can run up to 35 mph on land, in short spurts. This guy never got even close to that.

I got a video of him eating some of the marshmellows and you can see how close he was and how sharp his teeth are! O_o

Next was the babies!!!! The were adorable.....

but I guess they're pretty aggressive though.

Part two of the Florida trip to be continued....