Up through October I was blogging chronologically and I got behind once we hit the East Coast and when I hit my busiest time for work. I was feeling overwhelmed by all the posts I wanted to share to get “caught up” so I’ve made the executive decision to hop ahead to current time (for now) and plan to fill in some of our East Coast fun as I’m able. It’s not ideal – but I had hit a roadblock and missed sharing updates. Sound good with you!?!
Travel dates :: December 19 – 21, 2015
Christmas is just around the corner and we’re tucked in down in the Florida Keys. We arrived on Saturday (Dec. 19) and it was a blustery, windy and rainy weekend. I’m not complaining though, temperatures are still in the mid-70s and the views are breathtaking.
We spent our first two nights at Curry Hammock State Park and it is wonderful. We are tucked into back-in spot #22 – with just a small dune between us and the beach. We have peek-a-boo views of the beautiful water and thanks to the wind, we saw lots of kite surfers this weekend!
This is looking from the beach back to our spot. The dune is roped off and there are signs saying to stay out of the dunes. But it’s a very, very short walk from our spot to the trail that takes you to the beach.
Curry Hammock State Park is just north of the famous 7-mile bridge and the more well-known Bahia Honda State Park. It’s a small park (which we like) with a security gate, lots of waterfront sites and some nice public space areas.
The spots on the beach side are not as long in terms of length (ideal for smaller rigs – probably 25-40 feet) but the inside of the loop looked liked it had room for bigger rigs. Although there are only 20-25 camping spots, we saw four other Airstreams within the same park (that’s not ours pictured above) and even one leaving as we pulled in. 🙂 Florida looks good on these shiny, tiny homes.
I love that Curry Hammock State Park campground had information signs all around the loop highlighting the plants and flowers. They were really well done and our kids enjoyed walking around and reading the signs. There are opportunities EVERYWHERE for homeschooling and learning!
We like the central location of Curry Hammock State Park – it’s sort of in the middle of the Keys with similar distance to Key Largo (44 miles) and Key West (55 miles). It’s about 5-10 minutes from Marathon which has a ton of services and stores. This came in handy because I had a few last minute Christmas presents to pick-up when we got to the Keys. And last night we drove to an RV park near Bahia Honda (about 17 miles away) to meet up with three other full-time traveling families – an easy drive considering there are a lot of farther places we could have been staying.
Walk just a few minutes from your campsite and you’ll find a nice playground (with swings, not pictured), a large grassy field, picnic pavilions, restrooms and a public beach. If you’re not staying at the park, admission into the state park is spendy – I think it starts around $6 and increases per person (I think a family of 5 would be $11-$12). If you’re staying in the campground ($38/night) you can of course access these areas for FREE.
You can rent kayaks – and if it hadn’t been so windy, we might have considered it, there is a little inlet of water that would be perfect to paddle around.
The water here is shallow – great for young kids, the sand is soft (although a lot of organic material/plants on the beach, it’s soft and not much of a nuisance) and the water is clear.
We had a lot of fun exploring the rocks and beach. . .
Not many shells, but we found a lot of hermit crabs. He was too shy to come out for a photo.
Lots of birds. This flock blended in well with the organic matter on the beach and we walked right up to – surprising us as they all took flight. So beautiful.
The weather has already warmed up quite a bit today and the wind has completely disappeared – with a solid forecast of 82 degrees and sunshine all week. We hope to do some exploring – checking out some local attractions and tours – and we’ll be sharing about those as we’re able.
Driving through the Florida Keys
Do you have favorite things to do in the Florida Keys? Favorite tours? Favorite restaurants? Favorite keys or beaches? Please leave a comment and let us know!
Make sure you go to Robbie’s and feed the tarpon- I take my grandchildren every year- mm 77. Also look for key deer around Big Pine key fishing lodge- I have always seen them on that road!
Hi Rosalind! We heard Robbie’s is fun – we hope to check it out while we were down here.
Have fun and enjoy the keys!
Merry Christmas to your family!!! What great memories you will have. Florida is a total change from the early years in Alaska for Heather, but I bet you will adjust just fine. Hope to see you soon. I have it on good authority Santa will visit Liam and Hadley at their home on the beach.
Hi, Lorna! You’re right, I’ve never had such a sunny, warm Christmas – definitely different than the -40 degree days I’ve had in Fairbanks, Alaska. We did make sure that Santa knew where to find us. 🙂
Just found you through Instagram….we have a teacher (my husband) and a blogger over here, too :). Still waiting for the blog to make enough to finance full time travel, but it does help out a lot with paying for shorter trips (not the travel blog; that one’s just a baby). Anyway, looking forward to hearing more about your adventures–Merry Christmas!