Everglades National Park

Campsites are hard to come by in Florida in the winter.  However, they were plentiful in the Everglades.  I suppose that a swamp is not as attractive as a beach to most people. 

This was our site in the Flamingo Campground.  It doesn't look much like a swamp because the campground is on the Gulf.  The water is about 100 yards from the campsite.  As you can see, the weather is beautiful with an afternoon temperature of about 80 degrees.  Not too bad for January. The palm trees are coconut palms.  The coconuts were still green, however, so we couldn't get any.  Oh well, it's not on my diet anyway. 

This small snowy egret showed up in our campsite.  He didn't seem to be overly bothered by our presence.

A rather large number of his brothers were here on a nearby island.  There were hundreds of them all over the island.  I had never seen egrets perched in trees before.

This great white egret was probably looking for his lunch.  I hope he found it before the fellow below has egret for lunch.

Right now he looks like he has already had his lunch.  He was very inactive, not moving for more than 30 minutes.  I could understand how he felt.  After a mile walk around the island, I was ready for a nap too.

These turkey buzzards were looking for someone else's lunch.  I hope this camper left enough food to fill them up.

These are red mangrove trees growing on West Lake.  They look like their roots start several feet above the ground. 

The strangler fig sometimes starts life in the bark of another tree.  It grows down the host tree with long vines that wrap around the host until they reach the ground.  The fig then takes root and continues to grow.  It will eventually replace the host as a free standing tree.  In this case, as a free leaning tree.  It had been blown over in a recent hurricane.

Just off the Gulf coast lie a large number of small islands.  They are called the Thousand Islands.   (Actually, they are called the Ten Thousand Islands but I could only see a few of them.)  I wonder if Thousand Island Dressing comes from here.  These islands are a part of the Everglades National Park.