Off To The Lighthouse!!! Hoping To See Some Gators

Today we are going to go the the lighthouse that we saw from the boat. We get to the light house we stop in the museum area right before you head in. We saw a few animals that would be in the St Mark refuge where the lighthouse is. The road to the light house is surrounded by the refuge it is pretty cool they had a controlled burn today so it was all black from the burn.there is water and swamp on both side it is about 7 miles to the lighthouse we are driving really slow because normally there are tons of gators laying on the side of the road and in the water and on the banks of the water. On the way back to the light house we saw a few little gators Robin was on the hunt for what she called the biggin lol.. We are about 1 mile from the light house and where Robin and David launch their boat we pull in and see a decent size gator laying on the other side of the water we got as close as we could and took some pictures it was awesome seeing one up close and personal in the wild lol.. we have seen them at the alligator farm in St Augustine but never in the wild.


We make it back to the lighthouse it is beautiful about 1 week prior to us getting here there was a monarch butterfly festival here so there were still some monarchs hanging around from the migration here I was able to get some really good close pictures while there were hanging around the butterfly bush they were beautiful and colorful I know my mom would love to see them up close so I took tons of pictures for her lol.. your welcome mom :-) Next we walk around the back side of the lighthouse there is a small little beach back here with white sand not very long but we walk it I took my shoes off and I was in heaven with my toes in the sand it was so soft and white. Took a picture from the beach of the light house and it looks like a post card picture lol..



We head out and we are just about out of the refuge and on the right we see a huge gator laying on the bank we stop I took a picture we notice there is a bike trail  and we pull off and we got out of the car and were able to get within 10-15 feet from the gator. There was another car there looking and they called us crazy for getting out of the car. Todd and I walked down to the water and that was the closest we wanted to get to the gator he was just laying there yes we are crazy but hey where else can you get that close to one with out getting hurt or eaten LMAO.. after getting pictures we looked down in the water and turned around and looked in a little underpass and saw tons of blue crab of course you can not crab in the refuge otherwise I would be having crab for dinner lol.. As soon as we turned around the gator moved into the water some it was like he was trying to sneak up on us and attack we kept a sharp eye on him haha. It was so cool to get that close to one and get some awesome pictures. Jokingly I told Todd he was not allowed to get really close because I do not have life insurance on him LMAO….



On the way home Robin asked us if we ever been to a sulfer hole….NO…so she took us to one the water is so clear everyone swims in it supposed to be good for you complexion maybe I will take a swim there is almost no wildlife in it and def no gators but one thing for sure was it smelled like rotten eggs but supposedly when you swim in it you do not smell like it lol..