My girlfriend and I set out Saturday mourning to spend the weekend at a campground in the middle keys. On the way down we stopped at the dolphin institute in Key Largo and played with them for a few hours. Amazing creature dolphins, they accept you into their world with complete trust and genuine interest. I use to live right down the canal from the institute and could swim there and play with them anytime I wanted to. I miss interacting with them very much; I feel they enriched my life in ways I may never fully understand.
So we get to the campsite by noon and set everything up. After lunch we took a walk on the nature trail on Long Key. it was a typical summer day in the Keys so we took another dip to cool off and then a fresh water shower to wind down for the evening. Hot and buggy is just the way it is in the Keys but it’s still worth it. This time the heat just made us appreciate even more what nature had in store for us. After another one of my excellent barbecues, a line of storms began to funnel down the coast, like a giant train of air conditioners bathing us with clean cool air down from high. Never coming on shore and having infrequent lightning, this train lasted all night. It turned what can be a sticky not so comfortable night into perfection.
Now storms are certainly not unusual in the Keys but for there to be a constant line of them just off shore, not just for that night but all of the following day, is a once in a lifetime event and we had the best seats in the house to benefit from nature just showing off. The storms never got close enough to block the sun delivering only the occasional sun shower to wash the salt spray off our bodies as we lounged on a sandbar. I started mention how rare this was when she politely shushed me, whispering softly in my ear “we might jinks it”.
Over 2100 weekends on this planet and this was the best one so far. Not sure how I’ll ever top it but I’m going to try. I got 2400 more chances if I’m lucky.