Dry Tortugas

Dry Tortugas National Park is 70 miles west of Key West. The park includes the waters around Fort Jefferson. We got lucky, and the waves and westerly wind were not bad. I was able to stand on the front of the boat for much of the trip, looking for wildlife.

We got up early to walk the mile over to the pier by 7 am. The Yankee Freedom took about 2 3/4 hours to get out to Fort Jefferson. The Magnificent frigate bird is huge, with an 8-foot wingspan. They don’t take off from the water very well, so they hardly land when spending months at sea. They steal fish that other birds have caught, so they don’t have to land or dive to catch their own fish.

The Dry Tortugas are the only place in the US that the Masked Boobies nest. They spend most of their time at sea fishing. They followed our ship in the Caribbean for a day when we were on our Amazon trip.

It’s possible to take a seaplane out as well.

The United States worked on Fort Jefferson (it was never completed) between 1846-1875. Materials originally came from the southern US, but the Civil War interrupted that and some bricks came from as far away as Maine. There is no water source, hence the “Dry” part of the name. There are large cisterns built under the fort to catch rainwater.

Many of the buildings inside the fort burned down over the years or fell down. So you mostly see the footings.

There is a small bay beside the fort. It’s mostly a bird sanctuary today.

Inside the fort you can see that the rain water dripping through the fort is creating stalactites and stalagmites.

Most of the cannons that were installed have been removed for scrap metal, but a few remain.

We went snorkeling along the moat wall. There wasn’t a lot of fish, but it felt good to get in the water, and was very relaxing.