I'm Home From The Key West/Marco Island Trip...and I'm SICK!

Just wanted to let you know that I'm home from the Key West/Marco Island Trip. We pulled into my driveway about 12:30 AM on Monday Morning (January 21st) in the sub-freezing temperatures (18 degrees without much snow on the ground). I also have been battling a fever of 102.8 degrees as well as a raw throat.

Fortunately, I've been taking meds and I actually got sick on Saturday when we were at Wooten's Alligator Farm and Wildlife Sanctuary (http://www.wootenseverglades.com/) on the Tamiami Trail. I was having chills earlier that day, but really didn't think much of it. I knew I was feeling cold and wanted to get warmed up. I wore a long-sleeve black shirt which I purchased from Porky's Bayside BBQ in Marathon (http://www.captainpips.com/) located in the Middle Florida Keys.

Anyway, when my friends were holding some of the smaller gators, I got out-of-sorts and had a chance to taste my breakfast a second time. I was extremely dizzy, clammy, etc. My vision was blurry as well. Too bad I didn't get a chance to hold any of the smaller gators. One of my friends decided to take my camera and do a few pictures. She asked me if I would like a picture of me on the ground. I said yes. So, there are a few pictures of me on the ground when I was sick. (It's all clean, though.) I do remember my friend's brother and sister-in-law asking me if I wanted to go to the ER...and I thought to myself, "NO!" I didn't want to end up staying overnight in a hospital room in Florida. Ironically, I was given Gatorade (in the middle of gator country in the Florida Everglades) to help hydrate me in the 85 degree heat. I don't know if it was heat stroke/exhaustion or not. If it were, then I would be feeling better now, wouldn't I?

(I do think that having to drive back to the Raleigh area from Daytona didn't give me much time for REAL rest even though I slept most of the day on Saturday after coming back from Wooten's. I will say that my sickness delayed our departure because this was the last day of the trip and we were going to try to do quite a bit of traveling that evening. We did actually leave Marco Island around 9:15 PM on Saturday and stayed in Tampa....and when we were leaving Tampa on Sunday we had to travel Interstate 4 to Daytona....and that was where that 70 car pileup with four fatalities occurred over a fourteen/fifteen mile stretch a couple of weeks ago. Also, the friend who was driving us from Tampa to Daytona actually got lost in Tampa despite the portable GPS system we've been using. That added about an hour or two on the ride back.)

Well, I'll close this post for now. Time to go back to sleep (in my own bed) because this fever has wiped me out. There still is quite a bit to share about this trip, such as going to Marco Island Beach on Friday, etc. When I start to feel better, I'll do some more posting on the blog. This trip really has been awesome even though I've been sicker than I've been in a long while and the trailer lost its right fender as well as my Jeep Liberty's left rear window's regulator getting all bad and such.