We had no idea where we wanted to eat in Marathon on the way to the beach, and ended up going with Burdine's, after looking at reviews online. It ended up not being anything to write home about, and (as usual) the boys were fussy and didn't want to sit still or eat, so we kind of rushed through lunch.
After lunch, we made a stop at Bahia Honda State Park. And the boys LOVED it, although I wasn't too fond of all the nasty seaweed washed up on shore. The Keys are known for their beautiful water and temps, but they are NOT known for their beaches. Once you get away from seaweed mounds, it was alright, but the water still had bits and pieces of the seaweed floating around in it.
The rest of the day kind of ended up going downhill. We decided to head on to Key West, and the boys fought naps until after Big Pine Key. We got to Key West and ended up finding that it just really wasn't our thing. If we had a stroller that we could transfer the boys into, it might have been better, but it was just so crowded and busy and loud and crazy, and while that might have appealed to us 5 years ago before we had little ones in tow, it just wasn't our thing. So after spending 2 hours driving all the way down there, we basically drove around for a bit, let the boys nap longer and then headed back home. I didn't even hardly take any pictures.
We ended up stopping in Marathon at IHOP for supper, knowing that at least the boys would probably eat pancakes (and they did - thank goodness) and then just went back to the condo.
It was a VERY long day. We were both kinda glad that we had pressed on to Key West, however, because we then were able to spend a whole other day at the condo instead of drive that far with the boys again. It freed up another day that we decided to spend swimming and playing at the park, which was a MUCH better decision for us.
