Day Three - More road tripping, more lucking into camping spots. We hit MM 36 by the afternoon, skated 7-mile bridge to Pigeon Key (landmark) & camped at Big Pine Key Fisherman's Lodge. They had only two spots left when we got there, both tent sites, and we were set for the night.

This is Big Pine Key Fisherman's Lodge. Most of the residents arrive sometime in November and park their RV's till the following May.

We had to be the youngest folks in the crowd - we're pretty sure that everyone had that figured out after our first night's stay.

If you look closely at the camp map, you will see the black "X" that marks the little patch(es) of gravel parking lot that we called home for two nights.

First things first! After checking into Big Pine Key Fisherman's Lodge for our second night of camping, we hit what used to be the beach (before Hurricane Jeorges) for an M-inspired Tequiza commercial.

If only the marketing guys at Anheuser-Busch knew the brilliance of our targeted campaign ideas, we would make millions.

The Key Deer are exceptionally tame, thanks to all of the clueless visitors to the Lower Keys in recent years. Endangered, their numbers will likely continue to decline due to their lack of fear of people, cars and white bread fed to them by hand (bread wrapper included - don't laugh, I witnessed this).

In the afternoon, we skated historic 7-Mile Bridge. The old bridge, used by vehicular traffic till about 1980 (scary!), led to Pigeon Key at about the 4 mile mark then stopped.

Pigeon Key has some interesting history and stories of its own, read more at the Pigeon Key Foundation official web site.We walked around it a bit, but we got there late and everyone wanted to go home, so we didn't do much other than grab a drink of water.

Here we are, all sweaty and smiley. We had a great time skating the bridge & visiting Pigeon Key, which L insisted on seeing up close and personal.

May we remind you that it was 75 degrees in the Keys that February day? Compare that to the typical 40 degrees, windy and raining weather in Chicago.

After our skate, we did a quick change in the car and headed to a fantastic outdoor tiki bar/raw bar/seafood restaurant called Shuckers (MM 47) for dinner and a dockside view of the sunset.

Yum! A Caesar for me, plus mussels and pasta and a seafood pasta for M with every type of shellfish you can imagine. It was a heavenly meal.

M and I created another night of terror at the Fisherman's Lodge after returning to camp with an air mattress that required testing. We were loud, we were wild, we didn't care.

The next day we were told that there were no more campsites - I suspected they wanted us out - but a kind camper near us announced that we could have his site as he was leaving early. ha!