68. An hour in Everglades National Park

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The Shark Deck. I'm Johnny Mack
and travel is back. I hope you

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enjoyed the Key West saga in the
last few episodes. So on the way

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back from Key West, we realized
if we got up early, we could

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cram in an hour, maybe ninety
minutes at the Everglades. And I'm crazy

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and I decided to do it.
So we hit the road at like five

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in the morning. And you can
hear me being a little low talker and

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low energy at the beginning of the
recording. Keep in mind Sunday morning,

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no sleep, very quiet place.
But we did it. We went to

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the Everglades. Everglades National Park stretches
across one point five million acres of South

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Florida across three counties Monroe, Miami, Dade, and Collier. It's the

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third largest national park in the contiguous
US. Yeah. I remember looking at

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the map and being like, wow, this is quite wide, especially when

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the ways app was like, and
can go to this place? It's eighty

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miles from here, and I'm like, no, I have a plane to

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catch. I'd love to believe me, but I only have an hour here

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because I got up early. There
are three entrances to Everglades National Park Homestead,

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Miami and Everglades, which is by
Naples. The tour guides will tell

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you a great way to explore the
park is by boat. I did not

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get to do that. Rangers recommend
taking an airboat tour to get into the

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heart of the wetlands. Many companies
offer tours on the airboats. They take

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visitors right through the wetlands, which
means plenty of opportunities to spot exotic birds,

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as well as gators floating and sunning
in the waters. As you're going

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to hear in my recording, I
didn't have to try very hard to be

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two feet from an alligator, and
the more I listen to the audio,

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I'm like, boy, that was
stupid. All right. What you're about

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to hear is the Anhinga Trail,
a one mile round trip accessible four wheelchairs

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and strollers. It leads visitors along
a boardwalk that elevates you above the water.

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You'll likely see creature swimming or lying
on the shore, or you know,

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two feet from you. When you're
not paying attention, it happens.

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Alligator sidings are common along this trail. Yes, so keep your eyes peeled

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for those giants. Scaly reptiles.
Yes, all right, let's listen.

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All right, just past the panthers
crossing road sign. Never saw that before.

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It's the ernest ff Co Visitor Center. Welcome to Everglades National Park.

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What to see and where to look? If you want to see what's special

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about the Glades, you have to
get out of your car quiet, walk

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down one of the boardwark trails.
That's what we're going to do. Tram

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right through Shark Valley. Don't have
time today or boat to or Florida Bay.

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Wow, this is cool, nice
and cool in here too. There

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are no other Everglades in the world. The unusual birds and unusual animals that

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thrive in the river of grass or
in danger of disappearing as their habitat is

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manipulated by man. With its one
and a half million acres, Everglades National

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Park preserves only one fifth of the
original Everglades. Wow, a white land

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like no other in the world.
Was a cool gift shop like this frog?

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These are cool. That's a great
picture. These are nice. Yeah,

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the ot was awesome. These are
great photos. Looking at the art

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of Jack Boucher, best known as
an architectural photographer. In April nineteen sixty

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two. Cool took about a four
mile drive and making them that number didn't

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feel long at all. It's your
royal pomp trail. So the Everglades using

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Wheeze as my name, gear was
kind of navigating me towards. Told me

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I had forty five miles to go
once I got off Root one, but

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it was more like ten. It's
a factor that and it's not far out

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of your way off Rout one at
all. Seventy six degrees and mostly sunny.

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Kind of signed here warning vultures make
damage vehicles. Vulture in this area

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attracted to the rubber around windshields,
sun roofs, and windshield wipers. He

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used provided tarps to cover vehicles so
that every day check out the trail.

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It's the Hinge trail. This trail
skirts the edge of a freshwater slopers where

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wildlife is like it appeared close range. The encounters are not exactly random during

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the dry season and operates like one
of the main gator holes around the shallow

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river grass allowed one hour to go
pointing a months perfect unwelcome guests, exotic

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fish beast himself. Non native fish
are more successful and human made habitats that

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just canals than the marsh of the
Everglades. We know how they got here.

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There's an alligator right there. It's
a little too close for me.

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That was scary. I'm getting out
of here. It was like right there.

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I feel like they figured out that
he can't jump that two foot thing.

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And by two foot, I mean
six inches easily can Yeah me too.

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Is he just peaceful? I'm terrified
if I'm so quick? Like how

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the lily pads are just kind of
moving around right there? There's two alligator

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right there, so peaceful? Yea, until they move, I'm not going

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that way. It really is.
We're walking along a boardwalk, elevated boardwalk

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of some shallow water with alligators in
it. Let's see, here's a water

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level thing. The markers are foot
and a half three feet and were will

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below the foot and a half.
It's probably not deep at all. Yeah,

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I can see the bottom from here
in burkey water with alligators just lily

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pads everywhere, Like you could easily
mistake that for a field. What is

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it? It's water with lily pads. There's a friendly part with like koalas

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turtle turtle or that's cool, nice
red turtle a boardwalk elevated boardwalk of some

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shallow water with alligators in it.
Let's see, here's a water level thing.

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The markers are foot and a half
three feet, and we're well below

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the foot and a half. It's
probably not deep at all. Yeah,

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I can see the bottom from here
in burky water with alligators, just lily

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pads everywhere, like. You could
easily mistake that for a field tropical hard

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work hammock, a world dramatically different
from the wide up and slew. Now,

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I mean, I how to pronounce
that in the shadowy tangle of vegetation

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of plants first to pure all alike
and a wildlife non existent. But the

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hammock contains the surprising rioted species that
can take unfamiliar forms. I'm in point

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four miles half an hour. I'm
in this is cool looking an alligator,

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though I hope there's not an alligator
back here. There are koalits water.

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I don't know. I'm gonna have
faith someone has thought this out. Now

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you have me. Terrified forests like
this exists only in southern Florida. They

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can survive only because of the tropical
conditions. You may recognize Virginia creeper about

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seventy percent of approximately seven hundred and
plant speaches of Everglades or of tropical origin,

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and this unique environment temperate zone plants
mingle with unusual tropical plants. I

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feel like I'm in in Indiana Jones
movie. Now, Yeah, I like

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this a lot. Thought I saw
a bear, but I'm sure I'm just

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imagining it. And why were they
selling bears at the gift shop if there

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are no bears? Maybe it was
a panther bear. This is way cool

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back here. This hole is maybe
taken over by an alligator. Hope not.

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I don't see one. I'm leaving
in case there is. It's like

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that mound of roots toppled tree.
I guess morning, how are you?

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Yes, alligator lock is terrifying because
that looks like an alligator. Don't you

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block and yellow zebra butterfly? That
would be cool. That's terrifying, that

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lock. You see what I'm seeing
though, Yeah, clearly a lock terrifying.

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I'm just wondering why I'm walking around
if there's even a potential for alligators.

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Why am I walking around if there's
potential for alligators. Some other things

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you can do in the Everglades,
flamingo Marina. It's at the southern end

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of the park. A beautiful place
to visit if you seek adventure and wildlife

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sightings. The highlight of the area
is, of course, the exciting wildlife

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boat tours canoe rentals. I'm not
going out a canoe if there's alligators,

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you had seen hiking and camping opportunities. There's the Gumbo Limbo Trail. It'd

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say Small Forest and Everglades National Park. The Gumbo Limbo tree is a unique

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tree with a reddish brown bark.
The peels in flakes off the tree trunk

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is nicknamed the tourist tree because it
resembles peeling skin after a bad sunburn.

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Hey that's mean tree, or who
are you making fun of me? The

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Nike Missile Base. The base was
built during the Cold War in response to

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the Cuban Missile Crisis of nineteen sixty
two. I did drive out to the

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Nike Missile Base. Skip it.
There are other things to do their skip

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it, skip skip it. Shark
Valley is a popular stop in the Everglades.

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Don't Know. Despite its name,
you won't see sharks, who be

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a likely see alligators. Don't know. I wonder why it's called Shark Valley,

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so the Everglades lots of fun.
Again, there's probably a better version

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of the trip to do than I
did. I didn't have a lot of

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time, but I'm glad that I
went at all. Next week, I

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don't know yet. I think I'm
going to do a few episodes of places

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I would like to go. I
host a comedy podcast called Daily Comedy News,

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and we wound up having a conversation
about some places in Texas, and

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I might make an episode out of
that. We've also been talking about Idaho

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for a lot of reasons, so
I might make an episode out of that

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as well. Regardless, there's a
back catalog here. The Montreal episodes are

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always super popular. I was recently
talking with a friend who's going to Paris

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and I was emailing and I'm like, you know what, just listen to

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these episodes. So there's Paris,
Australia, Iceland, Nashville, Chicago,

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a lot of the West Coast cities, Vancouver, travel is Back, wherever

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you get your podcasts. Did you
know you can name a cockroach after your

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ex lover and have it fed to
the animals at the zoo? Hi,

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I'm Johnny Mack with Five Good News
Stories. It's a podcast twice a week

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where I tell you five good news
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how Porto potties are about to be
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show is this? It's called five
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