Riverlake Cottage in Homosassa, Florida

Before starting our cruise, we rented a cottage for three nights in Homosassa, Florida.  They had a pond where we fished and we also took in a boat tour on the nearby Halls River.  While fishing at the pond, I noticed this anole lizard with his throat puffed out orange.

 
The cottage had this pond fountain going 24/7.  It was real pretty at night! This is where we fished.

On our third night, we took a boat tour and saw quite a bit of wildlife.  Manatees are common in the area and this large one came near our boat.

Heading out on our tour... it was so beautiful and calm.  Tony, our boat captain, told us we were staying at one of the best places in Florida for viewing wildlife.

This egret let us get fairly close since he was watching the fisherman nearby waiting for a chance to get some fish.

This double-crested cormorant greeted us as we passed by. :)

This bird that looks similar to an eagle is an osprey.

I think this is a white heron.  The white herons and egrets look a lot alike.

Tony told us about an artist who owns this house and that he used his cut palm trees to hold birdhouses.

Here's a closeup of the birdhouses.

Tony is an experienced captain and he said this is the first time he ever saw a Anhinga bird and her babies in a nest.  I felt privileged to capture this sight!

Monkey Island was our last sighting on our tour.  There are actually live monkeys on this island but its hard to see them in this image.

Key West boat tour

Key West was our first stop on our cruise; however, I've listed our three cruise stops in order of enjoyment with Key West being the third.  We captured the following images during our custom boat tour.

I wonder if the folks who live on this house boat don't go on vacations but instead have staycations! :)

Waters in the Key West are very shallow with a lot of sandy tidal flats.  Everywhere we went on our tour, we could see the bottom as it was only a few feet down.

This blue heron flew away as we got nearer.  Mangroves trees are shown in the background.

Our tour guide took us to the Great White Heron National Wildlife Refuge but we didn't see a lot of white herons probably because it was in the heat of the day.

Out of all the images taken during our 11-day trip, the one below is one of my favorites; and due to the distance and speed of the boat, I captured this one with my iPhone instead of my Sony camera.

Since our stateroom was on the starboard (right) side of the ship, we were able to enjoy a beautiful sunset while leaving Key West en route to Havana, Cuba.