Key West Diary 17

The last thing on my list of things to do before leaving Key West was visit Fort Jefferson at the National Park in the Dry Tortugas. The Dry Tortugas, so named because there is no fresh water on the island and tortuga is Spanish for turtle, lie seventy miles west of Key West. The island was first discovered my Ponce de Leon in the 1500's when he was searching for the Fountain of Youth. This island is actually the last island in the chain of islands that make up the "Keys".

Because Sara strained her back a couple of days ago, she decided it was best to stay back and let her back rest, so I went by myself.

There are only two ways to reach this least of all visited National Parks, by sea or by air. I decided on a 35 minute seaplane ride on a De Havilland "Otter" instead of two and a half hour ride on the park ferry.

This is the same kind of plane that Sara and I flew on when landing in the Artic National Wilderness Area in Alaska. It holds ten passengers and one pilot.

One of the many small uninhabited islands along the way.

This is one of the few private islands in the keys, owned by a real estate developer.

Flying at 500' above the ocean, the dark smudge just forward of the wing strut towards the top of the frame is the wreck of one of Mel Fisher's salvage boats that sunk when searching for the treasure galleon Atocha. This wreck marks the northern end of the eight mile long debris field. To date, more than 400 million dollars in gold, silver and jewels has been brought up from this sight.

Fort Jefferson as we are getting ready to touch down on the water.

The nice thing about a seaplane is that it needs no runway and the pilot can just back it up on the beach. The passengers didn't even get their feet wet getting off the plane.

Construction on Fort Jefferson began in 1846 as a means of protecting the shipping lanes thru the Florida Straits and the approaches going Northwest towards New Orleans and the Mississippi River.

It was the largest of its kind in the US and used more than 16,000,000 bricks to construct. Designed with a moat around it for additional protection from land attack it was never attacked from land or sea.

One of the Park Rangers that actually live at the Fort explaining the history.

One of the 15,400 lb Columbiad cannons capable of shooting a 10", 65 lb cannon ball for 3 miles. The three mile jurisdiction that states have over their adjacent waters was derived from this ability to shoot a cannonball that far.

The ground level of one side of the fort. Each casement or gun room housed either a 8" or 10" Columbiad cannon. The fort was designed for 430 cannons. The iron tracks for pivoting the cannons are still embedded in the stone floor. Though the fort was never fully operational with its full complement of cannons, it did serve as a Union prison for Union deserters during the Civil War, even though Florida was a Confederate state.

In the foreground is a Hot Box used to heat the cannon balls to a red hot temperature before firing them with the intent of catching the wooden ship and or sails on fire.

Where the red hot cannon balls would roll out. The gun officers least favorite private would be assigned the task of picking up the balls with tongs and running them to the guns!

Because technology and artillery advanced so much during the Civil War, the fort was abandoned in the 1870's.

The park ferry getting ready to depart and head back to Key West.

An interesting side story about the fort and the Dry Tortugas is that it is only 80 miles from Cuba while Key West is 90 miles. For this reason many Cuban refugees end up landing here in their makeshift boats.

Two such examples of the boats they use to make the 80 mile open ocean crossing are on display at the fort. Since the average Cuban cannot have access to real boat building materials, they improvise with non standard materials.

This boat was made out of tin roofing material and the seams in the bottom were covered over with fiberglass cloth and glue. It was designed to last just long enough to get to freedom. 33 men and women made the crossing in this boat.

Present law regarding Cuban refugees states that if they can set one foot on U. S. soil they are granted refugee status and are allowed to stay. If the Navy or Coast Guard intercepts their craft before reaching land, they are returned to Cuba.