I have loved manatees since I was 9 years old and wrote a report about them in the 4th grade! As a college graduation gift, a friend of mine pledged money to the Save the Manatees Club in my honor, and I sported the t-shirt that came with the pledge for years! I also still own a stuffed animal manatee from my childhood. 🤣

Prior to starting a hard push to pay off my student loans, I had planned a trip to Florida to swim with them. I canceled it in order to focus on clearing my debt, but this weekend, three years after my initial plan to, I was finally able to swim with manatees!! 🎊🎊🎊

Manatees are adorable aquatic mammals and herbivores, sometimes called ‘sea cows’, they move slowly and respond with gentleness. Their large body habits is due to intestines that aid with digesting grass, usually up to 9% of their body weight is eaten each day. They cannot survive in water temperatures below 60 degrees Fahrenheit, so during the winter months, they often congregate in the gulf areas of Florida. Citrus County is known as the ‘Manatee Capital of the World’, so I ventured to Crystal River, Florida to see them up close with a guide.

We started at 6:30am in order to have the best chance to see the most manatees. We were given full body wet suits and hot chocolate before we headed to the boat. Thankfully, we found about 20 manatees at our first stop just floating around! 😁

I used an underwater camera bag, but was so excited about being surrounded by manatees that I didn’t get many photos, and most are a bit blurry. A mom and her baby swam right by me! At one point, I was surrounded by 3 huge, but mellow, manatees all at once.

Crystal River is quite small and a lot of its economy is based around manatee tourism. As such, there are adorable murals, business doors, statues and even mail boxes dedicated to this cute animal. Needless to say, this was definitely a super fun day for me! ❤️

Not nearly as exciting, but still very pretty, was a lovely hike that I took in the area, in Withlacoochee State Forest. Compared to the 10 degree temps that I experienced when visiting family in the midwest, walking along the trail in 70 degree weather felt downright tropical!

Next up: hopefully Panama!