Approaching Marathon

50 days to Key West!

Duck Key

Crossing bridge #13 (Tom's Harbor #3), you will end up on a piece of fill that was constructed during the railroad days.  Barely as wide as the road and about a half mile long, there is little on this fill.  About halfway down, you will see a small sign pointing down a side road on the Ocean Side for Duck Key.

The railroad bypassed Duck Key altogether.  It passed by on the fill just north of the island, but was not connected.  There is little history here - Duck Key had a salt pond operation in the 19th century, but was otherwise essentially ignored until the 1950's.

In the early 1950's, the island was purchased with the intention of making it a resort.  A causeway was built connecting it to the highway (where the sign is today).  Canals were dredged and fill was used to expand the island.  Construction began on Hawk's Cay Resort.  Between then and now, several hundred homes were constructed out there as well, known as Hawk's Cay Village.  You can drive out there if you'd like, but there's not much to do there.  It is a very beautiful community though, with well maintained roads, bridges and canals.

Continue straight on the fill, past Duck Key, and cross Tom's Harbor Bridge #4 (your 14th), to Grassy Key and the greater Marathon area.

The Marathon Area

Marathon is everything Key West is not.  Quiet. Unassuming.  A city of residents, not tourists.  To me, Marathon seems to suffer from an identity crisis, it doesn't know what it is or what it does.  Key Largo is all about diving.  Islamorada is all about fishing.  Key West is all about partying and night life.  But Marathon has no identity.

The Marathon area consists of a number of islands, once separate, but joined by fill during the railroad construction.  This part of the railroad was constructed between 1906 and 1908.  Grassy Key, Crawl Key, Long Point Key, Fat Deer Key and Crawl Key #2 eventually became one big island.  Likewise, Vaca Key, Hog Key and Knight's Key also became one.

Today, the City of Marathon stretches 13 miles from MM 60 at the northern end of Grassy Key to MM 47 on Knight's Key at the foot of the Seven Mile Bridge.  There are close to 10,000 year-round people there, an airport and a VERY long strip of hotels, motels, fast food restaurants, service stations and souvenir and T-shirt shops.

The story is that Marathon got it's name in 1908 when the railroad workers compared the long hours and toil of building the railroad to a marathon.  Before then, it was known only as Key Vaca and there was little early history in this area.  There were some early settlers and evidence of some shipbuilding operations in the early 19th century, but by the 1860's, the area was mostly abandoned until Flagler and his railroad-builders arrived in 1905 and 1906.

Grassy Key

Construction began here in 1905 and the railroad landed on Grassy Key in 1906.  There was a siding and a depot located here.  The large natural width of Grassy Key made it a good location for a construction camp and there were quarters built here along with a supply depot.  After regular train service started here in 1908, there was a small town on Grassy Key known as Crainlyn.  There was a hotel, a post office, and a few homes - but much of it burned around 1913 and Crainlyn essentially vanished.  The post office moved to Long Key.

For the next 15 years or so there was little development of interest in Grassy Key.  There was a flag stop on the railroad, which was completed all the way to Key West by 1912.  In 1928, the first Overseas Highway was built, but this area was bypassed by the 40-mile long ferry from Lower Matecumbe Key to No Name Key.  However, at the same time, construction began on a 11-mile long road from Grassy Key, through the city of Marathon, to Hog Key on the far end of Marathon.  Ferry landings were constructed on Grassy and Hog Keys.  By 1930, the 40 mile water gap was reduced to a 14 mile gap from Lower Matecumbe to Grassy Key and another 14 mile gap from Hog Key to No Name.  The Grassy Key ferry landing was at the end of what is now Dorsett Drive at the north end of Grassy Key. 

If you're a fan of dolphins, Grassy Key is the home of the Dolphin Research Center.  On the right hand side, right around MM 59 is a giant statue of a dolphin at the entrance.  Here is one of the places you can swim with dolphins.  The original dolphin ("Mitzi") that became Flipper on the TV show was caught at Grassy Key.  There USED to be a restaurant at MM 58 that was THE place to stop for a burger if you were passing through at lunch time, but the Grassy Key Dairy Bar is sadly no more.  There are a lot of RV parks, motels and other "resorts" in this area, but otherwise little else to see or do here if you're passing through.  The width of Grassy Key means you don't often see the sea, either.  Do pay attention to the mailboxes on the road around here, there are a lot of whimsical fish, dolphin and manatee mailboxes here.  Around MM 57, you will cross a railroad fill to the island of Crawl Key.

Crawl Key, Little Crawl Key and Long Point Key

Crawl Key is around MM 56.5.  There is a small motel with a private beach on the ocean side.  On the bay side are the remains of a turtle processing operation.  In fact, the name "Crawl" comes from the Dutch word Kraal, which was the word used for the "corrals" used to hold sea turtles prior to their being butchered and canned.  Around MM 56.1, there is a turnoff to the left for Little Crawl Key and a piece of fill leads you onward to Long Point.  Both of these islands are part of Curry Hammock State Park.  If you make the left onto Little Crawl Key, this is where the park headquarters are, including a campground and a beach.  The rest of the park, spread out on Crawl, Little Crawl, Long Point and Fat Deer Keys, is a very large stand of hardwood trees and thatch palms.  There is little development of any kind in this area.  This is all two lane road here with nothing but trees on both sides.  At MM 55.5 you'll cross another fill to Fat Deer Key with more of the same.

Fat Deer Key and Crawl Key #2

The first mile and a half of Fat Deer Key, from MM 55.5 to MM 54, is more of the same.  Hardwood hammock on both sides of the road.  A hammock is an area of hardwood growth in the middle of the mangrove swamps.  This area is the last undeveloped stretch between Key Largo and the Torch Keys and a good opportunity to see what the islands would have looked like before the days of the railroad.  At MM 54 is a turn off on the Ocean Side to Coco Plum.  This is a development of homes, most of which are extraordinarily big and expensive.  About a mile down from here is a stretch of unspoiled beach called Cocoplum beach.  If you want to see what a natural sandy beach looks like in the Keys, go to Cocoplum beach and check it out.  You never know what you might find washed ashore here!

Just past Coco Plum drive, you'll cross a fill to Crawl Key #2.  At the time of the railroad building, there were as many as ten keys all named Crawl Key number something-or-another.  Today, Crawl Key #2 is where the turnoff is for the Sadowski Causeway to the city of Key Colony Beach.  Sadowski was a real estate developer who purchased most of what was then called Shelter Key sometime in the 1950's.  He set about building roads and canals and dredging up fill to mae the island bigger.  Homes started going up.  Close to 1960, fearing absorption into the city of Marathon, which was not yet incorporated, the residents of Shelter Key petitioned and incorporated their own city of Key Colony Beach.  Key Colony Beach is completely bounded by Shelter Key, has its own post office, its own police force, a motel, a couple of parks and a few restaurants despite only having a population of a few hundred.

Continuing past Key Colony Beach, you'll finally cross water again at Vaca Cut (bridge #15, MM 53) and enter the main business area of Marathon, and Vaca Key.  Slow down here as the speed limit slows down, traffic gets congested, and there's lots of stop and go for the next six miles or so.