goodbye florida...

Our last morning in Florida was spent relaxing at the beach.  The water was so warm, like bath water, and so calm in the morning.  There were hardly any waves...yet.  It was hard to believe that we would be leaving the ocean for a while.  

Andrew & mom were finding treasures and seemed to be looking at something in the water...

 Sure enough, there was a school of fish...just swimming along by their feet!  Pretty cool huh?  We saw several schools while we were there and even some bigger fish too!  The water was unbelievably clear (come to think of it...I guess we were in "Clearwater beach").

Like I said, so clear and calm, that mom & I actually took our beach chairs and put them in the water...never done that one before!

Then, only a few yards out, we could see a huge dark shadow...can you guess what these are?

Sting rays!!  Yep, it's sting ray season.  I had no idea they swam in groups of 20 or so!  This was the best picture I could get without getting too close for comfort...although these guys (below) were already out there...can you see the dark area where the sting rays are swimming toward this group of people?
The key is to stay put and don't move when they're swimming around you in the water.  Yeah...sounds a little freaky to me too.  We had lots of sting rays swim by us while we were there.  My cousin Owen even got stung by one...it's not a family trip without heading to the hospital!  We even got to see a manatee!!!  Although I didn't get a good shot of it...it was pretty awesome how much ocean life we were able to see.  Can't wait to come back!