Boot Key

I love this town, it is so cute and very cruiser friendly. We walked almost the length of Marathon today and got caught in the rain, but we had alot of fun!

Marathon began in historical times as Cayo de Bacas or Vacas. Vaca is spanish for "cow" and general knowledge is that there were no cows on Key Vaca, in spanish "Vaca Marina is the manatee or sea cow.

But Bill Ackerman wrote in his 1957 book "The Florida Keys, "Key Vaca" or Cow Island, was so named for the spanish cattle that once roamed here in a wild state.

The earliest map that shows Cayo Vaca is estimated to be named in and about 1670, it was then just a group of Islands. Conjecture has it, that it was named after Alavar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, he was a explorer.

Anyway, Key Vaca and four small islands were granted to Don Francisco by a spanish land grant in 1814, he then sold Key Vaca to Isaac Cox in 1824. Three years later Cox sold it to Charles Howe, and by 1835 Key Vaca was considered one of Monroe County's three principal settlements, the other two being Key West and Indian Key.

Now the standard story for the name Marathon has many stories, but the main one is when the railroad was being built the popular exclamation was "is this a marathon?"or "this is getting to be a real marathon!"

However the naming of Marathon took place durning the building of the railroad, now that was a huge undertaking and it ran all the was to Key West

The one with Pierre pointing is the Atlantic, the one with the road is one of all the roads in Marathon the ones going East and west all lead to the Gulf or the Atlantic. We ate at the Keys fisheries, it is all the rage here, all I have to say is Meh! Check out the lizards!