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Article: THE CURIOUS HISTORY OF DRY TORTUGAS NATIONAL PARK.(Dry Tortugas Islands in the Gulf of Mexico)
- Article from:
- Parks & Recreation
- Article date:
- September 1, 1999
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1999 National Recreation and Park Association. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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His stories were what frightened people worst of all. Dreadful stories they were -- about hanging, and walking the plank, and storms at sea, and the Dry Tortugas ...
-- Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island
We are standing on the bow of the Yankee Freedom II, a 100-foot catamaran, knifing through the aquamarine waters off Key West, Fla. Ahead of us, on the horizon, are the Marquesas Islands, where Ernest Hemingway often fished. Beyond them, 55 feet below the water's surface, sits the Nuestra Senora de Atocha, a sunken 17th-century Spanish galleon that only recently relinquished its $400 million treasure to modern-day pirates. Dolphins join us alongside ...