![\"st-andrews-bay-emma-driving.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/tour.airstreamlife.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/04\/st-andrews-bay-emma-driving.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nFrom the state park you can rent boats for the day and roam around the bay, stopping off at Shell Island and snorkeling in the sandy shallows. \u00a0 Since we had a reliable captain with us (pictured above) who today has turned eight years old, and the weather was fine, it seemed like an ideal thing to do. So we packed up our gear, some food, and a lot of sunscreen, and took off.<\/p>\n
Shell Island is fairly good for shelling, but not amazing. \u00a0 The island is an uninhabited \u00a0 sand barrier facing the Gulf of Mexico, with green water and dazzling white sand on the Gulf side, and yellowish sand on the Bay side. \u00a0 It’s an easy place to chuck out the anchor and wade to.<\/p>\n A bit further east we found the sandy snorkeling spot that we’d heard about. \u00a0 (Approximate coordinates: \u00a0 30 \u00b0 5’14.54″N \u00a0 \u00a0 85 \u00b039’0.37″W) \u00a0 No tropical fish here, but plenty of sand dollars, starfish, sea urchins, and a crab or two. \u00a0 The wind picked up and it got to a one foot wave, but after borrowing her mother’s dry snorkel<\/a>, Emma did very well.<\/p>\n To the west we entered the commercial part of the bay over by Audubon Island and checked out a large ocean-going container ship which was being loaded, as well as a lot of extravagant water-side houses. Six hours on the boat vanished in no time.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n