Part of the ideal South Seas experience involves leaving the resort: The on-site Captiva Cruises features five-to-six-hour narrated voyages to nearby islands, including Boca Grande, Useppa and Cayo Costa State Park. I joined a cruise to Cabbage Key, a 100-acre speck purchased by its original owners for all of $2,500. We disembarked at the Key’s sole attraction: a historic home converted into an inn and restaurant, one of many places in South Florida attributed as the site where Jimmy Buffett wrote “Cheeseburger in Paradise.”

Boaters first view a sign in Pine Island Sound that marks the channel leading to Cabbage Key, seen in the background.

More impressive is the restaurant’s interior, in which dollar bills—including one signed by Buffett—are duct-taped over every inch of wall space and dangle precariously from the ceiling, a tradition that dates back to a time when fishermen would leave dollar bills as lines of credit. (Ten to fifteen thousand dollars fall to the floor each year, and are then donated to local charities.)

But it was a moment en route back from Cabbage Key, as the boat neared the resort on our final afternoon, that brought the festivities full circle. A dolphin crested near the forward side of the vessel, attentive eyes gazing in the direction of 1 o’clock. As the boat drew closer to the harbor, so too did the dolphin, ducking and weaving around and under the boat, traveling with us like a trained performer. This is about the time somebody noticed the V shape in its dorsal fin. It was Chip, resident South Seas mascot, seeing us off in style.


This is an excerpt from an article by John Thomason published on bocamag.com