In Florida, Swimmers Brave an Ocean That Feels Like Steamy Syrup
The water temperature near Key Biscayne, a barrier island just east of Miami, had already passed 89 degrees one morning this week. And though the ocean off South Florida was slightly cooler than the recent record highs that had stunned scientists and threatened marine life, it remained phenomenally hot.
But on this serene patch of the Atlantic Coast, it was still a summer day at the beach, when nothing satisfies quite like a dip — even when the ocean feels like a thick, simmering syrup. Almost gooey.
“I like it warm,” shrugged Niki Candela, 20, a Miami native, moments after a powerful siren warned of approaching lightning.
Few of the heat-dazed people on the largely empty beach paid it any mind. The shore, usually clogged this time of year with rotting clusters of seaweed, was pristine, no longer menaced by a huge sargassum blob that unexpectedly shrank last month in the Gulf of Mexico. The shallow water was a crystalline teal, rolling oh so gently, not a cresting wave in sight.
Source: The New York Times
