Steve ferries an iguana back after spotting it swimming four miles off Key West
Steve was heading back from an offshore kayak fishing trip when he noticed an odd shape floating about four miles off the coast of Key West, Florida. "All I could see were the multiple fins running down its back so I thought it was some sort of palm frond, but it just didn't look right. I ended up stopping and noticed that it started swimming," he wrote.
The shape was an iguana. "It was pretty crazy seeing this guy so far out. I have seen plenty swimming around the islands, but never one that far out," Steve wrote. A land animal swimming that far from shore. The video he filmed that Thursday drew more than a million views after he posted it Oct. 18, 2017, to his Key West Kayak Fishing channel. "Most likely, because of the King tides that are occurring it got caught in one of the swift outgoing tides and got pushed out to sea," he wrote. "But you never know and it could be it's normal daily swim back and forth between Cuba and the US."
He pulled the kayak alongside. "Dude, what are you doing out here? Are you lost, or what?" The iguana swam over and climbed aboard with a boost from his paddle. "It was pretty cool see it trust me enough (versus dying of course) to swim toward the kayak and hop on," he wrote.
Steve settled it on the cooler lid. "Don't panic and jump off, I'll leave ya." They headed for land. "Doing OK back there? Hold on."
As they neared the mangroves, the iguana slipped off the kayak and swam the rest of the way to shore on its own.
