Gulf of Mexico Tour: Day 6 in Perdido Key

Many canceled hotel rooms on the Gulf coast of Alabama and Florida despite seemingly beautiful beaches and clear water.

This vendor sold two beers in four hours. The Flora-Bama, right, a beach bar in Perdido Key, Florida, had a handful of patrons. Cars filled up to the third level of the usually packed garage, which is on the Alabama side.

A few workers disembarked a cart after a day's work. Oil had made landfall a week and a half ago.

Off in the distance, a shrimping boat works as an oil skimmer while a boom rig, left, separates oil from water instead of drilling for oil or catching bottom-feeding fish.

Sunset over Perdido Key on the Alabama side.

I stepped on an oil blob, which squished and crumbled like Play-Doh. I found many of these on the beach at Gulfport, Mississippi, but I had no idea at the time what they were until someone educated me in Perdido Key, Florida.