Gregory,
This public review is different from what you conveyed privately, when you said " I was looking forward to exploring on foot, but our guide skipped that part. Can you explain what happened?" ... I copied my response to you below.
"Convective Sea Breezes!
This has been an unusually warm period on the Florida peninsula, yet the water temperature is still relatively winter cool. As the land mass heats up relative to the water, the air over the land rises significantly and rapidly draws in air from the water to replace the rising land mass air (convection).
This phenomenon occurs everyday in the warmer months and is the energy source for our afternoon thunderstorms. The breezes can become significant near shore increasing wave action making the ride to the outer barrier islands "bumpy" and making beach landings, where we conduct the walks, impractical or unsafe.
Because of this convection and the energy/waves created, we try to only conduct morning tours in the warmer months ... before the convective sea breezes develop.
Sunday, the convective sea breezes, although fairly unusual for this time of year, generated pretty quickly. Your captain, based on comfort and safety, made a decision to extend the paddle and not go to the outer islands under those conditions."