Manatees, Gators, Snakes and Snowbirds

 

Once again we packed up and headed south into the land of the Snowbirds (Florida).  We thought that we had seen mass migrations before in southern Texas, southern Arizona and southern California – even Quartzite, AZ with their 500,000 plus, but they have nothing on this place!

 

Our first stop in Florida was in the Ocala area where we had intended to be the consummate tourists and venture out to Orlando, the Cape, Crystal River and various other places leaving a trail of money at all the tourist places for the next snowbirds to follow.  Well we were able to make it to Crystal River for our first adventure in the area to see the Manatees.  We were lured into a place that allowed us a chance to swim and even touch these gentle guys and girls – it had our expectations cranked to maximum!

 

Oh by the way the pair up above are Mable and Mikie, the Manatees, they say “hi!”  Unfortunately this was not our picture – it came from a postcard in the gift shop.  Linda had bought an underwater camera and even had it with her ready to go but the opportunity and lack of water clarity when we did find the Manatees just didn’t work - I think she forgot that she had the camera.  Linda was able to see a few of the Manatees and even got to pet one for a short time.  My experience wasn’t quite as good – being unfamiliar with snorkeling gear and a real sucky swimmer I only managed to get my mask full of water (which ends up going straight up your nose) and somehow I managed to suck water through the snorkel at the same time.  Someone told me that wasn’t possible, but I was there!

About that same time a thought came to my mind – we were in the water with lots of Manatees, some weighing a couple thousand pounds.  They eat all the time!  They pee and crap a lot!  And here I am with a nose and mouth full of their toilet water.  I got out of the water about that time and was content to take pictures from the boat.

 

 

 In the pic, to the right, Linda is the one with the double floaties and you can just see the Manatee right below her near the bottom center of the pic.  I guess you could call this little adventure a success as it was one to remember.

We didn’t make it to the Cape or Orlando but were satisfied with what we were able to do.  I guess we are just not in the “Hurry up and see something!” mode any more.

 

 

While we were in Ocala we had to go see the Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing and if you like to see dragsters and classic cars this is a worthwhile stop.  This museum was all about drag racing - the star drivers of the late 50’s through the 90’s with names like Big Daddy Don Garlits, Shirley Muldowney, Jake the Snake Prudholme, Connie Kalletta, and so on.  With displays of their many cars (the real ones!) and accomplishments.  The car above was Don Garlits’ first dragster that he built and won his first event in August of 1955.  Hot Rod magazine wouldn’t even run a picture of it in their magazine because it so ugly.  Over his career he had 34 different dragsters built, all named Swamp Rat (1 through 34) and won over 140 World, National, and Championship events.  He was the first to break the quarter mile speed barriers of 170, 180, 240, 250 and 270 mph.  His last run with Swamp Rat 34 was at 318 mph at 4.76 seconds. 

 

 

 

The pink dragster in this pic was the car driven by Shirley Muldowney, the only woman to win three Top Fuel NHRA World Championships.  She was also the only drag racer to have a full length movie made about her life – Heart Like a Wheel.  She always wore a pink helmet and, of course, drove the pink car and was one of Big Daddy’s competitors through the years.

 

 

 

 

 

Although this little piece of equipment was in the museum I doubt it could be classified as a dragster or a classic car – but wouldn’t  you just love to crank this thing up next door to an irritating neighbor?  “Just mowing my yard neighbor – just mowing my yard.”

 

We also had an opportunity to visit one of the local Flea Markets in Ocala - there are a number of them in the area. Little to no RV type of stuff and considering the snowbird population that was a surprise, but it was big!

 

 

On the next stop we made it down to Lake Manatee State Park – just south of the Tampa area. There we were able to visit with our Winter Texan friends (who have since moved to Florida) Tom and Ginny and their pet gator “Alley” (what else would it be named?)

They came down and visited the first night we were there and over the next couple of days we were able to have dinner together and go for a bike tour around their development. One day 

 

 

 

we took a ride out to Anna Maria Island to walk the beaches and the Mangrove boardwalks just looking and relaxing as we caught up on all the happenings since we were last together down in Texas during  2009.  This is one nice beach!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lake Manatee State Park was a nice place to spend a week, a very quiet, serene place with Spanish Moss hanging in curtains from the trees and swaying with the breezes.  There are no Manatees here as they are prevented from coming up into the lake by a man made dam.  There were plenty of other animal life though – as we wandered through the park there were squirrels, rabbits, many different types of birds, snakes and so many spiders that Linda went into her spider dance just at the thought of them.

 

 

We did a bit of geocaching in the park and found some interesting ones and even tried to find a couple with Tom and Ginny while we were exploring Anna Maria Island.  As we have found in the middle and eastern side of the country there are obstacles such as bugs, plants and animals that really put a damper on the urge to check under that next bush or behind that next tree.  This time it was fire ants!  Linda stepped on a pile of them (they were hiding in the foliage) and she ended up with quite the number of bites and blisters on her feet.  Great fun ay! 

 

 

 

 

The last leg of our migration put us down in Everglades City, Florida where we will be volunteers with the Gulf Coast maintenance division of Everglades National Park.  We plan to stay here for four months and will be doing a variety of things to include running around in the boats around Ten Thousand Islands.

 

 

Our first impressions are ok, but we are still very cautious and it seems that being in the Mangrove Swamps has some challenges to overcome, we will be working on that as we go along.

 

Oreo - our 17 pound Tom Cat, who has lived and traveled with us for quite a few years, decided he likes being part of the Blog and will continue to provide a few purr-fect bits of wisdom and observations for all the blog readers out there as well as a few comments about the antics of his pride members and life on the road.

 

 

You have got to be kidding me!  Last month it was the cat hating chickens and now this!  This has got to be the most humiliating thing that has ever happened to me – Gator bait!!!!  My human has turned me into Gator bait!  If I get out of this thing I am going to bite his toes while he’s sleeping.  This is so upsetting!  I feel a hairball coming on.

 

He told me later that he was only kidding, yea, right!  I’ll tell him the same thing tonight after I bite his toes.

 

Oreo

 

 

 

 

With all of that and our Fall migration complete, we look forward to more visits with friends and family - and new adventures for us along the way. We leave you to view one of our buddies (yes, they really do want to eat you!) that we came across during one of our early forays around the area.  There will be much more to come in future posts!

 

 

Home is where we park it!

Lee & Linda