Dec 2006

it's orange picking time in FL. Hi Everyone, I have been trying to be more organized so I have been writing our experiences every few days in Word so I will be adding at the end of this. We are Dade City, enjoying the warm weather and Richey family on my mom's brothers' side. Kids and TV, my children are in heaven! Pictures from our adventures are attached. Some of them are from our time here in Dade City, we went to the Pioneer Florida museum where Mark was in his soul's time period. In Tallahassee we saw the tin can camper and thought of us. Here is the rest of the story...

There are parts of Florida that are like the Carribean and then there is the interior. The interior of Florida is like the cloudforests of Costa Rica. Or at least it is today. Everything is wet, wet, wet. The humidity is like smoke in a forest fire. When you walk through it, it penetrates your soul as well as your hair and clothes. There is a primeval instinct that is aroused when you are in a jungle and it stirs a desire to go and hunt mastondons or some prehistoric creature. You know you are in central Florida when they hand out a flyer about alligators with your campsite map. Fortunately for us there was only cute little deer everywhere. At Manatee Springs, we saw so much wildlife, you practically stepped on it wherever you walked. Mariah needs an internet infusion every couple of days so we found a great place called the Sunday coffee house where we were able to leave her for a couple of hours while we wandered down to Cedar Key. Talk about the lost coast. This is a town where they used to make pencil blanks to be shipped around the country. At one time it was a very prosperous place but has fallen from grace and is trying to rebound. There are handsome two story wood structures connected by porches and boardwalks with the gingerbread style accents. Some have been restored and some need restoration. Unfortunately for this little town, it appears to be very vunerable to the whims of the weather and the ocean. Sea level takes on a new meaning when you realized the storm surges in this region regularily go 8-10 feet above normal. We knew this to be the case by the number of houses built on stilts like mini-hi-rises. Still it was quaint and kind of old timey. Paynes Prairie is the misnomer of the trip so far. If this is Florida prairie, I am Marilyn Monroe. This is jungle and I am not blond. I know there is an open area some where near here because we drove through it but I can't see it from here. I hope to explore later with our bikes.

Later really comes and with it a change in attitude that evolves from education. We went exploring at Paynes Prairie and found that not only is it a prairie now but it was once a lake. This is all due to it is really a very large sinkhole in the middle of Florida and in late 1800's the bottom plugged up with logs and a lake formed. American's being the great entrepreneurs that they are, started using the lake for transportation but alas all good things can come to an end and when the "log-jam" broke and the lake drained in a week. I imagine that a person could pick up a steamboat very cheap about then! The marsh that remains is a fond reminder of the Bosque del Apache at home. Our neighbor at Paynes Prairie was a musician and we look forward to meeting up with him at Highland Hammocks State Park and playing together again. In case you are wondering the federal government does have National Forest in Florida and we found it here at Ocala National forest. There is quite a bit of camping here and the sand pine and sand oak scrub make wonderful privacy fences between sites. Alexander Springs is like Manatee Springs only bigger and has more alligators. I was so excited by Manatee Springs that I went out and bought a mask and snorkel. We are in Florida after all. I went down the 72 degree spring, jumped in and saw tons of fish, river grass and turtles. What I didn't see was the alligator swimming about 30 yards away from me, darn I should have looked. That would have been hilarious from shore as I would have paddled like mad to return to terra firma! I did get to see it from above when I lifted my head to tell the family what they were missing and they told me what I was missing. Not to worry, alligators are not noted for attacking innocent bystanders although some Darwin awards were handed out last year for about 8 candidates I believe. We are trying to take advantage of the many outdoor activities available so with that in mind we rented canoes one day and paddled down the Alexander run. It was gorgeous. We did get to see an alligator on the shore with his mouth agape. There were so many turtles even Olivia quit being amazed by them and she loves them. Our treat for the effort however was a river otter who came over and inspected us and played around. We have spent enough days at this campsite that we have been adopted by some locals who now ask us to dinner every night (nice to be fed!) and we entertain them with our musical antics and Olivia's sparkling conversation! Tommorrow we head to the big city of Dade City to spend with our cousins for the holidays. Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and sorry no cards this year but lots of virtual hugs going out to everyone. Be safe and remember "It is easier to ask forgiveness than it is to ask permission", Happy Holidays from the Meanderthals

NOT! Hi everybody, Hope your holiday season is shaping up nicely. We have been spending time since Thanksgiving beach hopping and eating fresh fish and shrimp until we can't stand it anymore. After our sucessful gig at Big Lagoon at which Mark played his bass with us, we have been resting and moving on our laurels from incredibly beautiful gulf beach to gulf beach. One of the prettiest we went to was called Henderson beach near Destin. When you are in the park you feel like you are a million miles from civilization but as soon as you leave, you are in major shopping land - McAmerica. The water is as blue green and clear as I have ever seen it. Mariah was lucky enough to spot a family of rays swimming right in front of us. The next day I just had to go swimming. The kids said I was nuts but it was actually quite warm. We had a great time watching the pelicans dive into 2' of water and catch fish. After we left Destin we went along the gulf coast to Seaside which is a famous 1990's development. It has houses and streets planned to try to create a sense of community that in NM we take for granted but in most places it has to be "created". It was a very hip and beautiful place (I really liked the Airstream food stand, see pictures). I read that it got so popular that investors bought most of the houses so now they rent them as vacation cottages so they lost what they were after. It still was nice though. While we were there we rode our bikes for about 2 miles and got some fresh tuna which we made into sushi that night. It was the best! We did get to see some old Florida along the coast at place called Mexico Beach. How ironic! Our next stop was St Andrew's State park where we enjoyed the bay views. We spent the next few days inland at a park called Ochloknee State park at the confluence of the brackish water from the gulf and the fresh water from inland rivers. For all of you who have been rooting for Mariah to catch a fish, it paid off. She caught 2 on her first cast and then one more. Needless to say she was a happy camper! We saw our first distinct eastern white squirrel here. They are not albino' s they are just pure white with dark eyes. Our neighbor was a land speculator from Alaska who just bought a house in Panacea Fl and seems to think it is the place to invest. The inland area of FL south of Tallahassee is a jungle as is farther south. It reminds me of Costa Rican rain forest only with Walmarts every 30 miles! Once you get away from the coast it is not very crowded. Our next few days we spent in Tallahassee with Tim. The capital of Florida reminds me of Albuquerque in it's size. We went to museums and we even went bowling. One of the places we visited was the Tallahassee Museum of Science and Natural history which really was a zoo but because they had a re-created plantation on the grounds I guess they felt they couldn't call it a zoo or humans might have to admit they are just animals (not a go in Florida). We did get to see some spectacular animals in their natural habitats. There is a boardwalk you walk on that goes over the animals enclosures so the animals unless you make noise aren't aware that you are there. It was very well done. We saw Florida panthers, red foxes, red wolves, black bears, tons of snakes, alligators and bald eagles and of course lots of squirrels (both gray and white). Floridians will never starve because there are enough squirrels here to feed the entire state. We are now at Manatee Springs State Park where we hope to catch a glimpse of the vulnerable Florida manatees. There is the clearest flowing spring here with turtles, alligators, black headed vultures and manatees in it and you can swim it! Hope you enjoy the pictures, I don't have them all on my computer but will send what I have in a separate email. From the Tin Can campers