Little Manatee River SP, Ruskin, FL

We are at the end of our week here. It has been a busy one and a good one. This is where we learned of the birth of our beautiful new grandson, Cooper Wyatt; we met up with camper friends from Tenn. who are camp hosts here; we viewed manatees; paddled the river; stopped at the shrimp docks in Tampa; and visited a historic cigar district.
Above is a picture of the beautiful river here to paddle. Nice flat water with mirroring of the canopy that just takes your breath away. We were able to get in 2 runs on this river. Just north of the park is a power plant were you can view manatees. Seems the heated water that is discharged provides the manatees with a safe haven from the cold winter water. This plant has built boardwalks and facilities to make view these amazing creatures comfortable. The manatees are sometimes called the elephants of the sea. I can understand why. They are very docile and very large. Their movements are more floating than swimming. What a treat to see so many in one place. Our friends, Gerri and Leon, took us to a Tampa shrimp dock where you can buy truly jumbo shrimp right from the folks who harvest them from the Gulf. They are suppose to have a crisper texture and better flavor than the farm raised shrimp. We are planning a shrimp dinner tonight to test that theroy. Yum. Actually, we bought 15 lbs so they had better taste good! At $8.60 a pound it is a real deal for us and better price for the shrimpers. While there we saw the boat our shrimp came in on and watched some crew cleaning the last of a load, de-heading them. Close to the docks was a historic district, Ybor City, where around the turn of the 20^th century there were many cigar manufacturing business. We toured the museum and a sample of a worker's home. It was very interesting and the historic district which has many shops and restaurants was great to walk around. In the slide show you will see some of the beautiful hand painted tile that still decorates some of the building. Many of the shops had a person hand-rolling cigars. What a labor intensive task. We are still seeing new butterflies and enjoying this beautiful season here. We move back to the Sarasota area tomorrow to Oscar Shearer SP and the close beaches there. During that 2 week stay I will fly to Balt to help out with my grandsons! What a joy. Les will stay with the camper and looks forward to hugging on the boys when we return early April.

Myakka River State Park, Sarasota, FL

Here we are at our favorite inland park, just 9 miles east of Sarasota. The weather has been super and we are enjoying the hiking and biking offered here. Because this area has had a dry winter, we have not been able to kayak this beautiful area with these natives. The water is just too low that even areas that have some water are shallow and I sure do not want to bump one of these guys while they rest at the bottom. Their reaction under my kayak is not one I wish to experience. A positive to the low water conditions is that a lot of new feeding areas have been exposed for the birds. There are large numbers of sand-hill cranes, American coots, numerous ducks, roseate spoonbills, and white pelicans that we have never seen before. This year the wild pigs seem more numerous also, with lots of damage and sightings of a large number of piglets. A real blessing about coming to this park in February is that spring is popping here now. That wonderful fresh green of new leaves and grass is coming out. With our winters here, we get an extended spring season, February thru May. One of the activities here that is so good for my soul is riding our bikes the 4 miles of paved road through the park to the birdwalk at dusk. The day use people are gone and we have the road to ourselves. The temps are balmy and the late afternoon light is golden making the Spanish moss draped from the tree canopy over the road glisten. Thank you Lord for that beauty. This was taking during a hike at Collier Seminole in the Everglades but we have seen a number of these black racers this year. Thankfully they are not poisonous. We have enjoyed this week with our PA friends Pam and Joe. The week has been so packed that pictures from this week will come later. They fly out tomorrow morning and we leave Myakka Monday. Our next park is Little Manatee River SP, sw of Tampa, for a week. We look forward to seeing our Tenn friends, Gerri and Leon who are volunteering there this year. We should be able to kayak there as that water tidal.

Our new grandson is not ready to join us yet apparently. We are so excited to greet him when he is ready.

Our blessing in Long Key SP

We are still at our campsite by the ocean here in Long Key SP. Oh what a blessing! As we mentioned on our last post, this park is scheduled to be closed this winter. But because of work delays, they have opened the campground on a day to day basis and we are benefiting from it. We have been here 10 days now and should be able to stay until Friday. We loved our time here but have more and different adventures awaiting us on the Gulf Coast. While taking a morning walk on the beach, Les made a “significant discovery”. He came to get me so I could photograph a baby crocodile laying on the beach! This is the first verifiable sighting of a crocodile in Long Key SP. The rangers were excited and a bit jealous. Being that this was such a young one begs the question, “Where's Mama?” We were able to get the kayaks out to paddle when the wind calmed down and we were treated by some wonderful sights. Above you see a frigate bird roosting on a mangrove, normally you only see them soaring above you. In the slide show you can see a tree root with a gathering of cormorants drying off from their fishing expedition. And here is a picture of a Portuguese Man-o-war with his tentacles flowing and a pilot fish tucked under them. Oh my, see how clear the water is? It truly does feel as if we are paddling in an aquarium. Les saw small sharks and a sting ray on our trip. Of course we had to do some buoy hunting along the mangroves. One trip and we filled our boats. A picture of Les searching the mangroves is in the slide show. Also, check out the teapot he found for me! We are still trying to research what it is exactly. Nothing is coming up?? It had fishing line attached to it and the name Tahirou with a crescent moon and star symbol. Any ideas?? Here is another discovery. We were finding many of these shells but my “book”, that has everything, did not have these. Then, after a few days, they disappeared from the beach. We spoke with a local couple and the husband turned out to be a Marine science teacher. He had no trouble telling us they are spiny oysters but that they should not be on the beach. These oysters live at depths 100ft or more. Hum, this is our year for significant finds. I have said before that one of the best things about camping is the wonderful people you meet. Above is neighbor MaryAnn paddling with me on a treasure hunt in the mangroves. Can you see the monster rope she found?? Ron and MaryAnn were our neighbors here in LK long enough to share stories, laugh, share great meals and shed a tear as they drove off to their next adventure.

I hope you enjoy the slide show of our stay here. We plan to move out of the Keys Friday. We will stay in Collier-Seminole SP, a new one for us, for 3 days. We are lucky that a neighboring community is having a seafood festival that weekend! Then on to our second favorite park, Myakka River SP, where we paddle with the alligators.