January 3, 2006 - Lovers Key S.P. - 2
This is the third time we've left the park to sightsee. First was Sanibel and the Ding Darling National Wildlife Park, second was Corkscrew, and now we're at or near the end of the road. Everglades City.
We like Florida a lot, and I think we've made that clear. We also like Arizona, Texas, and a bunch of other places. But there's this constant draw to Florida for us. The first time we came here was our first winter "out" as fulltimers. Well, that's not quite true. We'd both been here on business trips in the past, and a couple of times we made those trips together. So, with our first winter (2000-2001) at Avon Park, we were pretty convinced that Florida was our favorite place. Except we'd not spent a winter in AZ or TX, or even Mexico yet, so we had to withhold our opinion. Then in 2003 we came through FL again, this time as tourists and not volunteers. Well, we did some volunteer stuff in December at Ocklawaha, but only for a month. We visited the Keys and the Everglades National Park and Big Cypress Swamp, and Naples, and then decided that we really liked Southwest Florida best, and would come here to spend some real time and see if the luster and attraction would somehow dim. And I've got to tell you that at this time, not only is Southwest Florida our most favorite place, but Lovers Key in particular.
Now, having said all that, I've been on a constant quest for our "next place". See, I'm one of those planners (dreamers) who no matter how happy I may be with status quo, I know it's not going to be forever, and I want a pretty good idea of what "next" is going to look like. That's one reason I'm so happy with Christianity. I know what "next" is, and it gives me an overwhelming sense of awe, gratitude, and anticipation. But I digress.
Since we both love Florida so much, why don't we find a place to buy, so when we quit this crazy running around we'll have a "home" to go to, eh? And during a previous visit we'd found this funky place called Plantation Island that was for mobile homes only, and every home site has waterfront. Either a canal leading to the river, or the river itself which is the doorway to the 10,000 Island part of the Everglades National Park, and incredible fishing. Now the pet of choice isn't always a pit bull in this place, but it has it's share of rusted out hulk cars, trucks, and boats. Along with other assorted "stuff" sort of laying around. Some fairly old mobile homes and a few pretty nice ones. I figured that we could pick up a lot there with lots of junk on it, haul the junk away, clean it up, and have a decent place to spend some time someday. And so off we went.
First on the agenda was the Outdoor Resorts RV park near Everglades City, where you can either rent a lot owned by somebody else or buy one yourself. The developer of the Outdoor Resort system throughout the U.S. owns them only until they sell all the lots, and then the local owners take over the management. Pretty good arrangement in our view, and the parks we've seen are all upscale kinds of places. We took a tour of one of the parks in Indio, CA, and liked it a lot. Just too expensive for us. Turned out, so was the Outdoor Resorts here in Everglades City. And while we were waiting for the salesperson to get back from someplace else, we went to JT's for one of the best burgers either of us have had in a very long time. Carl's Jr. sort of 5 napkin burger without the Carl's Jr. price. As you can tell from my posture, it's a pretty relaxed place. Our kind of place, in other words.
Barb got a big kick out of finding some papaya growing. She's only seen them in the stores I guess. They grow wild in Hawaii and since I've lived there in a past life, they weren't that unique to me.
Evidence of Wilma is still around in abundance here. When you get this close to the end of the road, and the community as a whole is pretty laid back, it seems it takes longer to clean things up. And regardless of the damage, new construction is still underway. Portable phones available at the trailer, by golly, so modern conveniences are still working.
When we got to Plantation Island (and don't bother trying to find it on the map -- there's a Plantation Island, FL, on the Atlantic side which isn't where we went), we found what we'd expected. As a refreshing change in the routine, Barb knew how to get there and I didn't. What a kick. Anyway, once there it was hard to tell the difference between what the hurricane had done, and what was mostly normal. Blue tarp roofs aren't the exception in this neighborhood, remember. There were several for sale signs around, and at one place we stopped because there was a woman outside raking the gravel. Before we could get out, Barb had a visitor peering in her window. It was one of the residents asking if we were looking for a particular Alaska family. He'd seen our Alaska plates on the Jeep and this other family were Alaskans as well, and he assumed we were looking for them. Friendly place. Our kind of neighborhood, for the most part. Not that we like junk, but we sure do like casual, and I really like living on the water and fishing.
The lady raking gravel was quiet friendly, and was happy to talk to us. I'd explained that if she wanted us to, we'd just contact the people on the For Sale sign, and not bother her. The lot was about 60' by 120', with the narrow part on the water, of course. The dock was a bit rickety, but the davits looked OK. The single wide mobile home was 25 years old, but from the exterior it looked well maintained. There was some storm damage but nothing severe that we could see. We asked how much she was asking for the place and without batting an eye she told us she wanted $350,000 for it. We left.
I was still a bit upset when we got home, so I went fishing--11 paces from the back of our motorhome. And while I was doing my usual catch and release, it dawned on me. We are on some prime waterfront right here. We have a decent fish cleaning station, a canoe launching area, some of the best shelling in the country on a gorgeous beach is a short bike ride away, we have the entire park almost to ourselves from dusk to 8 AM every day of the year. We pay no taxes, we have no mortgage, we have no water bill, no garbage bill, and no sewer bill. The total "cost" to us for this little bit of heaven is playing in the woods (trail maintenance), getting acquainted with other really neat volunteers, driving the tram, doing some office work, watering plants in the nursery, etc. What's wrong with me? Why in the world would I consider buying something down here? Barb never did really show any interest in buying anything anyway, but like a good wife is always going along for the ride. Some people might answer that question by saying it's a good investment, as the property values in Florida are always going up. And they'd be right. If you happen to need a good investment. But we're at the age where we're spending our good investment money! We're on the downhill slide of that "get it while you can" rat race. We've done it, and we're retired, and don't have to worry about that anymore. Yeah, we have to watch our expenses, and yeah, we sometimes get crazy when the market goes in the toilet, but we sure don't have to buy a small piece of land with an old mobile home on it for $350,000 hoping its already inflated value will inflate some more for crying out loud.
Whew. Now I feel better. Thanks.
And speaking of that gorgeous beach with the fantastic shelling......... Elmer and Ann were heading out and invited us to join them. I knew I'd have a good time, as Elmer had his chair. So I borrowed one of theirs, and off we went. The women went off to find that special shell, and Elmer and I sat and talked and solved most the world's terrible problems. Until Ann set up a hollering and running around in this little tide pool.
Looked like this little ray got caught in the pool when the tide went out, and as Ann was walking slowly looking for "stuff" she didn't step on it, but near it, and it took off in a hurry giving her a fright.
Then Barb yelled at me to bring the camera (sure glad the Christmas bunny brought her a little digital she can pack around instead of that heavy old 1998 clunker she's been trying to use), so I could take some pictures of some critters. The starfish wasn't so unusual, but that little sea urchin was sure well camouflaged. At least it apparently thought so.
Now, look carefully at that whelk, and you can see how big its "foot" really is. And you can see at the "fat" end, that thing that looks like an old leaf? Well, that's the part that shuts the door when the foot is totally retracted. Amazing critter. And of course, we had to include the noisy osprey in the process of adding sticks to its nest. What a messy nest. Good thing, too, because they're terrible housekeepers. They don't remove the droppings of the chicks, and any leftover fish is just left there. So when it rains all the unwanted material just flushes through the nest. At least that's what we've been told.
It's water like this that we got the canoe for. Poking around and just generally exploring. What fun! Is this a great lifestyle, or what?????
Ranger Matt is getting ready to show us how to use a cast net. The nets are used to catch bait fish as well as for serious fishing. Using a net is about the only reliable way to catch several species of fish, the mullet being the main target.
By grasping the net about 1/3 of the way down, a portion is thrown over the right shoulder (for us righties), then at a particular spot more net is taken up by the thumb and forefinger.
And the whole shebang is then tossed over the rail. Nice and flat and round. At least it was when Matt did it.
That's the way it's supposed to look. But even a newbie can catch fish with a cast net. Tough to clean when they're that small, but hey, a fish is a fish, right? Actually that's a bait fish, and just what the net was designed to catch. A bunch of these little guys went back in the water before they got smart and got out of range.
When I finally got a nice looking circle, Barb was kind enough to take this picture for me. It never happened again. That yellow thing in the middle is the collar that gives the net the ability to collapse and bunch up around the weights at the bottom, and that's what traps the fish. When pulling the net up by that black cord, it looks like it's an impossible jumble of nylon net, but lifting by that collar will put everything right back in shape for the next toss.
We had several people learning how to cast the nets that day, and I've heard good reports about Matt's class from some other visitors as well. That half dry/half wet T-shirt was the order of the day. Draping the net over the shoulder enough times, and you'll be a member of the wet T-shirt crowd. Well, at least the half wet T-shirt crowd.
If you concentrate hard enough, you can get cramps in your jaw muscles, too.
OK. First we grab it 1/3 of the way down, then we take the weight string like so, getting it ready to go over the right shoulder.
Then drape it over the shoulder (notice Barb's not a wet T-shirt kind of girl -- yet) then spread the thumb and forefinger to get another grip like so....
...and heave it over the rail (standing on your tiptoes to clear it, of course) and even if it's not totally flat like Matt's, it still makes a pretty good circle and would have caught some fish if there were any left in the area. And to think this counts as hours worked, eh? Can it get any better than this?
Matt is looking up the answer to some dumb question I had, and I'm pulling wet T-shirt off myself. And this picture was taken sometime in December, and I'm not the least bit chilly. HA!!
On the second bridge to the pavilion, there is a family of kingfishers. One of them, the female I think, will sit there until the tram is almost alongside her before she'll fly away. Nicely colored birds, but look a little awkward compared to other birds their size. The head looks too big for the body to me, anyway.
I've been trying to determine what it is about this particular bird that makes it look like it has two eyes on the side of it's head. Been looking at it for nearly a month now, and all I can figure is that it may have a growth on it's head. Odd, anyway.
And then an answer to "What are you going to do with all those shells?". Well, somebody (not Barb - yet) made ornaments with them. Nice ones, too.
Well, there's a few pictures of what can be done with shells. If these shell decorations look Oriental, there's a good reason. A neat little Asian lady around our age does volunteer work here too; she comes on Wednesday mornings and usually just walks around picking up trash. Well, she made all these decorations which, in my opinion, epitomize the delicate art that Asians are famous for. There's another piece she did which you'll see later. Some natural colors and some painted ones. Great fun at any rate. And there's my own personal "shell lady" hard at work. Sorting, cleaning, and deciding which ones to give to some friends for their shell garden, which to give to another friend who likes cockles, and stuff like that. The rubber gloves are to keep the skin on her hands, as she uses plenty of bleach to keep them from smelling up the place. The green filters are because the park doesn't use too much chlorine in the water which is just fine with us. With three filters in our drinking water system, we're just fine. The filter on the left is a 20-micron sediment filter anyway and is only white for the first couple of days no matter where we park.
You thought I was kidding about my wife's addiction? HA! And these were all taken at the same time, so she didn't take them off the table, off the valve cover (that box with slits in the side), or the power pedestal and then put them in those plastic boxes. And these are "old" pictures. No telling how many we have now. I'll admit that some of those are from our Mexico trip, and she's just now washing them with bleach. I'll also admit that I only tease her gently, because I so enjoy watching her get excited about the new finds, and getting them all clean and organized. She's an organizer, that's for sure.
Now, when you come to visit us, just before you get to the ranger station (where they'll accept your $5 per carload up to 8 people), on the right is the manatee feeding station. No, we don't feed them, they just like coming in here to feed, and it's the most popular place to find them. Barb's seen 5 at the same time here, and today (1/4/06), I was talking to Pam (the beach walk lady) and she saw a mama with two babies about a year old yesterday. There's space enough for a few cars, and a couple of benches to sit on while you wait for them. Not very easy to get good pictures of them I've discovered. You can see the scar on the lower right side of this one. Doesn't look like a propeller cut, so it must have run into something else. They don't have very thick skin, and their scars always contrast with their normal dark brown coloration.
The ever-present turkey vultures doing their morning workout before breakfast. They've already been up there long enough with their wings spread out getting warm, so now they're just waiting for the thermals so they can go to breakfast/lunch/dinner without having to flap their wings too much.
These are both turkey vultures as opposed to the black vultures, because they've got red heads. Their glide pattern (wing angle) is different as well, but I'm not good enough to tell which is which. Sometimes they'll sit with their wings really spread out, getting the warmth from the sun. Caught these guys while we were doing trail maintenance on the Black Island Nature Trail. You can guess why that job is one of our favorites.
This was a great day for pictures, for some reason. Crested Cormorants on the left, and snowball berries on the right. This is about as close to snow as we're going to get this winter. Ain't it great?
AHA! A good sized whelk. Alive, yet. When picked up, it'll "close the door" to its house, and you can see that "foot" I've mentioned before. Really does an excellent job of keeping predators at bay. When Barb sets it down, she'll put it right back where she found it, and it'll be none the worse for wear.
This little scene with the hermit crabs cracked us up. The one in the darker shell has a good grip on the one in the lighter shell, and is dragging it all over the place. Why? Only God and the hermit crab knows.
The baby horseshoe crab is in danger of getting stepped on it's so small. Good thing it felt us coming and moved or it may have been killed. Not that there's any shortage of horseshoe crabs, but we still hate to kill something we're not going to eat.
And speaking of eating. One reason I do so much catch and release is I have no place to clean the fish without mucking up our home/yard. Until now. I had planned on building a big 2' by 4' fish cleaning station, until Barb brought home this cutting board from one of her forays into town for groceries. So, I didn't use as much of the used lumber as planned. Hose attaches to the pipe, there's a valve to control the water flow, and the water will drain into the canal.
The 4" pipe was from the scrap pile as well, so I'm doing my part for recycling. Yeah, right. The whole shebang is painted a kind of camo color now. Not as obvious from the water where lots of canoes and kayaks go paddling along, enjoying nature and each other.
What an awful thing to do to a rod holder! Use it as a glove drying rack. And then guess what. Yet another wonderful sunset. That's a volunteer by the name of Lee on her bike down there. She and her husband Joe have been coming here for years, and are responsible for so many of the nice signs and interpretive plaques in the park.