Wildlife at Lovers Key

One of our goals while we’re here for these 2 months is to get familiar with some of the local wildlife, and there’s plenty of it here in the park.  There are 2 hiking/biking paths that cover the island between the canals and the beach, so this weekend we went out on our bikes in search of alligators and other animals.

 

The Rangers have told us that they know of one large male alligator (“Slimey”), and 2 females, one of which recently had babies – they think there are 9 of them!

The Black Island Trail goes past the pond where the gators are known to hang out (and where the babies have been seen), and an island in the middle of the canal where Slimey spends his days now that the females have taken over the pond.

 

 

Not far into the trail, we spotted several mounds of sand off to the side of the trail, indicating tortoise nests, and several large gopher tortoises.

Tom and I spotted this pair, and called to the boys to stop and look at them.  When Tom yelled, the tortoise on the right got really agitated.  He “ran” up to the nest and was shaking his head back and forth at the other tortoise, like he (or she?) was telling the other one something really important!

Just past the little sitting area at the edge of the canal, we took a shortcut over to the alligator pond.

We watched for awhile, but didn’t see any action in the pond.  Nicolas thought about stirring things up by giving Tom a little shove, but wisely decided against it!

Continuing on, we came back around along the edge of the canal, where we saw the resident bald eagle.

He was up pretty high, and across the canal from us, but we still got a pretty good look.  We’re still on the lookout for their nest, and we’ve heard that there are probably some eggs in it. 

As we were watching the eagle, Nicolas spotted some motion in the center of the canal, moving away from us.  From the distance we were at, it was hard to tell what it was, but we thought it might be an alligator.  We followed along, and occasionally spotted a snout above the surface.  Some kayakers came along, and with their better vantage point, they could tell that it was a couple of manatees.

We couldn’t see them too well from the trail, but as we rode our bikes back to the RV, we stopped at the Manatee Overlook, and there were 2 just hanging out by the mangrove trees.  They were being pretty timid and shy, but I managed to catch one as it came to the surface.

We were all pretty warm from our bike ride, so we decided to go down to the beach for a swim to cool off.  The water felt great, and was very refreshing!

 

After our swim, we took a walk down the beach and found a couple of fishermen being stalked by a great blue heron.

This guy was really photogenic and not bothered by me at all, so I got lots of photos of him!

At one point, I moved away to take some pictures of seagulls grabbing fish, and all of a sudden the heron flew over to where I was!  It was almost like he didn’t want me taking pictures of anybody but him!

 

 

while I was busy taking pictures, Tom was talking to the fisherman, and found out that he had caught of couple of small black sharks – right there on the beach!

I got back just in time to get a picture of Bryce holding one of them!

I didn’t think they were real, but I guess they were . . . they each had a big slit down their bellies, where he had gutted them already!

That was enough to have Bryce state that he wouldn’t be going back into the water!  I think he’ll change his mind, though . . .

We walked back to our bikes just in time to catch another beautiful sunset!

Christmas Decorating

Back at “home” we cut down a fresh Christmas tree every year.  Even the year I had my broken ankle, I hobbled out into the field on crutches with Tom and the kids to pick out the perfect tree.  Sometimes it was snowing, and it was almost always cold!  We would walk around the field several times, “tagging” trees that looked like good possibilities, until we found the one that was “just right”.

It was a tradition that we all looked forward to every year, and one that none of us are ready to give up!  We knew it was going to be harder this year, but not as difficult as it turned out to be!

Being in southern Florida, we knew we weren’t going to be able to cut our own tree, but thought we would have several “Christmas Tree Tents” to choose from.  As it turns out, there were 2 that we found . . . and both were ridiculously expensive!

On our first trip out, we stopped at Walmart, where they had 1 (yes, 1!) tree left.  It was a 6’ frasier fir, already in a stand, originally priced at $30, but the manager said he would give it to us for $15, since it was a little spindly looking.  Nicolas wasn’t too thrilled with it, so we said we’d think about it while we shopped.  By the time we came back around to the garden center, it had been sold!  OK, so much for that one!

We went over to the one christmas tree tent that we had seen, only to find that they were not open until evening . . . OK, I guess we’ll try again tomorrow! 

The next afternoon we went back out, and decided to try Home Depot.  They had frasier firs also, starting at $33 for a 6’ tree.  Once again, we decided to think about it some more.  While driving around looking for a Big Lots to buy lights at, we found another tent.  Trees here were $60 and up, so Tom said “No way!”  Back to the first tent we had tried, they were open now, and their trees started around $50 for a 5’ frasier fir!  We were all starting to get a little discouraged!  I was ready to suggest that we just decorate the palm tree on our site!

Nicolas was determined, though, so after dinner we made one more trip to Home Depot.  We were shocked to see that the tent that had been full in the morning was almost empty of 6 – 7 foot trees!  We found one, though, had the guy unbind it, and said “We’ll take it!”  That’s it – it took all of 5 minutes to pick out a tree!  We got it back to the RV, and put it in our newly purchased stand, and that was it for the night!

It was a little tree (compared to what we’ve always had in the past), but Nicolas was happy!

The next morning, the boys got to work decorating it.

While they worked on the tree, I put up our stockings inside,

and a few Christmas quilts,

both inside and out.

When we were done with the decorating, it was time to make some cookies – gingerbread men and pizzelles.

Bryce helped with the frosting on the gingerbread men.

It took us longer than usual to get into the Christmas spirit (hard to get into it when it’s 80 degrees and sunny, and the beach is calling your name!), but it took us less time than usual to get our home decorated, so I guess it worked out OK!

The tree turned out pretty good!  Now I just need to do some shopping!

Christmas on the Florida Frontier and a Podcast Interview

We finished up the TechnoGeek Learning Rally on Friday night, and since we were not leaving until Monday, we had a couple of days to relax by the pool, play some shuffleboard, and just relax.

One of our fellow rally attendees was John & Kathy Huggins, of Living the RV Dream.  They were interviewing some of the rally attendees to get various opinions of the rally and fulltime RVing, and they asked Nicolas and I would talk to them about homeschooling on the road.  We did, and it was easier than we thought it would be – even fun!

You can listen to our interview at this link (starting at 18:30, and continuing to 29:00), or you can listen to the entire podcast -  the other interviews are good, too!  It’s the TechnoGeek Learning Rally podcast from December 6, 2012.

On the door of the Recreation building, there was a flyer about  “Christmas on the Florida Frontier” being held at Dade Battlefield Saturday night, so we decided to check it out after dinner.  For just $3 for all of us ($3 per car), we listened to music,

 

watched square dancing, and enjoyed some Christmas treats – wassail (spiced cider) and popcorn over the fire.

We even tried our hands at some craft projects from the frontier days.  Bryce and Tom made tin luminaries out of soup cans,

and Nicolas and I made an authentic “Old Florida” Christmas wreath – with long-leaf pine needles, cedar, holly, and other items native to central Florida.

Our finished wreath looks pretty good – now we just have to find a place to hang it on the RV!

Before we left, we learned about working for the “company store” and harvesting pine tar from the thousands of long-leaf pine trees that covered central Florida.

It was an interesting look into the history of Florida, and a nice way to spend a warm summer (oops – winter!) evening!