Category: Photography

Manatee

When I was little, my grandparents moved to Florida. We visited with them, but I can not remember ever seeing manatee. I know that I really wanted to though.

This trip, we were able to see a lot of them. I am not sure what the total was, but we enjoyed watching them most everyday we were there.

Allan figured out that there was a drip in these waterlines, so the manatee would hide under the dock for fresh water. It was fun watching them.

While standing on the dock, I realized that there was a manatee just under where I was standing. He flipped his tail and startled me, it was a lot closer than I had thought!

We know there was at least one momma and baby. We could distinguish at least three other ones. The kids insisted they were all either “Barbara” or “Bill”.

Obey the Signs

We discovered this sign at the campsite. I did not want to see the snakes, but hoped to see alligators. But alas… there were snakes in the campground.

We first meet this Eastern Diamond Back Rattler.
Then Audrey discovered this snake near her feet while pulling down some clothes from the line. (She did not obey the 15 feet rule. )

She also did not scream or jump or act surprised. She calmly informed me, “Mom, there’s a black snake over where the clothes were hanging.”

We saw another snake while driving and the kids noticed a few small ones while we were hiking. I am thankful that we did not see many and I was never the one who saw them first!

Camping in Everglades

We have enjoyed many nights camping with the family. We all enjoy back country back packing, carrying everything we need in backpacks and walking or canoeing to each camp site.

This trip, we went “car camping” instead. Everything we needed for our trip fit into our van. We did run to Walmart the first day to get some gas and some fresh vegetables. However, we kept things very simple. Oatmeal for breakfast, gorp and granola bars for lunch and simple meals for dinner.

The sites we stayed at in “Lone Pine Key” were very nice. Since our family is “large” we needed to have two sites. The boys slept across the street from us, so we had a lot of space. The view outside our windows was always relaxing.

It was also amazingly quiet most of the time! During the day children would be on bikes or scooters, or you would see people walking. But, unlike many campgrounds, there was very little noise or music.

Once the sun went down, the mosquitoes came out, so it was a great time to head inside to get ready for a busy tomorrow!

Florida Welcome Center

Allan asked what we wanted to do for vacation and we could not come up with ideas. Wanting warmth and the chance to visit someplace new, Allan decided we should go to the Everglades. Just for fun, Allan planned it all as a secret. I found out where we were going, but still kept it a secret from the kids. They figured it out before we left though.

The trip down was good and we got into Florida early on Monday morning. Then we hit Florida Traffic. It took us all day to get to the Everglades only stopping a few times after the welcome center.

It was light when we arrived, but by time the tents were set up, it was dark. So we learned about Florida mosquitoes.

Ice

Yesterday we took a walk and was amazed by all the neat ice patterns we were finding. My favorites were the ones that looked like mazes with marbles.

Megan tried breaking the ice to see if we could figure out what was causing the unique patterns. Most of the ice was still to thick for her to break, but we did discover some neat patterns under some.