Hey, wanna explore with me today? Come on … Let’s Beat the Crowds to the Manatees Let’s get up and ride our bikes down to the spring early before the park opens. I hear that later in the mornings the manatees are in the river eating, but early they’re still keeping warm up in the […]
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Scenes from Hillsborough River
This state park reminds me of the one we stayed in in New Ulm, Minnesota, because it’s designed with lots of amenities for locals: a pool (closed now), snack bar, playgrounds, pavilions and picnic sites, kayak rentals, hiking trails. I’m guessing there are lots of large, community-friendly state parks out there with camping, and I […]
Crappy Campground amid Royal Palms
Pro tip: Never book a campsite on the inside of a campground loop. We’re wedged in here at Collier-Seminole State Park like one of the pie pieces in a Trivial Pursuit game. The folks on the outside of the loop all have plenty of space to set up chairs and tents, but we can’t open […]
A Vast Quiet
When you look out over the sawgrass prairie here in the Everglades—where we’ve been hiking through a very wide, shallow river—you can see far across to the horizon, across limestone flats, with zero signs of mankind. The quiet around you seems surreal. Like time has stopped. In reality there are roads nearby, like this one […]
Back in the Everglades Again
Out where a friend is a friendWhere the big mosquitoes feedAnd the lowly hikers bleedBack in the Everglades again. Here we are, for the third time, because this place is worth it. We spent Thanksgiving at the large campsites of Big Cypress, as a quick stop between reservations in Tampa and Naples. Then we had […]
Crazy for Rays (and more water photos)
Because we’ve been in the Keys for so long and have everything we own unpacked and strewn around our campsite, we have much to do to prep for leaving in three days. Tracy called yesterday his last day kayaking, but I can’t quit my hunt for rays. Here we were yesterday afternoon kayaking over to […]
Bahia Honda and Airstreamers
I have a half hour to put this post together in the free time I have before Friday morning’s email goes out. Wait, you heard that right: I don’t have much free time because … [drumroll] … we’re walking over to have happy hour with two Airstream couples in a bit. In real life! People! […]
Getting in the Groove at the Keys Just as We Prep to Leave
We have one last week here of our six-week stay, and I’m realizing how much I’m going to miss this place. Yes, it’s crowded with tourists, and the new highly-contagious variant of the virus is here more than most anywhere in the U.S. So it’s definitely time for us to move on. But look at […]
I Blew out My Flip-Flop, Stepped on an Iguana …
In case this song isn’t stuck in your head yet, the lyrics go, I blew out my flip-flop Stepped on a pop top Cut my heel, had to cruise on back home. You guys remember pop tops, right? The Beautiful Nuisance of Iguanas I apparently don’t need them to mess up my feet. First I […]
Scrap Photos
At the magazine where I worked last, the designer and I would keep folders of images we had permission to use but hadn’t used yet. Here are my scrap photos from this week. Sunrises and Sunsets from the Campground Hiking on Big Pine Key The geology of the lower keys is unique, with a very […]
