South Florida Central

Lake Placid, Florida

December 31, 2006

It's an unusual “dry season” in Florida; it seems to be raining almost every other day, but only part of the day. The rain is often very local. Also, if we leave our canvas chairs out overnight, they are often wet in the morning if not by rain, then by dew.

Speaking of dew or, rather, do-do. There are many large tropical birds in Florida. That means that my canvas chairs also get large tropical poop on them. Sort of a gray poop-on. The poop is also on every side of van except the bottom. Actually, I'm not really sure about the bottom being poop-free; I didn't really look, but it's a good assumption. It's probably just spattered with armadillo parts.

Gray poop-on van.

We left Palm Beach and are now at the northwest margin of Lake Okeechobee. It is about 100 miles from Palm Beach to here. [There are many lakes in this region of Florida. It's good for boating, fishing, and getting bitten by alligators. Also, pooped on, op cit.] Lake Okeechobee is about 50 miles inland. It is the large lake that appears on the T.V. weather map that we see a lot during hurricane season.

The campground that we're currently in is very nice, clean, and friendly. They are also 'dog-friendly' as long as the dog is under 40 pounds and not of an aggressive breed. Dogs have to be kept on a leash so that they don't get snatched by alligators, 'walking' Asian catfish, or carried off by the large mosquitoes. Dogs left unattended are often found eaten or drained of blood, I have heard.

We stayed in southeast Florida longer than we had originally planned. We came to the area to visit my aunt, but she had taken ill, so we hung around until she got better. Since we were waiting, I asked Dan to send me some things via Priority Mail. It had been more than two weeks since the package was mailed and I've given up on it and moved on. I don't want to settle in Florida waiting for a package that may never arrive. I'm not all that concerned; it was insured and nothing was irreplaceable.

One of the items in the in the package was my new 'Hellarewe' device. It is a GPS system that works with my lap top. When I get lost, I say, “Where the Hell are we?” and Sarah would plug the device in and tell me where to go. At least, that was the way it's supposed to work. Now we'll just have to do it the old fashion way: Argue about it until someone calls the police. Actually, we've never gotten so lost that we didn't get back, but now gas has gotten expensive and I don't want to miss too many states by making a wrong turn. It's happened before.

We have a less sophisticated GPS with us so that we don't get lost hiking or biking: It'll back-track us to our starting point by dropping electronic 'bread crumbs.' It also shows some roads and towns, so we're not at the total mercy of navigating by the stars. I hope that rural areas have as many satellites as urban areas; they're expensive to put up.

There is a New Year's Eve celebration here. It is celebrated according to Greenwich Mean Time and they watch the festivities in London on the big screen T.V. in the rec hall. It makes Europeans staying here feel more comfortable and people can still get their 'early-bird' dinners and be in bed by 8 p.m. Just kidding; but the party does end at 12:30, which is not bad because the local all-night diner closes at 9.

Homosassa, FL

January 4, 2007

Lobby, Tampa's Museum of Science and Industry

We spent two days in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area. Our first stop was MOSI, the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa. It's a top-notch museum that covers all areas well for a museum of its size (medium). Its current special exhibit is 'Monsters of the Deep' which had skeletons, fossils, and fiberglass models of large living and extinct sea creatures.

One floor of the museum is devoted to natural disasters that plague Florida: hurricanes, tornadoes, and wild fires. One can enter simulated homes and 'experience' what it would be like to be present during these situations. Information about disaster preparedness is provided.

We next attempted to visit the Tampa Museum of Art, but after finding the last spot in the below-ground parking lot which could accommodate the van's height, we fond that the museum was closed. Since the museum is regularly closed on Mondays and this Monday was a holiday, the museum also closed on Tuesday.

Not too far away is the Henry B. Plant Museum, the historic Tampa Bay Hotel, which is now part of the University of Tampa. We went there. It was closed so that the staff could take down the annual holiday exhibit.

Not to waste time, we headed for St. Petersburg's Fine Arts Museum. Small rooms display a small number of works, but the works are representative of various trends in art over the ages. Half of the museum was closed for the instillation of a new exhibit. The new exhibit will be still life from the Medici collection. I learned that in several other languages, still life is called 'dead nature.'

We over-nighted in Largo between Tampa and St. Petersburg and returned to Tampa the following day for 'clean-up': First to the Plant Museum and then the art museum.

The Moorish-style Tampa Bay Hotel

The Henry B. Plant Museum, the Tampa Bay Hotel, had been restored to its Victorian elegance. Visitors can see furnished rooms showing what wealthy people experienced there a hundred years ago. Unfortunately, some of rooms were still closed as staff members were still taking down and packing away holiday decorations.

The hotel was built by steamship and railroad magnate Henry B. Plant. He was also a general all-around rich guy.

The special exhibit this time is the 1893 Columbian Exposition that was held in Chicago. In one of the displays, I learned that a 13,000 pound replica of the 'Liberty Bell' was made for the exposition. To give the replica an 'aura,' historic objects were melted into the bronze: the keys to Jefferson Davis' house, George Washington's surveyor's chain, and the hinges from Abraham Lincoln's home were among the items used. There obviously was less of a concern for historic preservation in the 1800s than there is today.

The Tampa Bay Hotel was the staging point for the Spanish-American War. Officers stayed here and worked on their plans for the invasion of Cuba. Enlisted men and volunteers stayed in the Tampa heat living in tents and wearing woolen uniforms. I learned that the 'Rough Riders,' Theodore Roosevelt's volunteer cowboys, charged up San Juan Hill on foot.

About 12 drachma. Now that we've gotten the joke out of the way, I remembered the Tampa Museum of Art as housing the largest collection of Grecian urns that we've ever seen. (Etruscan, Roman, and other Italian urns are also included.) They're gone! Not all, but many. The collection here is still significant, but pieces that we saw the last time that we were here were on a 25 year loan from the Boston Museum of Art and went back last year. There was a particular piece that I wanted to show to Sarah, but it'll have to wait until another trip.

Part of the museum was closed because a temporary exhibit was in the process of being installed. A temporary exhibit that we really enjoyed was of large enameled bronze sculptures of foods: a six-foot bundle of asparagus, for example. A giant basket of grasshoppers was titled “A Taste of Indo-China.”

We made a reservation in Manatee Springs State Park for five days starting tonight. The park has a warm spring for swimming and trails for biking. It's flat, so it'll help us get back in shape for the more difficult trails in Alabama that we plan to do later in the month.

We've stayed here several times in the past. This is the place where I was hit by a car while biking into town and where I was able to photograph Sarah swimming with manatee. I swam with an alligator here, but it was small and not too close.

Floridians are complaining about the heat and rain, but as we continue to move north, we'll be cooler and more comfortable. We had to run the a/c last night; not so much for the heat, but for the humidity.

Regards,

Allen and Sarah