Travels with Gunther and Kara

I can’t believe it’s been 8 days since I posted anything but we’ve been pretty busy doing…well it seems like a whole lot of nothing…but we’ve been pretty busy for it being nothing. Neil’s been on a run or bike ride every day; we had Thanksgiving dinner, and we’ve been doing a bit of picture hanging, running out to the Walmart for supplies for both picture hanging and washing the rig, and Connie even worked a bit.

Last week Connie went on a walk around the nature trail that is part of the grounds here at Seminole and took some pictures of both the local wildlife and the facilities around the park. Here is the pool (heated, nice!) and the laundry/rec room area near the front office (very nice laundry, a dozen each washers and dryers which is triple to quadruple what you usually see and decent prices to boot). The laundry room shot is taken from right in front of the main office and pool and the pool is immediately out of view to the left in the first shot.

After wandering around the pool area she headed out and walked the 1/2 mile or so nature trail…it’s actually just a trail through the undeveloped portion of the property but does have a nice lake and some wildlife. The first shot is the creek that runs through the property and borders the parking areas. The rest of them were taken on the nature walk itself.

Lastly is a shot of a Pileated Woodpecker…this is the species that Woody the Woodpecker cartoons is based on. Unfortunately, it really doesn’t sound like Woody does on the cartoon. It’s not the best picture since Connie had the lower resolution waterproof Lumix camera instead of the Nikon D7000.

These shots were all taken on I think Wednesday before Thanksgiving. The next day we had a couple of Cornish Game Hens that were brined and then grilled. Neil made a Whisky Cream Sauce to go over them and they had some Cranberry Stuffing (came out of a box but was actually pretty tasty), a Winter Squash that they baked a couple of days before, smashed and mixed with Maple Syrup, cinnamon and butter and topped with a pecan/brown sugar crumble, and some garlic bread made out of Corn English Muffins (it tasted more like cornbread than an English Muffin). Connie thought they were better without the garlic but she’s wrong. They had some white wine with dinner and a pumpkin pie with whipped cream for dessert.

After Thanksgiving we pretty much vegetated the rest of the weekend. Watched Alabama crush Auburn in the Iron Bowl and lock up their ticket to the SEC Championship Game this week with a date in the BCS Championship Game (again) assuming they get by Georgia in the SEC Championship. Victories in both will give them 3 championships in 4 years; something not done all that often in the college game.

Monday Connie worked awhile and then we went off and got a bunch of assorted picture and decoration hanging materials. We have to use adhesive stuff to keep things on the wall while we’re moving (although some of it will need to be taken down of course) but we’re finally going to get all of our decorative stuff hung up this week (we hope). 

Today we were planning on a trip out to the Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary run by the Audubon Society…it’s the largest rookery for Wood Storks in the country. We’ve been there before (well, Connie and Neil have but it was way before they had me) and we were looking forward to the visit. Connie hurt her knee somehow though so we decided that a 4 mile or so hike (even though it’s on a boardwalk through the swamp and hence relatively easy as hikes go) wasn’t in the cards…so we jiggled the Jello the plans were set in and set of to Sanibel Island for a visit to the beach instead. Here’s a picture of the beach…we sat there on our chairs for a couple of hours eating lunch and soaking up some sun. It was like 80 degrees and sunny with a nice breeze to keep us cool…it’s a tough job but somebody has to do it so we took one for the team and persevered.

Tonight it’s off to the Elks Lodge for beer/bar food and Bingo (well, Bingo for Connie and more beer for Neil). We’re hoping they at least have some bar food or burgers although the web site doesn’t say anything about food on Tuesday nights.

Hopefully we’ll have something more interesting to post about in a day or two.

Cyas.

Well, after a strenuous 37 mile  travel day today we moved from Moore Haven, FL over to North Fort Myers. After coffee and breakfast this morning we got to work breaking camp, hitching up, and headed out shortly before the 1100 checkout time from Ortona Campground. We headed west on FL-80 until intersecting with I-75 then went north one exit…essentially getting across the river and exiting on to FL-78 East. From there it was maybe another 3/45 mile total to the campground.

Seminole is a great place so far. Quiet and amazingly secluded for being only a half mile from the freeway; we checked in with Stephanie at the office and then Rob led us back to our site 101. This is a nice back in 50 amp FHU site that backs up to some trees; on the other side of the trees is a rural area. We had the opportunity to get a site over on the creek a couple months back when we were making our reservations but given the campground layout we would have had no satellite visibility for Direct TV…so we took this site instead. We were a bit concerned that this side of the campground would be too much concrete parking area but it is actually reasonably well covered with trees and we back up to a nice view through our picture window on the rear to the tree line.

Here’s a shot of our site; you’re looking East here. The freeway is about 1/2 mile behind where Neil took the picture from.

Although the sites are a bit closer than we would prefer; there’s plenty of space to park both BAT and the car in our site. When we want to have a campfire in the fire ring you can see right in front of the car we have enough space to just back the car in front of BAT and still be out of the road.

We got parked in our site by about 1230 and finished setting up, holding colors to raise the flag, hooking up utilities and putting the awning out by about 1330. We spent an hour cleaning up; Connie swept, swiffered and dusted and Neil dragged the oriental carpet outside and vacuumed it off. After that we decided to head off to the Walmart for some groceries; we’re about out of a bunch of stuff. We stopped by the liquor store and got some Captain Morgan’s spiced rum since we can’t afford to drink Gosling’s all the time then picked up $180 worth of food, wine, and staples that we’re just out of. We got back to the rig about 1645 and Neil went on a quick bike ride while Connie put the groceries away. We then had cocktail hour followed by leftovers for dinner (Jambalaya Rice with leftover pork tenderloin that was mashed thin, rubbed with a combination of cocoa powder and various chili pepper powders then covered with a sauce that was flavored with chocolate and blueberries along with a bit of honey and some Frank’s Hot Sauce (way better than Tabasco Sauce) so it had a bit of heat along with a bit of sweet and a bit of mellow rounded out taste due to the chocolate.

Tomorrow Connie needs to work a bit then they’re headed out to a local restaurant for their 36th anniversary. We might do something fun on Wednesday but considering it’s Thanksgiving week probably not…we will likely wait until Monday before heading out on any hikes or kayak trips. Who knows.

Thanksgiving dinner is going to be Cornish Hens on the grill with some Baked Potatoes and Shallots with Sage along with a casserole of winter squash…then a pumpkin pie (sorry, it’s frozen) for afterwards.

Cyas.

Just a quick entry to summarize our time here. As I said before, Ortona South COE Campground has been great. Camp hosts are very friendly, large, easy to maneuver into sites, gorgeous views, and very nice weather.

We haven’t done much since Tuesday though. Neil had another computer issue but he thinks he’s figured out what was happening and hopefully it won’t happen again. Connie did some work but other than that we’ve just sat around being lazy. It’s been pretty windy all week but with temps mostly in the 70’s they just sat outside in their Zero Gravity lounge chairs a lot. It was too windy to get the awning out so we had to keep moving the chairs to stay in either the shadow of the rig or the sun depending on whether we wanted the sunshine or not. Neil ran pretty much every day this week; it was mostly too windy to run and it’s a pretty nice 4 miles out to the main road and back.

We did go out to Beef O’Brady’s Irish Pub one night for dinner…and really wish we hadn’t. Irish it ain’t and while they did have Guinness the food was pretty lousy It’s a chain down here but we won’t be visiting any more of them.

Tomorrow we’re headed off to Seminole Campground in Fort Myers and will be there until Mar 1. Connie has a couple of churches picked out and we’re going the next two weekends to audition their choir and see who she wants to sing with for Christmas. 

Neil sent an email off to their friend Pat Balzarini from college to see about getting together while we’re down here…they haven’t seen her since August of 2011 when they were in Miami for Connie’s ACP Board Meeting right before we retired.

Sorry no pictures this time; I already posted one of the rig. Guess I should have grabbed a few of the campground to add to this but it’s dark now so oh well. 

Cyas.

Sorry I haven’t posted in a couple of days but we have been pretty busy here at Ortona South. As I said before this is a really beautiful campground and we’ve been mostly just hanging around, Connie’s done a bit o’ work and we did work in a couple of fun things.

Sunday after Mass we drove over to Palm Beach and went to the Our Lady Queen of Peace Cemetery to visit the grave site of Connie’s parents. It was a sad day and was the first time we’ve been back since her dad died back in 1997. We noticed that a lot of the tombstones in the mauseleum have crucifixes on them but somehow her mom and dad’s doesn’t have one; so we’re going to contact the cemetery administrators to see about having one added.

Connie’s mom didn’t want to be buried in the ground so she and Harry got this lower row location in one of the above  ground mausoleums in the cemetery. Connie and Neil had a nice visit with her parents…they both still miss them even though it’s been 15 years since Harry passed on. We’re planning on making another trip over on Jan 14 which is their wedding anniversary as well as both of their birthdays. After the cemetery visit we stopped by a restaurant named Bru’s Room owned by a former linebacker for the Miami Dolphins and had a couple of pints of Guinness and a sandwich then headed home for dinner.

Monday was a work day for us. Connie worked and Neil did some computer stuff. They had a nice dinner of pork roasted on the grill with some cocoa/pepper dry rub, grilled pineapple and some veggies (corn for Neil and zucchini for Connie). Other than that Monday was pretty much a rest day.

Today Connie did some work in the morning while Neil went off and found a laundromat…he stopped by the Winn Dixie for some groceries on the way back. They had a nice smoked turkey sandwich for lunch and then headed out for some fun stuff. They headed to the Franklin Lock on the Caloosahatchee River. This is the same river that runs by their campsite but is about 30 miles or so west/downstream towards Fort Myers. The destination was a boat ramp where Neil quickly (well, maybe not so quickly since it’s a foot pump for the inflatable) pumped up the Sea Eagle kayak then they were off. They headed downstream about 1/2/ mile and then turned right into Telegraph Creek for a 4 mile up and back paddle. Telegraph Creek has just a little current (not like the main fork of the river) and they picked their way through a channel that varied from 50 to 20 feet wide. Zig zagging their way around fallen trees and branches in the water they  made their way upstream. Here’s a picture of Connie paddling and of the creek itself.

This last shot was of one of the wider parts of the creek; later it got really narrow and they had to pick and choose the best way past the logs and overhanging branches. Along the way they saw a Muscovy Duck and some Llamas (sorry, no Llama pic)

some sort of turtle

(this was the little one; they ran across one about twice this size another 200 yards or so upstream but he dived off the log before Neil could take a photo).

Right at the turn around point (determined by when they were half tired since they had to go back still) Connie spotted this Barred Owl right over the creek. We spent about 5 minutes right below this specimen about 18 inches high before he got fed up with the pesky humans and silently (that’s what owls do) flew off to another tree.

After that they turned around and made their way back downstream, under the highway bridge, and back to the exit from the creek back into the Caloosahatchee River. From there it was a tough half mile back upstream and upwind to the launch area near the lock/dam. Their arms are really going to be sore tomorrow although Connie has a really big bruise on her thumb that she got somehow during the day.

Packing up the Sea Eagle they headed back to the campground then down to the bath house for a quick shower…running into this little guy across from the bath house.

Kinda of a crummy photo but it was almost dark and it’s a phone picture anyway. Guess they need to think about upgrading their iPhone 4’s to iPhone 5’s for better photos.

Back home after showers Neil broiled a steak for dinner along with some rice and left over veggies (corn and zucchini) from last night along with a couple of wine coolers and then some Barefoot Merlot (hey, it was a good week for red wine when they made it). Tomorrow is another work day and then Connie needs to go get her nails done. Don’t know when the next fun stuff will be.

Cyas.

Today we decided to have some fun stuff after working yesterday. So; after eating breakfast and starting some short ribs in the crock pot for dinner we headed off about 20 miles for a hike in the Okaloacoochee Slough State Forest; specifically on the Tram Loop Trail. This was a nice 4.5 mile hike out and back on a road into the slough area of the forest. A slough is sort of a cross between a prairie and a wetland…it’s too dry to really be considered a swamp but too wet to be considered grassland. Lots of little ponds and wet areas interspersed between large areas of grass. Here is a picture of what one looks like.

As you can see; it looks pretty dry but looks are deceiving. After about a mile we had a choice to continue on the road or take a side loop onto an unimproved portion of the trail. We tried to side trail but after 50 yards or so gave it up since nobody brought along their hip waders and it would have gotten pretty messy if we continued. So; back to the road to continue our hike. Connie found a nice butterfly

while she was on her safari

We ran into this really huge flock of some sort of small birds; Connie thought she had been transplanted into a Hitchcock movie

We also saw this baby snake; we think it was a Black Racer but since it was a snake decided not to muck with it to make sure.

Along the way we also saw a Red Shouldered Hawk, a Great White Heron, and a Bald Eagle. We should be seeing plenty more of all of those the next  3 months as we head out into the Everglades.

The eagle kind of lost a lot of detail because it was really far out there and Neil had to crop the shot way down with Photoshop so it was more than just a black dot. I was hoping he would take off and fly but no luck with this one.

After the main part of the hike we stopped by the boardwalk area that extends out into the marsh. It was the middle of the afternoon so we didn’t see any wildlife but we did have a nice nap in the sun for 10 minutes or so. After that we headed home for a shower then a beer outside the rig watching the Blue Herons and Anhingas in the river behind our site until it was time for dinner.

Dinner was the previously mentioned Beef Short Ribs…Neil cooked them in the crock pot with some onions, garlic, carrots and a spare beer. The final sauce was thickened with a bit of red wine and some chocolate which made it really yummy. Served over some scratch made biscuits with a bit more of the red wine. Dessert will be some ice cream in a bit then we’ll watch TV until bedtime.

Tomorrow, who knows…Connie hasn’t told us the plans yet.

Cyas.

Monday morning we got up pretty early since we had a long drive ahead of us. According to google maps it was about 315 miles but that was with about 150 miles on a state highway. The truck GPS had other ideas and routed us on more interstate highways so we stayed on I-75 through Fort Myers passing within about a half mile of our next stop at Seminole Campground but we couldn’t see it for the trees. That’s good news and bad news I guess; bad that we have no preview but good that it apparently won’t have a beautiful view of the freeway. We were then on 2 lane FL-80 for 33 miles until we got here to Ortona South. This is a beautiful COE (Corps of Engineers) campground located at the Ortona South lock which provides a way for boats to get from the Gulf of Mexico to Lake Okeechobee via the Caloosahatchee River section of the Okeechobee Waterway. Anyway; we’re parked here in site 29 which is a water/electric site 50 amp (no sewer) which means we have to walk over to the bath house to have a shower. Luckily the bath houses are cleaned by contract from Goodwill and they are pretty spotlessly clean which makes Connie very, very, very happy. We got here after our 357 mile day and got parked and set up in site 29 by about 1715. Neil went on a bike ride, came home in the dark, and then they had some leftover chili-mac for dinner along with a salad and a frozen roll from the freezer. They tried to watch some TV (no trees here so it’s really great for satellite visibility) but by about 2130 they were done, stick a fork in them so Neil dragged them off to bed.

This morning we got up and had breakfast and caught up a bit on internet stuff…we have great connectivity on our cellular data connection since we can see the cell tower from our campsite. After that Neil got a nice shot of our campsite.

and went on a longer bike ride while Connie cleaned the rig. After lunch she did some work and he got a couple of shots of the really great views our of our windows; we have seen kingfishers, anhinga, and a Great blue Heron already. The waterway in the pictures below is maybe 30 feet from the back of our trailer; the first shot is looking to the left towards the lock and the second looking to the right towards Lake Okeechobee.

As you can see; the views are great as is the campground itself. Connie is really impressed with her picking this one; beautiful, easy to get into and out of, friendly staff and visitors and most of all great weather. We are running our A/C because the no-see-ums (itty bitty gnats) come right through the screens on the windows if you don’t. Otherwise we would have them open and be getting the breezes. Supposedly they only are out at night so we may try again tomorrow opening the windows during the day and see how that goes.

Tonight we’re off to Clewiston for dinner and a run by the Walmart for supplies and then tomorrow we’ll probably do something fun.

Cyas.

Well, it was quite a day today. Connie got up and did some work in the morning while Neil did a load of shorts/underwear/gym stuff then they had lunch and headed off to meet Mary Jane and Lauren at the Ijams Nature Center in Knoxville. It’s right in the middle of downtown but is actually pretty isolated. We went on a hike of about a mile or so and Lauren gave us the 50 cent tour since she’s been there before. We did get a couple of nice shots of the Tennessee river from the river boardwalk.

After that we headed home and Neil had a bike ride. Mary Jane picked up a carrot cake for dessert and then Neil grilled some Italian Marinated Chicken and made beans and rice to go with it along with some home made cole slaw since Lauren will eat that. We had a nice dinner and some wine coolers but Lauren got pretty over excited and started to get on Neil’s second to last nerve. She finally calmed down a bit and we had some dessert before they headed back home.

Tomorrow we’re off to Cartersville, Georgia for either 1 or 4 nights depending. If we can get into the COE campground on the lake we’ll stay for 4 nights. If not then we’ll shift to the KOA for at least one night…and see if we can get into the campground in northern Florida early. If we can we’ll leave the KOA after a single night since it’s just a parking lot essentially and spend longer in Suwannee State Park in FL. Since the KOA is not such a nice place to stay we’ll only stay there more than one night if we have to.

Cyas.