Hello!

It has been far too long since my last installment. I apologize, in advance, for the length of this one. Lots to recollect.

Kissimmee / Orlando

This is our first “fail” on our cross-country adventure. Central Florida’s weather is amazing, but the area looks as though it was “ridden hard and put away wet.”

We made the best of the bad AirBnB accommodations and area. It was hard to tell from the map, but any location in central Florida is a 20 minute drive. You’re either going around a body of water or a gated community. We thought we were doing so well by Google stalking the area beforehand. Note to self… Actually plot some point A to point B routes in the area to see how long they actually are.

We did have a little bit of green space behind the house and the birds serenaded us every morning. We even had an owl visit a couple of nights. 

We found and explored several nature preserves in the area. Disney donated money to The Nature Conservancy for about 2,600 acres in the Kissimmee area. Lots of wetlands and grasslands in that location. We visited several other nature sites on our daily walks (after a 20 minute drive) here and there. They all gave us a little different look at the different environments in the area.

I’ve never seen so many long-legged birds in one area. Herons, Egrets, Storks, Ibis, Cranes were all represented along with their subspecies cousins. They were everywhere. 

We had the opportunity to watch a Sandhill Crane family over the course of your stay. We first spotted them on our drive to/from the grocery store. The baby was just a hatchling and the parents were standing guard and keeping the little one in their shadows. Over 3+ weeks, we saw the baby grow and start walking/running along with the parents. Very cute. We weren’t there long enough to see the baby take flight.

The Vulture population is also abundant in Florida. There were several roadkills along our commute and the vultures would come in and clean up in short order. I bit gruesome, but interesting nonetheless. Eric took to calling them the “Road Crew.”

We visited St. Cloud and took an airboat ride into the marsh surrounding East Lake Tohopekaliga. This area is considered the headwaters of the Everglades. Our boat driver was a long-time, self described redneck. He knew the area like the back of his hand and drove straight to several alligators, including the infamous Suzie. Suzie has been known to charge boats and attempt to climb in. No such excitement, but she hissed and growled to let us know we should back away. Gladly.

The water in this area was about 6 inches deep. Eric ventured out to stand in the waters. I wimped out. There were two other people in our group. They were mostly interested in seeing as many alligators as possible. While alligators are very interesting creatures, one or two were plenty for me. 

The most interesting fact about alligators is, their brains are about the size of 3 olives. They act and react solely on instinct. They definitely give us a look at our once prehistoric times.

Again, many many Heron and Egret sightings during our airboat ride. A few Osprey were hunting, but no dives/catches while we were sitting and watching. I can’t remember the exact name, be we did get to see a Kite. The driver noted that this Kite is one of the most endangered birds of prey in the area. He said it was a treat to see one.

Back to our Kissimmee walks and hikes; our other animal interactions included an armadillo (I named him Armando) and a tortoise (no name). 

The armadillo was pretty cool. After a few minutes of us standing very still, it started rooting around for food and allowed us to get close enough to touch. Very leathery with lots of face whiskers. The tortoise was fun to interact with also. It moved much faster than I expected. He also show us one of his defenses; flicking sand with his hind legs. Kind of funny. 

We’ve officially had our lifelong fill of Florida.

Puerto Rico

We spent 2 weeks in Fajardo, Puerto Rico. What a lovely island! 

Fajardo is on the eastern side of the island; about an hour outside of San Juan. A bustling fishing and water sport community. We lucked out and found a great apartment located on top of one of the bluffs in the area. We got to overlook Fajardo and the coastline along the north side of the island — the Atlantic.

There is no shortage of things to do. The residents are mostly bi-lingual and very friendly and helpful. Most everything is metric, except for the MPH signs along the roadways. Weird thing to be different.

We’ve climbed to the top of El Yunque — the highest point in PR at 3,200 feet. The hiking trails in this national forest are beautifully maintained. Tons of people on the easier trails and lower elevations. The summit hike gave us a great opportunity to see every aspect of a rain forest. They aren’t kidding when they say, “Tropical Rainforest: If it isn’t moving, it’s rotting.” There were only a handful of people who muscled their way to the summit overlook. We found out later that there is a service road that will take you most of the way to the summit and then you can walk a few hundred yards to the overlook. I’m glad we did the hike.

We took a lovely drive to the south side of the island to check out the Caribbean. Of course, I wanted to take a more scenic route home. We climbed into the mountains on very narrow winding roads. 

We made a fortuitous wrong turn and came across an amazing ancient (or maybe not so old, given how fast things grow) Banyan tree. We spent quite awhile exploring its massive root system. We kept telling ourselves that we’ve come to the end of seeing “the coolest thing”, but then something comes up and it ends up being cooler than the last. This tree will be hard to top.

There was a lagoon near our apartment that can only be accessed via kayak through a very heavy mangrove forest. This lagoon is very popular at night because it is home to bioluminescent organisms that glow at night. Unfortunately, we were visiting close to a full moon and the luminescence is very low during these times. We still wanted to see the lagoon so we rented kayaks and set out by ourselves during the day. We were lucky enough to have the whole area to ourselves the morning we went.

We spent several hours exploring the waterway and lagoon. Bright colored (blue and red) crabs hanging out on the tree roots; tiny spider-like crabs scurry around like insects. Fishing birds swooping in for a meal of fish right in front of us. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it.

We snorkeled 2 separate times and thoroughly enjoyed it. We spent one afternoon, on our own, in a nearby bay getting used to the water, current and equipment. We saw all kinds of fish. Bright Dory-like (“Finding Nemo”) ones and more subtle colored ones. We happened across a Lion Fish. Thank goodness for PBS & Discovery Nature shows. We both knew to keep our distance since Lion Fish have nasty stinging barbs on their fins. 

Our more adventurous outing was with a diving company. They took us to nearby islands and reefs. The reefs were much bigger and many more fish to see. I’m glad we had a warm up day, since it was pretty windy and rough on this outing. Being comfortable bobbing about had its advantages. The other people on the boat were struggling with waves and water getting in their masks and snorkels.

We hung out on a spit of sand out in the middle of nowhere — Palomino Beach. This is the beach filmed for the last scene of “Pirates of the Caribbean.” I could almost feel Johnny Depp’s aura…not really.

Puerto Rico is definitely on our list of places to visit again. There is so much to explore and discover. We had some serious discussion about buying one of the condos in the complex where we were staying. Real Estate is really affordable right now. We’ll see. It’s a pipe dream at the moment.

Georgia > South Carolina > Raleigh North Carolina

We picked up the car in Orlando and gave ourselves a couple of days to get to our April destination – Raleigh, NC.

We headed North and spent a few hours touring around Savannah, GA. Unfortunately, this lovely historical city has succumb to the hungry tourism industry. You couldn’t walk or drive without running into a mass of people or tour bus/trolley. We’re very glad we decided against staying in this area. It’s a madhouse.

The history of the place is fascinating. I definitely need to reread “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” now that I have pictures of my head of the setting.

Onward to South and North Carolina. We’ve hit the Carolina’s PERFECTLY for Spring. The Azaleas, Dogwoods and Wisteria are in full bloom. Wisteria is EVERYWHERE. Most areas have rogue vines climbing anything that doesn’t move. I’m wondering if people truly like it or if it’s considered a weed. I’m in heaven and probably getting on Eric’s nerves since my mantra is, “Oh! Look at that Wisteria. Oh! Look at that one. And that one!”

We made a stop at the Hopeswee Plantation just north of Charleston, SC. This is one of the few plantations that were spared General Sherman’s burning spree as he and Northern troops headed South. 

This Plantation was owned by Thomas Lynch. He was one of the founders of the Declaration of Independence. Unfortunately, he suffered a stroke prior to signing and was unable to write his name. He named his son Thomas, Jr. as signer. If you look at the signature area of the D of I and find Thomas Lynch, Jr.’s signature, you’ll notice a blank line two spots above Jr.’s name. This blank spot was purposely left to honor Thomas Lynch, Sr.

The probable story of why this planation was spared is that the Lynch’s were not living there at the time. The caretaker ran off to hide and left the slaves behind to care for the place. When Sherman arrived, he didn’t want to disrupt the slaves living quarters. He burned the furniture in the house, but spare all the buildings.

The slaves and their descendants lived in the cabins on the property until the 1960’s.

We’ve been in Raleigh for almost a week. We are in the smallest accommodations to date. We’ve gone a bit too far with this one. The back of Subaru is our empty containers storage since there is no storage in this sub 500 square foot place. It’s in a mid 1950’s apartment complex. It’s very close to NC State University. Lots of students running around and making us feel old. The area has a similar feel to East Portland and Boulder, CO. It’s nice to be walking distance for all the needed services. 

Aside for getting to know the area, I will have the opportunity to see and catch up with my first college roommate; a childhood friend from Lake Arrowhead, CA; and my 6th grade teacher from Arrowhead. I’m very excited (Eric, not so much) to see these folks and reminisce. I’m realizing my memories of Arrowhead, Grants Pass and Corvallis are a bit faded. I’m hoping Shannon, Jack and Mike will brighten them back up.

I hope Spring is in full swing for each of you. If you have a few moments, drop me a note and catch me up on what’s going on in your worlds. The West Coast feels very very far away right now.

Be well and enjoy the sunshine when you can get it. Oh.. and if you see Wisteria, think of me. 🙂

Best wishes,

Cindy and Eric