Monday 2-28-2022 Home

 We got up early again yesterday, had breakfast and got on the road at 6:15 AM.  The traffic was heavier than expected especially above Richmond and beyond.  We had to take a detour in Maryland due to a traffic accident, but even New Jersey was heavy.  We decided to push on as we could almost smell home.  Unfortunately, we got shunted off onto the George Washington again.  What a zoo!  Very tense driving near the bridge and over it.  It was heavy in Connecticut also until we got over the Pearl Harbor bridge in New Haven.  As bad as the traffic was on our side however, the traffic going into NYC was much worse.  It was pretty solid on the south side of the highway through Bridgeport.  We got home about 6:30, emptied the car, grabbed some pizza and everyone was in bed by 7:30.  Russ and Cathie left early this morning to go back to Vermont.  It was a wonderful three weeks!  I'm not sure how long it will take to get used to the chilly temps, but at least we know that Spring is coming.  We have a few daffodil heads poking through the snow near the front porch.  Happy to be home!

 Saturday 2-26-2022 Lumberton, North Carolina

Important fact first: the boys won last night for a grand total of 11 games to 9.  They are the champs!

We got up early this morning and did last minute packing, cleaned out the fridge after breakfast and got on the road by 6:30.  We drove north and made it out of Florida by 11 AM.  Georgia was a breeze, but we ran into traffic problems in South Carolina.  First of all I-95 is only a two lane highway in this state so any volume of traffic slows the whole road down.  This happened several times for no apparent good reason.  We then got an alert that there was an accident up ahead so thank you, GPS - we were able to take a detour on a local road through St. George.  When we got into town, we were definitely on the wrong side of the tracks - very dilapidated small houses and most of the businesses were abandoned and shuttered.  Once we crossed the railroad tracks, things started looking up.  The town had a total of three car washes, about the same number of churches, one grocery store, and a pharmacy.  The best looking building in town was the funeral parlor.  We got back on the highway past the accident site, but still had a busy time of it until we hit the border and we encountered the normal three lanes in North Carolina.  We figure that the hold-ups and detour cost us about an hour and a half so we elected to stay in Lumberton instead of pushing through to Fayetteville.  Two crazy incidents on the highway were a crazy person who very quickly drove across the two travel lanes from the left and went down an exit, running over the grass to get there.  It is a miracle that the driver did not hit any cars!  The other was an Airstream trailer being towed that flipped over on its side off the road.  No one was hurt apparently, but I can't imagine that the Airstream faired as well.  We have just come back from dinner and are in for the night.  We will try to get an early start again tomorrow.

Friday 2-25-2022 Celery Fields

So the boys won at cards again last night so the best we can hope for is a tie tonight as we will be leaving in the morning.

We got up for a sun rise walk on the beach.  It was lovely at that time of the morning.  There were a few people walking and a few young Amish girls in their long dresses getting their feet wet in the surf.  I caught a pic of a gull eating a crab.  We went home and made a big breakfast - trying to eat up some of our leftovers.  We decided to go back to Celery Fields as it is fairly close to where we are staying.  We lucked out as we saw two male and one female painted buntings near the feeder - a great way to start the day.  Other bird sightings of the day: least bittern, blue-wing teal ducks, snowy and American egret, tricolored, little, and great blue herons, common, purple and coot gallinules, grackles, boat-tail grackles, red-winged blackbirds, purple martins, mocking bird, brown head cow birds, glossy ibis, a Northern harrier, and an anhinga catching and eating a sunfish.  We also saw an alligator and a tilapia.  We came back to the unit for lunch.  I did some laundry and went to the pool to read afterwards while Russ and Cathie walked across to the beach.  We will go out to our favorite place for dinner tonight and then pack up for our trip back home tomorrow.  It has been a wonderful three weeks, but it seems to have flown by.  We will miss our walks on the beach in shorts and tees, the wonderful sun, the birding, relaxing afternoons on the beach or by the pool and our nightly card games.  

Thursday 2-24-2022 Pinecraft Park and the Museum of Art and Whimsy

 We lucked out last night.  Cathie and I were down 2300 points after the first round of the game last night, but we persisted and won!  The score is now even with only two nights left to play.  

We went to a small local neighborhood park in Sarasota and although the park wasn't fantastic, we did see a few birds, but more importantly, the park is in an Amish community.  Most of the adults were either playing or watching others play shuffle board.  I did get a quick shot of some young women chatting and watching their kids play in the playground area.  For birds, we saw the common gallinule, a cardinal, American egret, pine warbler, both types of vultures, a bald eagle, mourning dove, woodstork, and due to a nice Amish man that we stopped to chat with and who pointed out a hole high up in a tree, we saw a pair of red bellied woodpeckers.  One of them was excavating the hole while we watched.  The park was quite wooded with lots of Spanish moss hanging from the trees, many ferns, air plants and palmettos.  We had a nice time in the park and then wandered down the road to Yoder's, an Amish restaurant, produce market, and store.  We were able to pick up salads, sandwiches, and shepherd's pie (for Russ) and some cookies for lunch.  We took the food back to the condo.  I made an a one-crust apple, blueberry, strawberry pie for dessert tonight and then while Dave was napping, the rest of us went to the Museum of Art and Whimsy.  Unfortunately, due to Covid, the museum was not open, but the grounds had many funky statues and sculptures.  I was only able to get one pic to put on the blog as a docent said that only cell phone pics were allowed.  I took a few with the phone, but have not figured out how to get them from the phone to the computer to the blog.  

Wednesday 2-23-2022 Venice Rookery

 Last night we went to The Cottage for grouper sandwiches - yum!  We went across the street and picked up some Meanie's mini donuts to bring home for dessert - double yum!  And . . . the girls won again last night so we are only one game behind.

We were going to spend the day at the beach today, but it was foggy when we got up so we drove down to the Venice Rookery.  What a fabulous spot!  It used to be a storm water retention basin.  There is an island in the middle which was full of birds - preening, mating and nesting.  Lots of the birds had their feathers fluffed out to attract mates.  It was really hard to pick out which pics to put up today.  There were so many choices.  We saw great blue herons, common gallinules, American egrets, a black crowned night heron, a green heron, anhingas and a nest with two baby anhingas, a red winged blackbird, black billed whistling ducks, a tricolored heron, a pine warbler, several glossy ibis, a few alligators and a cooter (turtle).  It was interesting to note that the egrets had a bright green area between its eye and bill.  This apparently only shows during mating season.  I put up two short clips - one is of a great blue protecting his nest and the other is of an egret doing a mating dance.

We came back and had lunch.  Russ and Cathie and I went to the beach while Dave napped.  The water is warming up - I even went in for a dip.  We are grilling for dinner tonight.

Tuesday 2-22-2022 Turtle Bay

 The boys won again at cards last night - boo hoo!

Happy two's-day to all: 2-22-22!  We went kayaking at Turtle Bay this morning.  It was a perfect day to be on the water - warm, but slightly overcast so we didn't get fried.  We haven't been kayaking in quite a while so we have sore thumbs and shoulders to show for it.  We kayaked around the Neville Mangrove Preserve.  We saw a number of birds: 2 Nanday parakeets in the parking lot when we first got there, an osprey with a fish in his claws that flew overhead, great blue herons, a tricolored heron, a white ibis, turkey and black vultures, white pelicans, brown pelicans, a sanderling, a snowy egret, an anhinga and a cormorant.  When we got around to the end of the island, we spotted Steven King's house.  We could only see the top, but it is shaped like a gymnasium.  We pulled up onto a beach and walked across to the ocean side.  It was amazing how much colder the water was on this side.  We had lunch back at the condo.  Russ and Cathie have gone out to the pool.  I have been sitting on the balcony and doing laundry.  We plan on going out to eat tonight.