Cooler air temperatures cause a greater number of manatees to seek the warm temperatures of the Spring, and manatee viewing was excellent. Several times this week, the park was closed due to limited parking.
And once we had to wait in a line for 40 minutes just to get back into the park after a trip to town! But the congestion was not hard to bear, considering the excellent manatee viewing. While they might look a little small in the following picture, each adult is in the neighborhood of 1500-2500 lbs.
A daily count of manatees is posted at the park entrance and one day it exceeded 400. Once we counted 40 manatees at one spot along the viewing boardwalk, which runs the full length of the spring.
In the morning when there were few people viewing, you could hear the manatees surfacing, blowing out air and sucking in more before quickly going under again. Pretty cool.
This guy was eating the moss in an upside down position while holding on with his flippers!
We used our week here to connect with friends nearby. It turned out that the scenic little town of Mt. Dora was roughly equal distance for Don and Sharie, Jimmy and Kay, and us to drive for a meet-up. With many shops and restaurants as well as a lake and scenic boardwalk, Mt. Dora turned out to be the ideal place to meet.
We had a nice lunch at The Lost Parrot.
We had a nice lunch at The Lost Parrot.
The boys had some time to solve a few of the world's problems while the girls kept the wheels of commerce turning at the Mt. Dora Olive Oil Co. and several other small shops that reminded us of Third St. in Geneva.
The town is on the banks of Lake Dora, and a nice park and quarter mile boardwalk provided great views of the lake and surrounding vegetation and wildlife populations.
We bid farewell to our friends, but were not lonely for long, because some others, Keith and Ruth, drove up from Orlando the next day to visit and see the manatees.
This fellow in the boat is a park ranger who was taking notes about the manatees. Generally no boating or snorkeling is permitted when the manatees are here in high numbers - in winter.
We took the Park's boat ride, boarding at the mouth of the Blue Spring and going into the St Johns River. Interestingly, the St Johns is the only major river in the Northern Hemisphere to flow north, and the largest river in Florida. We saw some wildlife including many birds, and a few turtles and alligators.
and spotted a unique little camper on the way back to our rig.
Dinner at the Texas Roadhouse capped another nice day with friends at Blue Springs, and the following day we journeyed back to the coast to Long Point County Park.
Long Point is an interesting island park in the Intracoastal Waterway that at first view seems to be just a big open space surrounded by water. Almost all sites had a small boat launch, like the one on the right at our site below. The park permits longer term stays (several months), and is ideal for fisherman and winter Floridians.
Our cousin, Chris, and her hub, Ted, are campers too, and we were happy to learn that while we were at Long Point, they would be just a few miles away at Sebastian Inlet State Park! We got together several times and enjoyed an exploration of the island just off Long Point and accessible via a short walking bridge.
Anne found a super sized garden center in the nearby town of Wabasso, and we spent a few hours and a few bucks there. Although the plants there were not too unique, the garden center's grounds were unmatched in our experience. Have a look.....
We capped off our visit with Chris and Ted with a great dining experience at a coastal restaurant, Cafe Coconut Cove. But, unfortunately, the next day as we prepared to leave Long Point, the bridge going south on A1A was closed for 1 1/2 hours. Fortunately, we stopped before going part way up the bridge, and were able to unhook our car, turn around and go North out of town - about a 1 1/2 hour detour!
And now we move down the Treasure Coast to Jonathan Dickinson .......
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