Sea Turtle Rescue

We toured the sea turtle rescue operation on Jekyll Island in Georgia. If turtles get too cold they loose all energy and wash up on shore. This organization examines them, gives them IV fluids, warms them up and sends them on their way.

We also biked around the island mostly on a very nice bike trail. Biking through all these live oaks with Spanish Moss (which is neither Spanish nor moss) blowing in the breeze and grazing the top of my helmet was a lovely experience. 

 

Moochers At Our Campsite

We had some moochers at our campsite. Mooching ducks.

The armadillo wasn't mooching. The armadillo was happily digging bugs out of the soil.

Besides 8 mooching ducks there were a dozen domestic rabbits mooching.

A mooching rabbit and a non-mooching armadillo.

I had looked for armadillos in Texas and never found any.

I was happy to find this one.

 

Saint Augustine

We visited the Castillo de San Marcos National Monument in Saint Augustine.

Saint Augustine is a cute town.

We walked across the old town to the oldest house where we had a tour.

 

Tortoise Strut

I love walking the beach with the sanderlings. I think they are just the cutest little birds dashing in and out of the waves as they roll into shore.

Later, on a bike ride, we found this gopher tortoise walking along the edge of the parking lot.

Just a tortoise doing tortoisey things.

This tortoise has places to go and people to see.

OMG, this tortoise has such a cute strut.

 

Hamnet

 I finished a book called Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell. This story starts out in 1580's when a woman named Agnes gets married. She has 3 children, Susanna plus her twins Hamnet and Judith. When the twins are 11 years old Judith falls sick with the plague. Hamnet loves his sister and decides to take her place when death comes to get her. The book is about the grief Agnes feels after the death of Hamnet. Years later her husband writes a play about his son. Basically the book is about William Shakespeare's wife. This was an interesting story about olden times.

Space Center

We stayed at that hip camp near Cape Canaveral so we could visit the Kennedy Space Center.

We spent the day there entering different buildings and watching NASA films.

We took a bus to another location to see the bigger rockets. 

We both agreed that the information was over the top, self-aggrandizing, pro-NASA propaganda. After a while this grated on our nerves.

 

Pole Vaulting

 

Once we finished touring the west coast of Florida, the Everglades, and Key Largo, we headed up the Atlantic side. We stayed in KOA's, state parks, regional parks, national parks, and a couple hip camps. I was unfamiliar with hip camps. Hip camps are usually on farms and have only the basics. This hip camp had electricity and an outhouse. This hip camp also had chickens and a turkey. I slept without a watch nor a phone so I didn't realize that the roosters started crowing at 1 in the morning. I think if I had known I would have been more bothered by the noise. Next to this hobby farm was, according to the hip camp owner, the third largest bee farm in the country. They mail bees all over the United States.

The hip camp owner is a 3rd generation pole vaulter. She and her husband met in college where they were both pole vaulters. Now they run a pole vaulting school on their property. When we arrived there were six students practicing pole vaulting in the Florida sun. We didn't get much sleep because of the roosters but it was an interesting place to stay.