Trip15

Sunday.

Got up, packed up, visited the neighbors, visited Lovie, Dovie, Bert, Jack, and ZZ, sat on the dock a while, and were off by 11:30. Drove all the way back up the Keys. I can now announce that Louisville is safe: we drove right past the yard statuary store and did not stop to buy a five-foot high concrete manatee holding a mailbox (well, they do ship). Had lunch. Marveled at the beauty of the Keys. Started planning our next trip to the Keys. Drove to Florida City and turned left. Drove into the Everglades National Park, and all the way out to the Flamingo Visitor Center and campground on Florida Bay.

The whole time we were in the Keys, we kept Annie out of the ocean. We didn’t want to mess with the salt water, and the mess she would make back in the car. We didn’t want her to be fish food, with all the barracudas swimming around, or gator food. We made it all the way to the last day of the trip. While we were sitting on the dock, motorhome packed, taking our last look out over the ocean, we heard a “plop” behind us. It was Annie in the water. She just couldn’t stand it any longer. She jumped off the dock into the shallow water. She was headed for the deeper water. Judy headed her off. We drove away with a happy wet dog in Judy’s lap.

We have a winner! You know, that contest to see who can get the biggest, most expensive, most garishly painted, most attention grabbing motorhome? Now I know brother Bill is saying to himself right now, “We already have a winner. It’s that ‘hooked on a dream’ behemoth with the programmable light sign board in the windshield we saw at the Grizzly RV Park in West Yellowstone.” That’s last year’s winner. This year’s winner is a giant pusher with all the pimp lights on around the smoked glass mirrors inside. The Italian opera is playing on the outdoor entertainment center. Purple lights glow outside from underneath the entire coach. This is all good, but not enough by itself. It still needs one more thing. What locked up the title is that the purple lights glowing underneath the entire coach are linked to the music. They are pulsating in time to the music. Now that’s class.

Tonight we’re in a National Park Campground. It’s a wide-open field with a few trees, and lots of space between each site. But we’re back to generators. I forgot about generators. Fifth wheel generators in particular. They’re always the loudest. It doesn’t seem that fifth wheels come with generator compartments at all. They all seem to have some industrial size generator in the back of the pickup, or set on the ground out in the open, grinding away. Fifth wheel campers. Enjoying the serenity of the outdoors to the roar of their generator. Generator hours are eight to eight. The fifth wheel behind us ran theirs from eight to eight. Maybe it doesn’t have a battery on board at all. Maybe that is their only source of electricity. Happily, the sites are all spaced fifty feet apart, so nobody is right next to us. And they all have to go off by eight pm, so we can hear the night after that. I like State Parks better, because they have electrical hookups.

Birded for a while at a swamp pond here. Saw an ibis tree. Saw egrets, pelicans, hawk, anhingas, coots, moorhens, pied billed grebe, green heron, turkey vultures, black vultures, and three alligators. No purple gallinule.

Went for a run. Got chased by mosquitoes. Pretty thick.

Two hundred mile day. Docks sitting to start. Neighbor visiting. Bird cuddling. Cat drugging. Driving. Birding. Mosquito slapping. No new birds.

Tomorrow, our chance to explore the Everglades. We signed up for two nights here.