Blue Springs SP Sep 1-3
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Record #379 DATE: 9/1/2015 DAY: Tue ST: FL NAME: Blue Springs SP LOCATION: Orange City Blue Springs SP was the destination of this 3 day trip. The schools are open now, and the traffic was very congested. It took an hour to make it to I4, but after that, traffic moved along. I took advantage of both rest areas on I4. How nice to have an almost perfect level area to park at my campsite. A shaded paved path lead from campsite 19 down to the springs. Thank goodness the walk was under 1/2 mile. Not like Wekiva Springs two weeks ago that was over a mile to walk to the springs. The entire spring and run out to the St. John's River has a boardwalk next to it. It was a most enjoyable walk. As I neared the river, the clear spring water suddenly changed to tannic dark color. I did not remember anything about the area. I thought that during the time that Ross & I had a power boat, that we had traveled to this area. Oh well, maybe we did and I just cannot remember. Back in those days, I did not write logs. Well, after the scouting trip, I returned to the camper to change into bathing suit and take my mask with me to swim in the run. I started downstream and managed to swim up to the spring - a good workout. An unbelievable number of fish were in the water. Some of them were 3-4 feet long. Wow! When I floated over the springs, it brought back memories of my cave diving days. We never dove this spring, but it looks just like all the others I did dive. On my walk back to the camper, saw an ARMADILLO & RABBIT. The third train since I have been here has just passed. FEC mainline is just outside the park limits. I enjoyed a pork slice with BBQ sauce and broccoli for dinner. Since it was not raining, ya, I could take an evening walk. It is quite a walk around the two loops of the CG, and then I walked back down to the run and river. It was starting to get dark, so the wildlife was starting to appear. TURKEY VULTURES, flock of TURKEYS, RED-SHOULDER HAWK, OWLS (only sound), ALLIGATOR, and a bunch of RABBITS.
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Record #380 DATE: 9/2/2015 DAY: Wed ST: FL NAME: Blue Springs SP LOCATION: Orange City After getting up in bed at 9:30pm to read, a train passed, and another woke me up at midnight. At 7:30am this morning, a train got me up and moving. Boy, it was tough getting the body going. A walk around the two CG loops several times picked up my spirits. A 9:30am train was during my eggs, blintz, and bacon breakfast. Of course with that kind of breakfast, I had to walk again several times of the loops. Another train, what fun; wish I could see them. However on the walk were overhead two helicopters that continued a back and forth pattern. I wonder what they are looking for? After 1/2 hour, and going onto an hour, it had become annoying. So much for peace and quiet of the CG. A late morning/early afternoon swim was as refreshing and tiring as yesterday. If I did this everyday for a week or so, I sure would lose those pesky pounds I put on this year. During the swim another train, and a return of the helicopters - right over the spring! After several minutes, they moved on. Good! Sure don't like the feeling of helplessness of being right under them if they went down. With the afternoon temperatures at 90 degrees, it was an easy decision to stay in the camper with the AC making it very comfortable. There just is no way to enjoy camping in FL summer temps without having electric to cool things off. A Jacksonville MRR convention will be in October. This last month I have been creating a PowerPoint presentation to give. The subject will be about the move of the WVN to Tampa and how the layout has changed. There is a ton of material to present, and clinics should run no more than an hour. So, today I ran though the presentation, speaking out loud, and timing the whole thing. Part 1 and 2 were 15 minutes each and part 3, 30 minutes. Well, it is close enough that I could talk faster, or remove some things. It is ready for Greg to edit and comment. While washing dinner dishes, it poured. The rain was hitting mostly the kitchen side of the camper. Sure enough there was water on the counter like it was a couple days ago in our driveway. Being here in the camper while it was raining showed me it was coming down the wall behind the stove top. Well, I cannot go outside to check, but it is probably coming in the kitchen fan opening. The tape sealing it up must have come off. At least, I hope that is the problem, because I can fix that! I was hoping to take an evening walk, but it is still raining at 7pm. Guess it will be reading, music, and FreeCell for the rest of the night.
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Record #381 DATE: 9/3/2015 DAY: Thu ST: FL NAME: home LOCATION: Tampa No trains to wake me up at 7:30am. I finally got moving and went out at 8am for many loops around the CG. There are now 15 campsites occupied out of 61. It will be a lot more by Friday and the Labor Day weekend. Not much of a desire for a big breakfast, so had orange juice, and an apple cut up with cereal. This morning, I finished reading "Polar Shift" by Clive Cussler that was started at Wekiva Springs SP trip. A visit to the dump station was really easy. So nice to have a steep incline to dump and not difficult for me to do alone. When exiting the park, a side trip was made down a unpaved road to the river and a boat launching location. If a kayak can ever be put up on the roof, it would be enjoyable to paddle the river. When arriving at I4, the traffic was backed up from an accident. The good thing was the accident was right after the on ramp on the east side of I4. Well, both directions were stopped or slow going. However, with patience driving on the on-ramp up to the merge, traffic let me in. Only took about 5 minutes to finally clear the accident area, and had no more issues with traffic on the way home to Tampa.
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