April 16, 2012

Big Cypress, Venice, and Clearwater


After a nice quiet night in the swamp (no wind!), we rolled out of the Skunk Ape campground bright and early since we had a long day of driving ahead of us. First we backtracked to drive the scenic road through the Big Cypress Swamp. When Everglades National Park was established in 1947, Big Cypress was originally intended to be included; however, because the land had not been purchased from its private owners, Big Cypress was ultimately released from the park system.
 



It wasn’t established until 1974 and there are still some private houses along the drive and they are surrounded by stockade fences. I thought they were really private people but I realized they lived in a swamp surrounded by many killer creatures (including the elusive Skunk Ape) so a good defense was probably the best strategy. The scenic road was a well maintained dirt road and it wound through some dense cypress growth with many alligators. Only one skittered off the road in front of us.
Can you see his tail?
Hopping back on the Tamiami trail, we stopped at the Oasis Visitor Center. There was a ditch of water out front that was also teeming with alligators.
  Our last stop in the area was the post office in Ochopee.

It is the smallest post office in the United States. The building used to be a storage facility for irrigation pipes of an adjacent tomato farm. It was turned into a post office, in 1953, after a fire which destroyed Ochopee's previous post office and general store. I made sure to mail myself a postcard from this famous post office.
 
It was now time to leave Southern Florida. I took over driving and we wound our way up the west coast of Florida. After lunch, we stopped at Caspersen Beach in Venice. This beach is known for its abundance of shark teeth.
We arrived armed only with a small bucket but were quickly intimated by the nets and other sieve tools that other beachgoers possessed. Undeterred Jess started scooping out buckets and dumping them on the beach for Lindsay and I to comb thorough. Alas, neither of us found anything but Jess managed to find 2 shark teeth!
Jess and Lindsay looking for shark teeth
I really liked this beach. I definitely prefer Gulf Coast to Atlantic Coast. It's just so much calmer (and warmer).
 
Continuing on North crossed the Sunshine Skyway Bridge which Jess and Lindsay warned me about. Apparently it is quite famous as The Travel Channel rated the Sunshine Skyway #3 in its special on the "Top 10 Bridges" in the World. The bridge is considered the "flag bridge" of Florida. It is also infamous for collapsing in 1980 when a freighter ran into it during a storm and 35 people were killed.
We drove into Clearwater to enjoy one last time at the beach. We went to Sand Key Park which is a a gorgeous beach. After playing around in the waves for a while we dried off on our towels and spyed on a beach wedding.
This picture is my "Ariel" moment

April 12, 2012

The Everglades: Part II

 
 Another highlight of the Everglades is the drive to the Flamingo Visitor Center. Driving down the road to it, Jess and I laughed at this sign that acknowledged the so called “pass”. In Colorado a pass was measure in thousands, not single digits. 
Driving along we saw a glimpse of pink birds that I excitedly thought were flamingos but it turns out they were spoonbills. Despite the name of the area, flamingo sightings are quite rare and typically only in the backcountry of the Everglades. At the Visitor Center the Ranger did point us to a place to see saltwater crocodiles and we actually got to see several! They are definitely a lot more skittish than the alligators and we didn’t get too up close but it was still really exciting.
Here's my zoomed in crocodile
While viewing the crocodiles we also saw a massive osprey nest with an osprey on top of the pole. We had kept seeing osprey's driving around but it was nice to view one up close.

While checking out the osprey, people also pointed out that there was a manatee close by so we checked that out as well.  
Manatee
The Everglades is chock full of wildlife and you definitely don’t have to wander far from your car to check it out.
After getting our fill of the Everglades, it was time to drive across the Tamiami trail to our campground for the night. We passed through the Miccosukee Tribe reservation and this is about all I learned about them:
The original alligator show?
Jess had discovered the Skunk Ape research center online which also ran a campground and decided that it was a good place for three single women to spend the night. The Florida Skunk Ape is the Southernmost Bigfoot in the U.S.A and gets its name from the awful stench that it emits. We were on the lookout for it along the road but didn’t see any glaring Skunk Ape signage. We decided to keep driving until we found food and gas and ask for directions there. Luckily food and gas were but a few more miles down the road and when we asked we were told “its back that way 4 miles, you can’t miss it”. Well apparently you can because we did. Driving back we realized it was the place we passed with a giant panther statue out front. I guess we were expecting more Skunk Ape signage.

The Skunk Ape Peacock
Upon arrival, we warily entered the “Research Center” to grab our campsite for the night. The gentleman who helped us was very nice and even gave us some free skunk ape bumper stickers. We were directed to enter the gate where another gentleman on a four wheeler (mounted with some steer horns) escorted us to our campsite. We had the choice of: a lovely lakeside spot where we were told “an alligator lives around there…but he probably won’t bother you” or a site under a tree next to “a tree house haunted with Indian spirits.” We opted for tree house. We asked where the bathrooms were and were told “that red building over there, just walk past the old jet engine.” With that, we were all set for a night in the swamp. The bugs actually weren’t too bad at all and we had a nice quiet night. For a bedtime story, I read from the Skunk Ape Field Guide that Jess had purchased. Did you know that Skunk Ape's love lima beans?
Sunset in the swamp

April 9, 2012

The Everglades: Part I


After leaving the Alligator Farm we headed into the actual Everglades National Park. We made sure to stop and pose with this panther statue outside of the Visitor Center. Jess and I never hesitate to climb all over a National Park statue.
  
Due to its abundance of wildlife, the star attraction that the Ranger pointed us to was the Anhinga Trail. As we drove down to the parking lot we noticed that half the cars in the parking lot were covered with tarps. Obviously we were missing something. We finally saw a sign near the bathrooms that warned vultures may eat the rubber off of your car so it was advised to protect it with the provided tarps. As we weren’t planning on staying long, we decided to risk it. Luckily this did not end up happening. Can you imagine coming back to your car and seeing this!?
 
The Anhinga trail winds through a sawgrass marsh, where we saw all kinds of good stuff!

I love the color of this guy's beak

Drying his wings
One of the many birds we saw
We caught this guy eating his lunch
The eye color of this guy was so pretty!
This bird let us get realllly close
Vultures and gators
There were tons of gators swimming around
The Anhinga Trail is definitely a must see in the Everglades. We only spent about 45 minutes walking around but the amount of flora and fauna we got to see was amazing. 

April 7, 2012

Everglades Alligator Farm

Day Seven (Friday, March 16th):
Last night we ended up staying at a hotel in Key Largo because we were too exhausted to make the drive to the Everglades. We made full use of the shower to scrub off the deserted island feel and arrived in the Everglades the next day as new women. Looking good, our first stop was the Everglades Alligator Farm. When Jess mentioned seeing gators and taking an airboat ride in the Everglades I was expecting some redneck shack with a few gators and a wild eyed guide but the Farm was actually really nice. We got to see all kinds of stuff:
Baby Gators
Crocodiles
Turtles. Lindsay even fed these little guys!
Tortoise
The elusive Florida panther. I caught him with his eyes open!
A blue eyed goose with crazy feathers
But of course the star attractions were these guys!!
Gators, gators everywhere. I obviously have not spent a lot of time around alligators but I think they are very interesting creatures. Most of the time they just lay around like logs (ah the perks of being cold blooded) but Lindsay started feeding some of them and they started moving around and they just look like dinosaurs.
Here's 'Grampa' at `14 feet long
My favorite part was the airboat ride. Not wanting to lose the cover of my awesome hat, I wisely slipped the required ear protection right over top.
 We hopped in alongside Pschyo Paul (our driver) and trolled down a small creek where there were plenty of alligators to be seen.
Psycho Paul

 

Then we hit the wide open grass and went cruising. The airboats are pretty loud but we all had ear protection and the ride was so smooth that I could have ridden around all day. Psycho Paul even spun us around and sprayed us with water in some spots which was really fun.
It was so cool to see the “river of grass” as the Everglades is known.

 Arriving back at the Farm, it was time for the Alligator Show where a crazy man angers a gator...
...and then holds the gators mouth open with his chin while tourists wait with cameras poised to capture the moment when the gator wins.
Alas the crazy man conquered while the gator just wandered off affronted. The audience participation portion is when a baby gator with tape around his mouth gets passed around to the excited tourists. The funniest thing was that the crazy man just hands out 2 gators and walks away to collect tips.  I definitely could have walked out of there with a baby gator if I wanted to.
 
With gators on the brain, Jess and I had some fried gator for lunch. It was so delicious. We wondered just how “fresh” the meat was as hundreds of gators lay within throwing distance of the food truck.
After a short walk through the nature trail it was feeding time for the gators. Once again crazy man graced us with his presence and proceeded to throw dead rats to a bunch of gators. I thought it would be more of a frenzy but I guess they are used to getting food thrown at them several times a day. It’s funny to watch them miss through because they have blind spots and they can’t see the rat when its right in front of them.