Loving Florida

Hello again! Sorry about the lack of pictures on the last Blog! This time I will try to do a bit better. The first few pictures were taken in Georgia that were suppose to be with the last entry!! Tybee Island Beach was on the Atlantic Ocean and quite different from the Gulf of Mexico. It was quite cold and windy when we were there, so we didn't stay too long.....we found ourselves a Crab Shack instead and spent the afternoon dining on fresh seafood instead of collecting shells.





For the last 3 1/2 weeks we have been biding our time in Florida, enjoying the sun and sea as well as some inland areas. The first place we visited was Highlands Hammock State Park, close to Tampa. This is where we has our first really good look at alligators in the wild...up close. We also saw lots of turtles and birds..plus an armadillo that was very obliging at letting me get a good picture of him. The ones in Texas were very camera shy!! I will put these pictures up the next section.
The trip from Georgia to Highlands Hammock SP was interesting to say the least. Once we were through Orlando, we happened to pick up something in one of our trailer tires and it blew in the fast lane on the Intersate Hwy.. A car came buzzing up beside us and the driver was making motions with his hands of something spinning and pointing back at our trailer! We knew what that meant! We were able to get over into the inside land and pull off the side. When we got out we were greeted by the smell of burning rubber and an empty tire rim on the back driver side of the trailer!! The side of the trailer was bent in and the fender around the tires was broken off (it is made of fiberglass). The blown tire was wrapped around the axle of the trailer and was not going to budge. We spent an hour on the side of the road waiting for help to change the tire. Once the tire was changed we had to drive back to the previous small town to a Discount Tire and have them struggle to remove the remains of the tire from the axle. Once done we went happliy on our way to the State Park. This was a day that was suppose to be a short drive with an early arrival. It ended up being one of our longest travel days. The Warden as the State Park was nice enough to wait around until we arrived (well after dark) and show us to our campsite. The lesson we learned from this day was to never say "This will be an easy drive!"