Let's jump right in.
Last weekend, we went canoeing down the Weeki Watchee River (that means "winding river" to the Seminole Indians who found it). Weeki Watchee is famous for its crystal clear spring (the bottom of which has never been found) and for having the first live mermaid show in the nation...a show that still performs today, although we did not go to it.
They started putting on the live mermaid shows in 1947. If you're interested in reading about the history of Weeki Watchee, you can do so here.
At any rate, it is about an hour's drive away, but is so gorgeous. We tried to take our canoe, but they made us rent one of theirs. We were going 6 miles down river and needed the canoe company to pick us up and transport us back.
Anyway...
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| This is the grass under the crystal clear water. |
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| Here's a better view. The water looks like a swimming pool. Beautiful turquoise blue. |
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| Sorry, you're going to see more shots of my back... |
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| We saw lots of big fish, like these guys. Not sure what they were, but they were all at least a foot long. |
Although, there were times we were seemingly alone in the river, there were actually places where there were tons of people, some of which were drunken hillbillies. There were people in motor boats, people who seemed incapable of operating a canoe, and lots of people either jumping from very high tree branches into the water, or jumping in off of rope swings. This seemed like extremely risky behavior. Especially as we had been warned not to swim in the water, and saw signs that this is an "Active Water Moccasin Breeding Area." At any rate, we rowed quickly through the areas of congestion, but next time would maybe try to go on a weekday.
There were also places along the water that were lined with houses.
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| Loved this place with the garage door on the water... |
Here was the most exciting thing...
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| Yep...that there folks is a manatee. Right up close. |
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| Not a huge one, but still pretty big... |
So anyway, that was Weeki Watchee. Pretty cool, huh?
In other news, you may have heard we had a bit of a hurricane down here. We lucked out in that it did not hit us directly. We got a ton of rain, and our back yard flooded a bit.
After the first day of the storm, where nearby Largo got over a foot of rain, I posted this to my Facebook page.
On Thursday, it hardly rained all day, and then, once I went to come home from work, all hell broke loose.
I ended up driving through the red part of the storm on the Courtney Campbell Causeway, which was without a doubt, the most terrifying ride of my life. I could not see at all through the heavy rain and 60 mph wind gusts. It was like driving across a bridge with my eyes shut.
Anyway, I made it home alive, thank goodness. We were very lucky all around that it wasn't a lot worse.
Whew!
So now the weather has settled back down. Yesterday, Glenn and I decided to go to a nature preserve we hadn't been to before in nearby Oldsmar, called Mobbly Bayou.
Mobbly Bayou is the home of a newly created adventure park. Here's a suspension bridge that people cross before ziplining across the lake (we didn't do any of this of course, we were just there to walk.)
It was near here that we saw a big gator. This guy was at least 6 feet long, maybe more.
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| Am I crazy, or is a turtle swimming right in front of his nose? |
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| Do you see the little turtle face? |
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| I think this is a speckled heron. We don't see these very often. |
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| Pretty guy |
We walked around this area for a while and then decided to walk to Mobbly Beach - thinking they would be close to each other. Let's just say it ended up being a much longer walk than either of us anticipated.
Still scenic though.
We got to the beach, which is actually directly across the bay from Phillipe Park in Safety Harbor.
I should mention that after the hurricane left town, we have resumed our normal scorching temperatures. But it is nice to have the sun back.
We didn't take the dogs to Mobbly, but we took them on a walk today, and they are beat.
Last night, we went to Clearwater Beach for dinner and sat out on the beach afterwards.
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| Hi! |
Alright guys, that's it for this post. Hope you enjoyed it and all had a great holiday weekend! Love ya!
