Been Wandering: If You Scratch...

“If you scratch, you will only make it worse,” Karen said with a somewhat cheerful voice as I scratched my arms and legs in the safe confines of our trailer. A bit of background – I must lay claim to the above words as our sons will well remember:) We had just finished setting the trailer up at Collier Seminole State Park in the heart of the Everglades. We were fine for the first part of the exercise until the mosquitoes discovered that fresh meat had arrived. There were not a lot of them, but the ones that showed up were definitely prepared for dinner. Didn't they know it is the dry season?? However, we knew this park was going to be iffy as it was in the Everglades, and we were right. Of course one of the benefits of being in mosquy territory was we could very quickly discover the shortcomings in our trailers mosquy defenses. Dusk found us scrambling for our electronic mosquy zapper ... and then scrambling for batteries for our electronic mosquy zapper. Soon our floor was littered with little charred bodies and we could retire without that annoying ear buzzing that mosquitoes have perfected. The next morning found me adding foam weather strips to the screen door to block further attacks – we hope.

To get to the Everglades from the East coast, we drove across the lower part of Florida along a highway named Alligator Alley. There were waterways along both sides of the road and the waterways were home to – you guessed it – alligators. Karen kept calling out sightings as we drove along. We soon ran out of fingers and toes so have no idea how many we saw. Let's just say lots and lots of various sizes. During a lunch stop, we learned why you do not want to play on the rocks at the side of the road.

My guess was that this little guy was a water moccasin.

At Collier Seminole, we had a great introduction to the Everglades. Our first excursion was along the Fakahatchee Board Walk near the park. Karen, the main photographer, emerged from behind the lens briefly at the start of the 1600ft board walk.

The boardwalk wound off into the heart of the Everglades – what mysteries lie before us?

Several flowers, under the general category of “flowerus prettious,” were seen along the way.

Our first bird sighting was a bald eagle's nest. There was a young eagle (eaglet?) in the nest.

And a proud parent stood nearby.

We were lucky to spot a white tailed doe with her little fawn – complete with Bambi spots – making their way past the board walk.

At the end of the walk was a large pond filled with baby alligators. It was an alligator nursery. Mother was in the shadows and numerous small alligators were practicing their “let's be still and catch something” technique.

Our next stop was Everglade City where we happened onto a boat tour ride through the Ten Thousand Islands of Everglades National Park. The number of islands apparently varies between 8000 and 14000 depending on who is counting and the tide level. Most of the islands are covered in mangroves and mosquitoes. Along the way, we passed one of many Osprey nests. Osprey's mate for life and they have recorded the same pair returning to the same nest for over 20 years. However, they do take separate summer vacations.

We were also lucky to spot our first Manatee. In our previous travels through Florida we have never seen a Manatee and we were starting to believe they were a somewhat mythical creature. But we did see one – or at least its tail as it dove.

We next went to Chokoloskee Island and visited Smallwood General Store – the only trading post in the area in the eary 1900's. It was accessible only by boat and served the local community and Indian bands. There was a lot of alligator hunting and trapping going in in this area until it became a park.

There is nothing like stopping at a picnic site to stretch your legs. But here, you have to share the site and swimming is not really advisable.