A Weekend Tour of Central Florida

We decided to do a short kayaking trip on Arbuckle Creek, north to Lake Arbuckle. It was a nice paddle, but when we broke out onto the lake, it was windy! We paddled over to the nearest ramp to pull out and eat lunch. There was a man in a guard shack who told us where a restroom was...we ate lunch..no one ever told us we were not authorized to be there!

The way back downstream to the put in.

We passed about 8 little bitty gators who started to grunt for their mama when we got too close. Never saw mama, but we quickly paddled away!

We had to experience Spook Hill in Lake Wales. If you've never done it, I highly recommend it. It HAS to be an illusion, but it's a very convincing one...your car gets pulled UP hill! Fun stuff!

I guess to someone from Pennsylvania, our orange groves are fascinating.

We did a little caching...

Checkout out Okeechobee...these Wood Storks were in a pond in a pasture on the way in to town. Pretty cool!

Stopped at Jonathan Dickinson State Park...

and Blowing Rocks in Jupiter. Ida made the waves and wind incredible! It was an awesome sight!

Then it was back to the airport in Ft. Lauderdale after a pitstop at Bass Pro.
A busy but really fun weekend and I can't wait to do it again!

Some Crazy Redneck Fun

Have you ever heard of lawnmower racing? Up until not too long ago, I'd never heard of it either. But this past weekend, I was invited to go to the lawnmower races in Avon Park.

My good friends, Suhzon and Corky who live in Sebring, invited Aidan and I to go with them to the races. They'd been before to watch a friend of their's (and fellow geocacher) race his mower and thought I'd enjoy it. I'd read about it in a magazine and it sounded like fun, so we met up with them Saturday evening to head over to Avon Park.

There were quite a few people there... bleachers, hotdogs and the sound of motors racing! Did you know there are different classes of mowers? I knew there were push mowers and riding mowers, but that's about it. These mowers are incredible!

I asked Dave how fast his mower goes, and he said, "On the highway or on the track?"

Are you serious??? "Okaaay", I said "...on the highway."

"74."

Oh. My. God.

"And between 38-40mph on the track."

Dave won first place in his class and gave his trophy to Aidan. How cool is that?

This is his 74 mph mower. (Heh, and I am happy with my new motorless reel mower!)

It was a fun night. Just some crazy redneck fun and I can't wait to see more!

If you want to see a short video I took, click here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stAiNinXwMo