Outdoors
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Washed Up
I’m a little lonely today. It’s cloudy outside, the sun hasn’t peaked out and said hello, the cats are curled up, and everyone is out somewhere, doing something and I’m not. Reviewing the rest of the Cayo Costa photos make me a little depressed. Call it two weekends of not getting outside, that’s probably my problem. So, I’m savoring the washed up fauna that found its way onto the shore… Oystercatchers…the first time I’ve seen these birds. A gannett…not sure if it was injured or feigning injury, but it was nice to see the bird up close. An ancient animal, horseshoe crab… Even the man-made objects get washed up…
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Wordless Wednesday
Play along here
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Tomatoes Make Me Happy
I’m going through some older photos from the past years. No tomatoes this year. But, they make me happy. They are the perfect plant, I think. They smell divine, their fruit is delicious and they are just so pretty. We still have tomato sauce from last year. Not a jar of spaghetti sauce bought in this house all year! My mind is wound up these days. I follow Chris Guillebeau in my email and have been for awhile. He said something in a recent blog post that stuck with me: “The road not taken. The destination not explored. The adventure not pursued. The life unlived. If we’re going to lose…
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Garden Bits—in Reverse
I had the day off for a doctors appointment and spent the morning mowing the back yard. It was seriously over grown, weeds had over taken half the yard. I also surveyed the frost damage from last week. It always takes two to three days for the damage to be known and sure enough the tell-tale signs of browning and curling were beginning. The ylang ylang took a hit as did the tropical almond and other tenders. I once had a starfruit seedling that bit the dust after a 45* night. Very tender tropicals. I think most everything will recover now that it has warmed up, but I will keep…
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Sanibel Sunset
Until I get the comments working again, I’ve put in my old commenting system that you can use. I’m finally trying to finish up our Christmas weekend trip to Sanibel. Here are the sunset photos from the day after Christmas. All but the last were taken at Blind Pass, the pass between Sanibel and Captiva islands. The last was taken at the last public access beach on Captiva. This one is Chris’. I like it…very wild and untamed look to it. I always feel a little reluctant to leave the beach after a sunset like that—a sad goodbye to a great day.
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Sunset—New Years Eve on Turner River Road
I know, comments aren’t working. boo on you wordpress…trying to get up up and running soon. Chris and I got off early on New Years Eve and decided to hit Big Cypress National Preserve to capture the last sunset of the decade. We also were aiming for photos of the Blue Moon but were unsuccessful due to clouds in the east that prevented a decent moon rise from being seen. The only glimpse we saw was for a few minutes but it was still partially hidden between the clouds. By the time it was up and shining, it was dark and we couldn’t find a decent place to take a…
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Florida Trail: Hickory Hammock to Hicks Slough (Avon Park Air Force Range)
This weekend, like last year, we went on a backpacking trip. This year we started off at the Hickory Hammock Florida Trail trail head on U.S. 98 between Sebring and Bassinger with the intentions of just walking north until we felt like turning around to come home. We got a late start on Friday after sleeping in a bit and then driving the two hours north. Before we left we checked the weather and weren’t too pleased with the forecast—rain and then a cold front right behind it. It didn’t start raining until we entered Lake Placid at nearly lunch time. We took some back roads to get to the…
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Heaven is a Place on Earth
Ok, so the title is slightly kitchy, but it came to me as Belinda Carlisle was singing to me on the way home from work today. Sanibel is heaven on Earth. It is one of the places that furthered my interest in marine biology growing up. We went to Sanibel and Fort Myers beach for vacation a few years when I was growing up and we loved it. I always thought when I moved to Florida that I would be living over there, but we never have. I hardly ever get to go, maybe once a year; it’s a good two hour drive from the house and we are often…
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Solstice Sunset
Rarely do we get blessed with such great clouds. The strong wind on Saturday brought rippling effects to the clouds and the sunset for our hike made a beautiful ending to the day. Which one do you like best?