His & Hers

We have made it back to the north country! We ended up driving the SSR while our friend Ken, drove the van back home. Ken and his father Don, had helped our mutual friend Di (who is now 93 and still skipper of her catamaran) bring her boat across the gulfstream to Stuart. He volunteered to drive the van back home, which saved him flights and also saved Dave another trip to Florida to bring the SSR north. Both vehicles ran flawlessly. A heads up for anyone driving I 95 though...the roads in South Carolina are really rough! Anyway, Dave did a great job of winterizing the house when he came back last fall to get the Mustang, and everything is up and running just fine. He had also finished cleaning up all the leaves, which is making our spring work really easy. We have never had so few leaves and branches to get rid of. Today we got both tractors going and mowed and mulched what leaves were left. Then we raked and vacuumed in the tight spaces. Every year we say that we are going to take our time, but then we start working and want to get everything done at once. 

His and her tractors getting cleaned up after the first mow (yes it was cold enough to have winter coats on!)...

Tomorrow we head up to Ticonderoga to see how everything made it through the winter up there. Hopefully all the snow that fell off the roof in the last snowstorm has melted. It makes us really glad that we were in Florida!

Going Out On A High Note

Our time in the south is rapidly drawing to a close. We were lucky enough with the weather to get two more kayak trips in before washing and storing them for the summer. Since it was the weekend, we left at 8 AM both days to beat the crowds, and it really paid off, especially yesterday. We wanted to see if there were any nesting birds left on Bird Island, and we certainly were not disappointed. We could hear the din from far away, and it looked like several of the different juvenile birds were trying out their wings and then flying back to the trees. 

We only saw a few roseate spoonbills, but the trees were loaded with brown pelicans, wood storks and surprisingly, frigate birds (also called man o' war birds). Frigate birds spend most of their lives in flight, so this was a fairly rare sighting as they must have made landfall and bred on the island. 

There was one frigate bird that seemed to be a loner and chose to sit on a nearby piling, instead of with the rest of the noisy birds in the trees. It was quite content to just stare over at the activity on the island. 

On our return paddle to Sewell's Point Park, we came across a pod of dolphins feeding where the deeper water meets the sandbar, pushing the fish up into the shallows. I didn't take any photos, but it was quite an experience with them everywhere we looked. One went right under my kayak too! 

🐟🐡

This morning we took one last trip to Sandsprit Park and paddled Manatee Pocket. Despite the fact that the launch ramp and boat trailer parking lots were full, there weren't that many boats motoring in the harbor. That made for a very pleasant time looking at all the marinas, yachts, houses, and... more dolphins! There were four of them this time, swimming very close to the surface and all of them kept very close together. What a great way to end our winter! 

😎

 

Not Your Typical Car Show

It has been almost a week since the Wheels Across the Pond Show in Jupiter, and I just realized I hadn't posted any photos about it yet. This show was for European vehicles only, mainly British. Hopefully we remember correctly what everything was. 😉

On our way into the show, we saw this factory made Mini-Cooper truck. The owner had installed a small turbo charger on the original Austin 4-cylinder engine.

Nice line up of MGA sports cars. One of these had a Buick aluminum V-8 engine.

I believe this is an Allard J2 Cabriolet.

I had to have Dave stand next to this Lotus to show how tiny it was.

Lotus aluminum body kit cars...

We moseyed to the nearby beach parking lot when we saw this Rat Rod. How low can you go? It sat on the ground until we saw it raised up pneumatically as it drove by us awhile later.

A very classy wine and beer truck.

A 1950s Mercedes Gull Wing...

A 1957 Isetta 400, one of my favorite cars. It is hard to see, but it had a big wind-up key on the back.

Another Isetta, which must be so challenging to drive.

Another favorite type of cars, there were several Metropolitans being displayed.

1926 Rolls Royce...

Nice Bentley hood ornament.

The perfect pair...a two wheel Triumph being towed by a four wheel Triumph.

A late model Jaguar Roadster. 

An English Taxi next to a Morris Minor. Note the right hand drive on the taxi.

Top of the Morris Minor Beatle themed car.

This is an open air Fiat Jolly, complete with wicker seats and a surrey top.

The inside of a brand new Bentley convertible.

There is a company in Jupiter reproducing these Allards at a base price of $250,000!

Motorcycles were a part of the show too. This is a 1967 Norton.

A gorgeous 1973 Triumph 650 Tiger Scrambler...

We think this was a 1959 Matchless.

Dave really admired these old bicycles...

Most of the time that we were in the park, bagpipers were walking around and playing. British music was also played through the loud speakers, adding to the ambiance. 

The turnout of vehicles was a bit lower than last year, but we were glad we went to experience this unique event. 

Gator!

We recently took a walk on the path around Hilmoor Lake, where we launch our kayaks sometimes. We have seen the 'beware of alligator' signs but have only seen small ones while paddling. As we walked out into the shade of one of the gazebos overlooking the water, we spied a much bigger gator eying us. Unfortunately, it must be that people feed him and the turtles, because this 6 footer, along with a large turtle, immediately swam up to us looking for a hand-out. 

"Sorry you two, we don't feed the wildlife. There is plenty of fish in the lake for you to eat."

Shell Shocked

Look at the cute little conch shell that Dave found in the surf at the Peck Lake beach this morning. No animals were living in it and it cleaned up nicely. 

I didn't realize it at the time, but if you zoom in on Dave's sunglasses, you will see me taking the photo. 

This was our last kayak trip out to our favorite secluded beach on Jupiter Island, and once again there wasn't a soul there. The water was calm, warm, and looked more like the Bahamas than we have seen it this season. We sure will miss this when we go back north. Then again, we have a whole other diverse life up there too!

😎

Fort Pierce Port Tour

What a view while kayaking Fort Pierce! What more could we want besides, tugs, barges, ships, and yachts?

Wrecks of course! These were along the western shore going north and were probably victims of the hurricanes this past fall. Last year when we saw the Trumpy motoryacht, it was still floating, but now it rests perfectly upright on the bottom. The shrimp boat is in about 6" of water, and last time we saw the ex-naval boat that is now on land, it was floating in a marina. We couldn't help but wonder if it blew or floated where it is now, or if it was brought there on purpose.

This sailboat washed ashore...

This dismasted sailboat looked to have had a fire and it certainly had lots of stuff on deck.

We keep running across the sailboat 'Notluf' which used to belong to friends in the Bahamas. It now seems to be a liveaboard. We also talked to a sailing catamaran captain who just returned from the Bahamas. It felt like we were back cruising on our boat again!

What a fantastic day of kayaking explorations! Hopefully we can do more like this before we prepare to head back home towards the end of April.

VWs Galore!

This past weekend was the annual No Dough VW car show in Port Orange. We haven't been in a few years, so it was a perfect opportunity to head north and also see my brother Rick, sister-in-law Eva, and nephew Matthew. What a fun day we all had despite the 90 degree heat. The show must have had an all time record number of vehicles attending. There were so many that it went all the way around the Port Orange City Center Circle. There were Volkswagen Beetles, vans, Westfalias, transporters, busses, dune buggies, Karmann Ghias, VW Things, and many other contraptions and inventions.

A Buc-ee's Bug including a convertible replica on the roof...

Nice Food Vendor set-up...

Notice the David Bradley cowl on the minibike on the back of this trike...

What a cool 'scooter bike' next to this transporter...

A stretched VW Thing...

Vehicles were around the pond. This van had the best and biggest awning, which was perfect for the hot day.

This Thing had a convertible top and lots of added accessories.

How low can you go? We missed the car limbo contest though, which would have been really funny to watch.

Notice the exhaust...

It's all in the details and extras at this show. This van was ready for a Woodstock revival.

Cool taxi!

Creamsicle themed...

We had a couple of favorites in the show. This hippie/band themed van was one of them. Even the inside had 'passengers' and we thought the cat on the pillow was real at first. 

Our second choice was this 1947 Flexible Clipper bus decked out as a camper. It had period correct appliances in it too. Nice rehab job!

What a great day with family and it was all so different! Next year we will do it all over again!

😎