A Day Trip to Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary

Every once in awhile, we get antsy and want to get out on the road. We really miss the RVing lifestyle! Sometimes it's a magnificent trip to Alaska, most of the time it's a little day trip somewhere. There's lots to do and see in Florida, that's for sure! Several years ago, we visited Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary near Naples, FL, about 30 miles east. Must have been about seven years or more, so we thought it would be cool to set out for Naples and revisit this wonderful place once again. It's a little less than two hours from Bradenton. We read that it had sustained some damage from Hurricane Irma, but was open to the public. It is open from 7:30-5:30PM every day of the year. So off we went!

It did not disappoint! The boardwalk is a 2.5 mile walk around the swamp, which had dried up in many places. This is normal for this time of year, it's the dry season. The birds move around and in different spots as the water levels rise and lower depending upon the weather and the season. The weather was hot today, and although there is some shade as you walk around, you can easily get overheated if you don't bring water. AHEM! You can get overheated if you don't bring water! (We forgot.)We saw the usual anhingas, anhingas doing a mating dance/ritual, which is NOT so usual. These two love birds were twining and untwining their necks around each other. They were either getting ready to make a nest, or they were just cementing their relationship before getting started!

We saw lots of strangler figs that manage to securely attach themselves to trees. They make such interesting patterns! The ficus aurea, the Florida fig is common around here. The seeds are dropped usually near the tops of trees by birds, then they grow their roots downward and start wrapping and grafting several roots together around the host tree. Sometimes the host tree will die, but some times they do not. If the host tree is older than the strangler fig, it will mostly likely die and rot away, leaving a tree column of roots with the trunk made of this circular pattern of roots. It then provides shelter and habitat for forest animals, so it's not all bad news!

Sparky spotted a red bellied woodpecker high up in a tree. 

And then, we happened upon a group of people intently looking over the boardwalk at a snake (ugh) who had just ambushed a frog, (really ugh...) and was just starting to eat it. Ewwwwwwww....

Let's go see something pretty, says Sparky to Eldo, so we moved on.....This is much better!

This is a wood stork...he's got one wing hanging out occasionally. While he's foraging for food, he will stick out one wing to provide shade so he can see better in the marsh, "the better to eat you with, my dear!" He was oblivious to the gawkers on the boardwalk. Guess they are really used to seeing people. We walked the whole 2.5 miles, even though we were hot. You never know what you are going to see around the corner. Whaddya know....another snake...ugh again. At least this one wasn't eating anything at the moment.

Probably one of the coolest things we saw was this yellow crowned night heron. Normally, they are sort of sleepyheads during the day, and out of sight, but this one was out and about. He didn't care at all that Sparky was immediately above him!

He was beautiful! He sat and posed for a long time, even though this guy was near by......Sparky just read in a Scholastic Magazine to the kids at school last week that if an alligator eats an animal or fairly good size meal, he might not eat again for a year!

We were coming to the end of the boardwalk...a couple more sightings...a little blue heron strutting along on a mission....

And some beautiful wild iris....

It was a lovely day, not a cloud in the sky....We highly recommend visiting here. Just a note: We did see a LOT of hurricane damage,

lots of trees down, big ones. The boardwalk is damaged and closed off in several places like in different connecting sections but we were still able to go for a nice long walk and see so much while we were there. I hope they will continue to repair and reconstruct this beautiful Audubon site. It's a treasure for southwestern Florida, that's for sure!

The Venice Rookery...Another Hotbed of Birding Activity

Wow! Every January thru May, the Venice Rookery hosts a multitude of egrets, great blue herons, anhingas, glossy ibis, an occasional gator or two for nesting season. (Months are approximate)....We love going down there from Bradenton in the early morning or late afternoon. It's about a 40 minute drive from our house and well worth it....

Depending upon what month you go determines the showy displays of the mating egrets and herons. Last year we went in April and Sparky got TONS of BIG, beautiful plume feather displays. This year we went a little earlier and the birds seem to have already settled down somewhat into their nests with their mates. We think they still will be doing courtship dances a little while longer.

It's a simple little place, a little park off of 41 down in Venice. Here are the directions from Bradenton or Sarasota: head 75 South to the Jacaranda Boulevard exit--stay on Jacaranda all the way to 41. Turn right on 41, go about half a block and turn left right by the state police building--there's a small brown sign that says "Venice Rookery" close to the turn. 

You see everyone sporting all kinds of cameras from their little iPhones trying to take photos, to the big humongous lenses that the more experienced photographers have. Personally, Sparky has been VERY happy with just a Canon point and shoot 50X lens camera called the SX530. Here are some shots from last year with that camera.

And one more....

Here are some photos from a trip to the rookery last Sunday....These photos are with a Nikon P900 which has an 85X zoom!  This camera is MUCH heavier, but wow! What a zoom!

Sparky watched a great blue heron ferry twigs and branches from one side of the pond to the other. It was beautiful to watch the collaborative efforts of the herons to build their nest.

At one point, it looked like the one ferrying all the twigs and branches got tired.....Doesn't he look like he's saying, "Why me, Lord?"

And here's a little weirdness...these cormorants at each other's throats! Either they were having a little battle about something, or one was feeding the other, (but we never saw any food exchanged). One stuck his head completely down the other's throat! 

If you ever get a chance to visit the rookery during the winter months down in Venice, FL, you should go see the beautiful displays of mating plumage and hear the noise the young ones put forth as they are waiting to be fed. It's just a little island in the middle of the park, but there are TONS of birds and babies to be seen. Sparky thinks the young great blue herons look like little Groucho Marx. With all the little chicks fussing and hollering to be fed, it's quite the ruckus! Sparky's favorite photo of the day? This one below, where the young great blue heron photobombed the nest building.

                                        

                                      Have a great day!

Sarasota is a HOTBED of Birding Activity!

Sparky has been SUPER busy subbing....almost every day since school started back in August. She LOVES it! She gets to get dressed up, be silly, and read her favorite books when she does kindergarten. Her latest favorite book is, The Day the Crayons Quit. The kids love the part where the beige crayon asks his owner to stop peeling the paper off the beige crayon because he feels "naked" and doesn't want to come out of the box. They love this book so much that they asked Sparky to read it twice while she was there. Her favorite grades are kindergarten, first grade, and fifth grade....Just this past week, the little kindergartners have been celebrating St. Patrick's Day all week long. They made leprechaun traps to catch pesky little leprechauns. The kid that made this one said he made it all by himself, haha. 

The kids come up in front of their classmates and tell how their trap works. One little boy went totally blank when Sparky asked him how his trap worked. You should have seen the deer-in-the-headlights look when she asked. There was a big pause, and finally he says, "Uh...I don't know. It was dark. My mom made this after I went to bed." All righty, then.....

Each day or so, the teacher does something different to indicate that the leprechaun has visited. She might sprinkle glitter to leave a path like he's been through their room on one day, and in the room Sparky subbed in, the assisting reading teacher went through and created a chaotic trail of glitter, notes, and mischievous deeds. 
The notes were like, "Haha, you almost caught me!" and "Thanks for all this gold, I'm going shopping!" The kids went crazy when they saw what happened. "He broke my ladder!" "He left me a note!" "I almost got him with my trap!" One little boy said, "My dad says there is no such thing as leprechauns, but I think there is!" So there, poopy dad!

If Sparky is not subbing on a particular day, she is out looking for birds and nature stuff....There are TWO eagles nests within a few miles of our home...One has chicks that are about ready to leave the nest, the other has chicks just beginning to flutter their wings in the nest.

They are always magnificent to see and watch....Here is a youngster who looks like just about ready to fly the coop.

And sure enough, in a few minutes, he did....


We are so fortunate to have these sightings here in Bradenton and Sarasota....


See you soon at the Venice Rookery, another terrific birding spot!

A Little Scare....

Sparky has been wondering and worrying a bit about Eldy since his quadruple bypass two years ago in February. She's been watching his fatigue level, which continues to be a problem, and wondering why the doctors don't do another stress test once a year to check for new blockages. Eldy has a very good heart/cardiologist doctor...he's one of the best in Sarasota, and the cardiac team at Sarasota Memorial Hospital has been ranked as one of the best in the country recently, so if they weren't thinking that was necessary, then we were accepting it. Eldo hasn't complained much about anything since the heart surgery, but that's the way he is....

So, a couple of weeks ago, he mentioned that he had been feeling "weird" and having more than the usual number of "odd" sensations in his chest. Then finally, on a Sunday, he said he was concerned...and you gals know, that when a guy finally admits something is not right and is ready to go to the doctor, SOMETHING IS NOT RIGHT! Eldy was having big belching, burping indigestion problems, he felt pain in his left shoulder, his blood pressure was up, he felt a tightness in his chest and he said his jaw was twitching. Sparky asked about the blood pressure and it was higher than normal for him. He had checked it four times unbeknownst to Sparky, and of course was stressing out about the readings, as each time they were registering higher. He was thinking that maybe he should get checked out. MAYBE?????  We're going NOW! said Sparky.  We started out with an urgent care center in Sarasota. In hindsight, we should have headed straight for the emergency room, but we both thought the urgent care center could handle the symptoms...Sometimes angina mimics heart attack symptoms, and we also thought indigestion could be part of the problem.

After about 45 minutes at one of the local urgent care centers, and their inability to provide a simple razor to shave Eldo's hairy chest and do an EKG because the leads wouldn't stick, they sent us to the emergency room at Sarasota Memorial Hospital, where he got in right away....Four hours later, the EKG was normal and the cardiac enzyme tests came back normal. We were given a sheet on angina, and the attending physician had talked to Eldy's heart doctor and they both said he could come home but to follow up with an office visit soon. We were super impressed once again with the care and prompt attention given to Eldy, being that the emergency room was PACKED on a Sunday night. The attending emergency room doctor personally called Eldy's physician right away after the test results came back and got the OK-to-go-home response right back. Everyone was courteous and efficient despite LOTS going on at the hospital that night--car wrecks, a code blue, and more.

A beautiful mosaic wall near the emergency room at SMH

We learned a lot more about angina, which had not been in Eldy's medical history thus far, that was given to us in an info sheet and it was a little disconcerting as far as someone might misinterpret a heart attack as angina. Here were some of the facts listed on the informational sheet:

1. Angina is not always felt as chest pain and it isn't always in the chest. It might feel like discomfort, aching tightness, or pressure that comes and goes. You can feel this in your chest, back, arm, shoulder, neck or jaw. 

2. Tiredness that gets worse or you have more shortness of breath that usual for no apparent reason.

3. Shortness of breath while doing something that use to be easy.

4. Heartburn, nausea, indigestion, or sweating.

5. It usually happens during an activity. It can also occur if you are upset, or after a large meal. It can also happen when the weather is too hot or too cold.

Call 9-1-1 right away if these symptoms last for more than a few minutes....

It was a little disconcerting to see that the symptoms of angina can be VERY similar to a heart attack, so how is one supposed to know? When in doubt, head to the emergency room! As a wrap up, Eldo is going to have a nuclear imaging test, and a sleep apnea test to check for the amount of oxygen he's getting while sleeping which might be contributing to his high levels of fatigue that he seems to be experiencing more than what he should, at least that's what Nurse Sparky thinks!

So-o-o-o-o...everything is back to normal, and so far, the follow up tests are looking good. It could have been indigestion or a little angina, but we are happy that everything worked out ok.....

What's in our near future? A trip to St. Augustine, and Sparky will be posting some local nature trips....Come back and see us!

Well, Hello Once Again!

Life really keeps us busy and time gets away from us....But every once in awhile, it's nice to get back to the blog to document our lives, and we always appreciate anyone who stops by to read.....What are Sparky and Eldo up to these days?


In November, Sparky's daughter and handsome little grandson came for a visit.....We went to Coquina Beach and he had a wonderful time! Coquina Beach is a nicer beach, in Sparky's humble opinion, than Siesta Key Beach. There is a lot of shade from Australian pines, and a shaded boardwalk that stretches for a couple of miles. You can walk or ride your bike from one end of the walk to the other and get some great exercise, or have a picnic at one of the many picnic tables along the boardwalk in the shade. There is a wonderful playground for kids, informational kiosks, and plenty of places to sit and watch boats come in and go out in the channel or you can fish along the shoreline.

Sparky took the kids to Marie Selby Gardens, in Sarasota. They have a fabulous rain forest garden for children. You can walk across a suspended wooden bridge and jiggle it as you walk to make anyone nervous that's trying to cross, (Grandma was naughty), you can play several different musical instruments as you travel through the kids' sections of the rainforest---marimba style, drums, and other percussion style instruments. There are cool sculptures for the kids to climb on. The gardens have fabulous displays, sometimes from guest artist exhibitions to holiday lights celebrations. The koi pond is cool with a waterfall and a special bell to ring that just beckons anyone walking by to ring it.

Sparky's favorite at the gardens is the huge tree--it's either some kind of fig or banyan tree, she can't remember....Grandson loved it, too....

And when not visiting the beaches or cool places, it was great to just rest and show Eldo how to play video games....

Got a lot more catching up to do, but right now, we gotta go......
See you again soon...we promise!

What Floridians Do on a Balmy Night....

Well...some of us anyway...Sparky was at the store the other night picking up a few things, so she thought she'd call home and see if Eldo needed anything. She WAS going to get him ice cream from Culver's for a dessert treat and was on her way there.  "No, can't really think of---OH MY GOD! THERE'S AN ALLIGATOR WALKING THROUGH OUR BACKYARD!!! yells Eldy on the phone.

"GET A PICTURE, TAKE A PICTURE, GET YOUR PHONE OUT THERE AND TAKE A PICTURE!" Sparky hollers back and hangs up fast. And she boogies home as quickly and as safely as she can, damn the ice cream, a gator is walking through our backyard!

Now, alligators are common in our neighborhood. We see them all the time---in PONDS, with their heads above water...We see them on the pond riverbanks in the neighborhood occasionally. Most of the time if they see you coming, they skedaddle right back into the water. We have NEVER seen one walk through the back yard in the four and a half years we have lived in Bradenton. There is no pond that is very close to the house, although one pond is halfway down our street. So to see a good sized gator waltzing down the golf course fairway and sauntering through people's back yards is something new. This one was about 8 feet long and he had a company of three sandhill cranes with him. The cranes appeared to be protective of him. Sparky was at first walking towards the cranes and the gator, and they promptly went into a warning dance, jumping up and down, flapping their weeks and making a racket. They were close to the gator and he wasn't interested. He looked like he had had a recent big meal, his belly and throat were distended and full. She didn't know if they were warning to stay away from the gator, or they were just alarmed at Sparky being on the scene. The cranes  in our neighborhood are quite tame and will come up very close to you if they think you might have food. Sparky and Eldy quickly hopped on the golf cart and started following the gator.

Sparky was texting a neighbor friend and told her about the gator. The neighbor was eager to see a gator, as she hadn't seen hardly any since she moved here earlier this year. Eldy graciously hopped off the cart so the neighbor could come along for the ride. Sparky went and picked her up on the golf cart. She was so excited! Sparky says, "Wanna get closer?" And game friend that she is, "SURE!" So we did. And then, "HE'S UP WALKING! OMG, OMG!"  She was SO excited to see this!

We picked up a second neighbor and continued to follow at a safe distance. The gator headed for the sand trap and then plunked down for a rest.

Can you imagine hitting your ball into a sand trap and then coming up over the crest of the hill to see the alligator in the trap?  Don't think anybody would go after their ball, do you? :-) With him deciding to take a rest, and it starting to get dark, we headed back to our house, just a few doors away......

It was a fun way to end the day...and interesting to see the cranes' behavior and how close they stayed to the gator as he walked down the fairway.

Bye for now!

Hurricane Irma Part 2

Monday morning.....we awoke....turned on the news and Irma was passed Bradenton...It had blown through, rather slowly at a less than category 1 storm...winds gusting from 45-90 mph. Sparky had a website called Next Door, where neighborhoods can set up a little private network of their own for neighbors to check on neighbors. You can request information about the best service people to use, what companies are good, and one of the best requests, "We are out of town, but how does our house look after the storm?" Because it's just your neighborhood and neighbors, it seems like a safe site to use. Sparky sent out a request, and a neighbor walking her dog was kind enough to report back, "Your pool cage has a branch through the screen, but it's just a small hole. Everything else looks ok!" Whew! Dodged a bullet there! It could have been really bad...the southern part got hit much harder than we did.

Sparky was anxious to get back home. Eldo, not so much. He was thinking, "Why not just stay here in Myrtle Beach, play a little golf, and wait for all the hubbub to die down?" But he knew how much Sparky missed school and the little kids, and how much she wanted to get back as soon as possible, just in case school resumed quickly. So we left late Monday morning. With no decision made on school other than it was closed Monday and Tuesday, Sparky was ready to go. There was just one slight problem. The outer bands of the hurricane were scheduled to pass through South Carolina close to the time we would be making our way back in the direction of Florida. Let's see what happened....

We drove and drove and drove....through bands of strong winds and heavy heavy rain. Just when we thought it was a bad idea to have headed home, the winds would calm down and the rain would completely stop. We kept going. Things started to get a little alarming once we got into Georgia. All the ramps were closed getting off I-95 through Georgia. We didn't know why....Apparently, the exits were closed due to the exodus of people leaving Florida, and the hurricane headed northwest tracking through Georgia and they hadn't opened back up yet. As the night deepened, the highway remained extremely dark. There were no overhead lamps illuminating the exits, there were no lights to be seen along the exits, where the gas stations, convenience stores and restaurants were. There were no gas stations open. There were no restaurants open. NOTHING was open. The area was without power. Uh-oh...we started worrying about gas, hearing that gas supplies were available. There was no electricity for miles and miles. We had kept our tank filled and topped off after having a terrible time getting gas once we were in the southern part of South Carolina. We started seeing lines and lines at the gas pumps and the gas pumps were closed off. We realized this was going to be a problem the rest of the way home.

Once we hit the border of Florida and Georgia, we were wiped out. It was about midnight. We pulled off the I-95 exit and interchange at I-75 in Wildwood, FL, deciding to see if we could find a place to spend the night and finish the drive the next morning. The most surreal scene greeted us. (Sorry for no photos, time of day and sheer exhaustion caused us to go into survival mode). Picture this...a major interchange with cars strewn all over the place in and around the gas stations....People sleeping in their cars in gas lines, lines of cars 25 or more deep, waiting for gas deliveries the stations said would be coming by morning. People sitting on the tops of their cars, parked willy-nilly all over in parking lots, on hillsides, like a demolition derby had just taken place and everyone had climbed out of their cars to wait the rest of the night out or choosing to sleep in them. People with children and babies trying to get some sleep, wondering where and when the gas would come. Others walking aimlessly around, talking to strangers. There was a motel right there, a Days Inn. A sign on the door said, "Sold Out" and it was locked. Sparky had to go to the bathroom, BAD! So she knocked on the door. The night clerk motioned to a little side window and Sparky explained her need. Sure, said the lady, and unlocked the door to let her in. After Sparky used the bathroom, she asked if she and Eldo could park the car in the back of the motel and just rest for a few hours. The lady took one look at Eldy, head down in the car and said, "Actually, we have a handicapped room still available. Would you like that one?" and Sparky WANTED  to say, "DOES A BEAR SHIT IN THE WOODS????" but she mustered up an effusive, "OH, YES! We WOULD! Bless you! Thank you SO MUCH" And we took it. Guess they were holding the room for anyone handicapped. At midnight, it had not been claimed, so we took it. They could have charged us an arm and a leg for it under the circumstances, but it was 116.00. That was all right. it was doable. Eldo climbed into bed and within 5 minutes was snoring logs. Sparky had her shower, and then she collapsed, too.

At 5:00 AM, we were back up and ready to roll. The thought of making it home on a low tank of gas was worrisome, but we had enough to make it. We headed for the highway entrance ramp for 75 south which had a line of 50+ cars in it at a dead stop. Nobody was moving. We couldn't figure out why until we saw a cop directing people AROUND the line of cars and it turned out the ramp was blocked because people were in a gas line that wrapped around the corner from the highway. We suspected that some people might have run out of gas in that line, but we didn't know for sure. We had to do a U-turn and come back the other way to get on the highway. As we got on I-75, there were cars after cars after cars on the shoulder. They had all run out of gas. We arrived home at 7:00 AM or so, and saw that the gas pumps were all out of gas in and around our exit as well....Unreal.....We have never experienced that nor seen anything like this ever!  We are old enough to remember gas rationing back in the early 70's but this was a lot worse....

Triple hurricanes 9/10/17

And wouldn't you know....school was cancelled for the rest of the week! Sparky owes Eldo, BIG time! :-) As we recovered from our ordeal, many emotions hit us the first couple of days back from having evacuated. Sparky was very emotional and tried to figure out why....(she's normally calm as a cucumber and very little gets her upset). Having missed a terrible storm, seeing others be not as fortunate, makes you feel guilty a bit. The Florida Keys got hammered. We felt terrible at the losses some RVing friends suffered from the damages to the Keys.

It was really really stressful....It took time to calm down and get back to normal, whatever that was and is...We learned some things about hurricanes in the process and being ready for the next one. We are not sure if we would stay or go the next time, but we do know how to prepare and how to be ready. We don't think we would stay in a shelter. There were some real horror stories about how people treated the shelter facilities in Sarasota. People left dirty diapers in children's desks in some of the schools that served as shelters. There was animal feces and other awful junk left behind.

We aren't blasé any more. We have a much more personal connection now with the weather here in Florida. We will have better supplies on hand next time. We will keep a "go" bag ready and packed a few days prior to having to evacuate if we do. We saw the power of a tropical storm, almost hurricane force winds, and we have a greater respect for the power it does have. It's been a busy hurricane season this year, THREE in the Atlantic basin at one time, Katia, Jose and Irma, something our weatherman says he has never seen. However, we are blessed to be in a location that has VERY few hurricanes actually come into the area. We are not worried. BUT--we will think about some new windows and we really should think about a new roof!

Until next time.....(not hurricane time!)

                                                             Eldo and Sparky