Thursday March 11th 2021

A little less wind and plenty of sunshine made another beautiful day. The temperature peaked a little above eighty. Tomorrow is forecast to be similar.

Today was dedicated to catching up on a lot of little chores around my RV home. The clutter after a week and a half here was in need of rearranging and the sink was starting to accumulate a few dirty dishes. I probably should have gotten the vacuum cleaner out, but I took a walk around the park and forgot about it.

The noise pollution from the drag strip down the road a little way is increasing. There is often the loud noise associated with a revving engine and tire burns on the weekends. During this visit it has been all day every day. When I drove by the drag strip earlier in the week it looked like they were preparing for a major event. There were many trailers and motorhomes in the drag strip parking lot. Most of the time I block out the noise, but it started before I got out of bed this morning. What little wind we have is also aiding the propagation of the noise in this direction.

Just like last week the campground began to transition into weekend mode today. The travelers that left this morning were replaced by RVs from Florida. Families are arriving for a weekend of fun. Sunday and Monday the park will probably transition back to hosting more travelers. I won’t know for sure since I’m moving on Monday.

Wednesday March 10th 2021

Today’s weather was another incremental change from Tuesday. It was a few degrees warmer into the high seventies, but otherwise a full repeat complete with the northeast wind.

I visited another of the area preserves today. This time drove into the middle of Sarasota to visit Red Bug Slough Preserve. The name is certainly unique. It is 72 acres of undeveloped land with hardwood and pine forests around ponds and drainage areas dredged from swampy creeks. It serves two purposes. The biggest use is as a recreation area, but its biggest value may be as a flood control area.

There is a small playground, picnic tables, trails for walking, running and biking along with the possibility of catching fish in the parks ponds. The trails are not well marked. They seem to go every which way, but you can’t get lost the entire area is surrounded by roads and housing developments. Most of the people that use the park come from the nearby homes. There is only one small dirt parking area.

I spent a couple of hours waking the trail and watching the wildlife in the pond. All of the pictures in this blog entry came from the preserve. I saw lots of turtles and a few water birds. There were plenty of warnings about alligators, but I didn’t see any today. By far the most common animal were the dogs getting walked by their people. Some of the alligator warning signs were design to keep the dog walkers out of the most alligator prone areas.

Monday March 8th 2021

Today was another day with a strong north wind. It was stronger than Sunday’s wind and kept the temperature from rising much above seventy. As long as you had a little bit of shelter from the full force of the wind, it was a beautiful day.

After my visit to Robinson Preserve last week, I wanted to visit the other side of the Manatee River today. On the northern bank of the Manatee river were it empties into Tampa Bay is Emerson Point Preserve. It contains trails, and ponds, as well as river and bay access. I walked about a mile loop on two of the trails before driving out to the point. The preserve seems to be very popular for watching the world go by on the river and in the bay. Many people had brought chairs to sit in the sun on the shore.

I saw the usual complement of water birds along the shore and in the ponds. While taking pictures of some of them the grass about fifteen feet in front of my position started to move. A raccoon was prowling the grass. It spotted me about the same time I saw it. After freezing for a few seconds it turned toward me picked up speed. I thought I was about to be attacked by a rabid raccoon, but it had something else in mind. About five or ten feet in front of me was the dirt bank along the trail. The raccoon disappeared into a borrow in the bank.

The raccoon wasn’t the only out of the ordinary animal sighting today. A few minutes after the raccoon sighting I saw an otter crossing the road. It was crossing from the pond on one side of the road to the canal on the other. It was way to fast to get a picture.

Sunday March 7th 2021

Today had a clear blue sky from sun up to sun down. The only thing detracting from perfect weather was the strong north wind. Not only did it make a lot of noise on the roof and slide toppers of my RV home, it made the outside temperature sweatshirt weather. The temperature peaked at seventy degrees, but it seemed much cooler.

My big activity for the day was a hike around the trails in the state park. I didn’t want to compete with all the other weekend revelers at some of the more popular parks and beaches in the area. Here at Lake Manatee State Park there were a few people in for picnics in the day use area, but the boat launch area was emptier than usual. The strong wind produced a heavy chop on the lake. Boating was not a good choice for the days activity. Walking the trails was good exercise, but I didn’t see anything unique or remarkable.

The park had about a fifty percent turn over today. That seems to be about normal for a Sunday. It didn’t take long for a new group of people to arrive and occupy the empty sites. The mix of origins still favors travelers over Florida residents. Midwest origins caught my attention among today’s arrivals. There were several RVs from Illinois and Wisconsin with one slightly rarer traveler from Iowa. California and Washington remain the distance traveled winners in the mini contest I run in my head.

Wednesday March 3rd 2021

On Monday morning, nearly 200 miles north of here, I woke up to a heavy rain storm moving through the area. I don’t think that front passed through this area. This morning around 8AM a similar storm passed through this area. It rained very hard for half to three quarters of an hour then started to clear up. The impact on the temperature was drastic. Yesterday’s high temperature was in the upper eighties. Today’s high was seventy for a brief period when the sun was out in full force. By sunset the temperature was in the low sixties. The weather roller coaster continues.

Driving around the area this morning the traffic was heavy. Back in December I thought the tourists and snowbirds weren’t around and the traffic was light. Today it seemed as heavy as in past years. There were plenty of out of state license plates contributing to the congestion. On Interstate 75 I passed two accidents with vehicles off the road in the short distance between Bradenton and Sarasota. In many ways it seems like any other March in the area, but then you are reminded of the current conditions. The local TV station showed pictures from the Atlanta Braves Baltimore Orioles spring training game. There were only 1800 people in the 7000 person capacity stadium for the shortened seven inning game. I’m OK with not seeing any games this year.

This afternoon I had a visitation session with one of the state parks gofer tortoises. While I was on a walk through the day use area on my way to the lake, I spotted a tortoise in the volleyball court. I sat at one of the picnic tables and watched it wander and eat. It came within about fifteen feet of my location before it realized it was being watched. After locking its eyes on me for a good minute, it turned and headed away at a good pace. It was a long way away from cover, so I didn’t harass it by following.

Tuesday March 2nd 2021

I finally got to sleep in this morning. After yesterday’s early start and stress filled travel day, it was really necessary. The reported morning fog was already gone by 9AM when I got my day started. It turned into a mostly sunny warm day with a high temperature in the mid 80s. The normal temperature at this time of year in this area is the mid seventies. The rest of the week is forecast to be closer to normal.

Most of my day was dedicated to rest and relaxation. I walked to the day use area and the boat launch a couple of times. One of the resident gopher tortoises didn’t appreciate my presence. It ran across the path and into the woods faster than I though a tortoise could move. Once it was in the relative safety of the brush it froze in the shadows and watched me. I can only guess that its hole in the ground home was near by.

Walking around the campground I detected a difference in the residents from my last visit in January. The sites are now occupied by travelers. In January most of the sites were occupied by Florida residents. Today I saw RVs from as far away as California and Washington state. Very few sites were occupied by RVs with Florida plates. That tracks with yesterday’s observations on my travel down Interstate 75. There were many RVs on the road from northern states. Tourism is still reported to be down, but I think there are plenty of brave, pandemic weary or unconcerned travelers around. The viral surges in November and December kept many people home, but cold weather and snow along with a lower COVID positivity rate and vaccines seem to allow people to justify coming down here.