Saturday March 11th 2023

After last nights rain filled front passed through the area, it was another nice day. The humidity was down a lot and the temperature was a few degrees cooler. The peak temperature was in the low eighties with a good breeze. There is another twenty four hours before the next front arrives with more rain.

Exploring other areas of the park today I found more signs of tree damage from the storm. There are more trees down in the other camping loop as well. All of the trees seem to have fallen in the same basic direction. The camping loops sit in an island of trees surrounded by open areas with only low bushes and a few trees. Combined with the nearby lake it is possible for the wind to really build up some strength.

This is the start of spring break. Most of the Florida school systems have the upcoming week off. That has an influence on the people in the state park. A lot of tent camping families arrived yesterday and more today. The TV news indicates that record numbers of spring breakers from other parts of the country are expected in the area over the next few weeks. There is concern that the beaches will not be usable because of red tide. Many dead fish wash up on different beaches every day. The red tide has been moving north and south along the west coast of the Florida peninsular.

Wandering around the park today, I started to see some wildlife. Unlike the south Florida area I was in the last three weeks, this area doesn’t have a ton of water birds. Even though there is a large body of water in Lake Manatee, it doesn’t seem to attract birds. The wildlife I spotted today was the ground variety. First up was a Gopher Tortoise feeding on some grass in the picnic area. There were also plenty of squirrels in the picnic area. Later in the day on my walk to the boat launch, I walked up on an Armadillo. We were both pretty startled. It made a quick retreat into the brush as I tried to get a quick picture.

Friday March 10th 2023

The weather was nice again today, but the forecast is showing signs of change. It was sunny and warm today. The high temperature was in the mid eighties. As night approached so did a line of storms coming in off the Gulf of Mexico. This is the first break in about six weeks. It was only a brief period of rain, but more storms and change are due over the weekend and during the day on Monday. A low temperature in the forties is forecast for the overnight Tuesday into Wednesday.

Today was focused on relaxing, settling in and refreshing my knowledge of the park. It has been more than a year since my last visit. On a positive note they have constructed a new pavilion near the water in the picnic area. On a less positive note there have been a lot of changes to appearance of the park. Some of it was planned and some of it was the result of storm damage. On the planned side is a large area that was subjected to a controlled fire. In that area the brush is gone, some of the bigger trees are burn scared and the grown is black in color. It was long enough in the past that the grown level palms are all green again.

In the campground proper the foliage between the sites has been thinned out. I’m not sure if this was planned or associated with the clean up of the storm damage. There are many trees that are down in the park. Most of them as the result of being uprooted. I presume this is the result of hurricane Ian. There is a lot of new open space. The trees that interfered with guest parts of the park have been removed, but the ones that are out of the way are still on the ground. There are also a few trees that are no longer standing straight, but are still living. I can’t make up my mind if the changes are superficial or result in a change to the over all character of the park. So far I haven’t checked out the other camping loop. Maybe the storm damage isn’t as visible there.

Thursday March 9th 2023

Today was sunny with only a little wind. It was a good day for travel. The temperature peaked in the mid eighties where I was at the heat of the day. It may have been warmer a my point of origin. One hundred plus miles north in Florida seems to make a difference.

I packed up and departed Collier-Seminole State Park at quarter to one in the afternoon. My departure was complicated by finding space to hookup my car for towing. In older state parks like Collier-Seminole there isn’t enough room along the campground roads near the sites. My usual solution is to use the day use area parking lot to complete the coupling. Today that was a long walk away. I was actually ready to leave the site before noon. Moving the car, walking back, using the dump station and then driving the motorhome to the day use area for the hookup took the better part of an hour.

My only stop on the 140 mile drive north was at a gas station under ten miles after I left the state park. I had scouted the station for good access earlier in the week. Unfortunately, the driver of a gray pickup didn’t know my plans. I entered the station from the back and came around the building to line up with the last row of pumps. A gray pickup truck was parked at that pump. The driver was probably inside the convenience store. I waited a good distance away for over five minutes with no sight of the driver. With plenty of room to maneuver I gave up waiting and continued on my way intending to stop at a station in Fort Meyers I have used in the past. Somehow a combination of traffic and maybe a missing sign, I drove right by the correct exit. I arrived at my destination with a little less than a quarter tank and a few more gray hairs from anxiety.

Starting in the Fort Meyers area and continuing most of the way to my destination I started to see signs of hurricane Ian damage. Even five months later there is still a lot of damage to things like road signs, billboards and other high business signs. I suspect similar damage is why I missed the gas station sign in Fort Meyers. North of Fort Meyers I think there were a number of areas with tree damage, but it is hard to say for sure.

The last thirty miles of my trip were the worst. Traffic was heavy through the Sarasota Bradenton area and a few areas of construction really slowed everything down. I can’t say I ever came to a complete stop, but the forward progress was down to 10MPH a few times. It was after three thirty when I arrived at Lake Manatee State Park in Bradenton Fl. Once again I used the day use area here to unhitch my car. The difference is I can almost see the day use area from my campsite.

Wednesday March 8th 2023

The beautiful sunny weather pattern broke a little today. The day started out cloudy and dull. There were a few brief periods of sun, but overall it wasn’t a fantastic day. Even with the cloud cover the temperature climbed into the mid eighties. Right when I set out on my final walk of the day, the sky opened up for a few minutes. It was enough that I got really wet in the 300 feet I had to navigate in the rain to get back to my RV home. It was over by the time I closed the vents.

The dull weather was perfect for getting a few chores done. The big one was the laundry. I checked the machine availability. Both of the two sets of machines at the nearest restroom were available. By the time I returned to my RV home, gathered the dirty clothes and laundry supplies then returned, one of the two sets was already in use. As I started to load the machine another dude arrived to use the machines. There was clearly a run on doing the laundry today, but I had my place in the queue. The actual time in the machines was only about ninety minutes. Once you add in the prep time, the walking to and from the facility time and putting everything away, it was well over a two hour chore. I did manage to eat a meal during the fifty minute dryer run.

This is my last day at Collier-Seminole State Park. Tomorrow I have a 140 mile drive north to the Bradenton FL area. My target departure time is between 11:30 and noon. Checkout time is 1PM, so I have some leeway. It will be mostly Interstate highway driving. Hopefully I can find a place to fill up the gas tank before I reach the highway.

Tueaday March 7th 2023

There were a few more clouds and a little less wind than yesterday, but the temperature still made it into the upper eighties. Along with the clouds came a little more humidity. It still isn’t uncomfortable during the day out of the direct sun. The good news is that the overnight temperature still gets down into good sleeping temperatures in the sixties.

My neighbors decided to leave early this morning. Shortly after 7AM I heard the chatter of RVers preparing to depart. Directions like “a little more” and “your clear” filtered in my open bedroom window. I didn’t really know where the voices were coming from and didn’t really care. It was only a brief sleep interruption and I was back to some kind of dreamland. When actually got up an hour or so later the occupants on both sides of me were gone.

I had errands to run in Naples today, but I stopped at the Marsh trial in the Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge to visit the birds on my way. There weren’t as many birds near the trail today, but there were still plenty begging me to take their picture. In particular there were fewer Anhingas and no visible Rosetta Spoonbills. On the positive side the Ospry was perched at the top of a tall tree watching everything.

It was very busy in the shopping area I visit in the outskirts of Naples. The area at the intersection of the main access route to Marco Island and the Tamiami trail is a major attraction. I suspect it gets a lot of Marco Island shoppers judging by all of the high end cars in the lot. There also seems to be as many northern license plates on the cars as there are Florida tags.

I stopped at Walmart to top off my grocery supplies. I am attempting to get my supplies on the same schedule so I run out of things in a predictable order. Over the last few weeks I have managed to get out of sequence. It isn’t fun to run out of veggies while you still have meat or run out of milk before you need to buy anything else. I only bought a few things, but the time and money spent would not prove it. My ten mile trip to town including a relatively brief stop at the Marsh trail was over three hours.

Monday March 6th 2023

It was another dry, sunny and warm day. It hasn’t rained in the area since right after I arrived in South Florida over two weeks ago. A burn ban was put in place yesterday. The park staff put up signs prohibiting open fires. There is no rain in forecast. The temperature peaked in the upper eighties.

Today turned out to be a very lazy day. I intended to do a load of laundry, but found all three sets of machines in use when I checked after breakfast. One of the restroom buildings have two sets of washers and dryers and the other restroom building has a third set. I intended to check again later in the day, but it was near four in the afternoon before I got back to the task. It didn’t matter the machines were still in use. They may have been available in between my checks. I’ll have to try again before I leave here on Thursday. If my memory serves me faithfully, there isn’t a laundry at my next stop.

Walking around the campground today, it occurred to me that this park has a lot of Canadian visitors. There are many Ontario and Quebec license plates. The units range from tents to big fifth wheel trailers and motorhomes. I have seen a lot of Canadians this winter, but the percentage here is higher than other places. The tent campers are particularly interesting. It is at least a three day drive from Canada and I doubt they used the tents before they were well south. Either way they deserve some warm weather compared to the temperatures north of the boarder.

The kayakers and boaters must have paddled their energy out over the weekend. The river access was very quiet today. Both times I walked to the water there weren’t any boats in the water. There were a few people fishing from shore. The species of fish in the boat basin likes to jump out of the water. Watching the fish jump encourages anglers to try their luck. Some of the jumping fish are a foot long. I haven’t seen anyone catch anything since I’ve been here.

Sunday March 5th 2023

The wind was down and the temperature was up today. The clear sky and bright sun allowed the temperature to climb above the midpoint of the eighties. Some areas in Florida are flirting with record highs again. This area is probably not one of them, but it is going to be warmer.

My day started out with a little more luck than the last few mornings. I was successful booking a reservation for next winter in a Florida State Park. It is for February 5 to 19, so I have three weeks from the middle of January to fill. I plan to try the Army Corp of Engineers Parks when they become available for booking in July. If that fails I’ll work on finding a commercial campground reservation.

The campground didn’t seem to empty out very quickly this morning. I was beginning to believe the end of weekend exodus wasn’t going to happen, but I was wrong. Starting a few minutes before the 1PM checkout time there was a rush for the exit. I would guess that close to a third of the sites emptied out. By evening the sites were filled with new arrivals.

For today’s exercise I drove east of the Tamiami trail to the Marsh trail in the Ten Thousand Island National Wildlife Refuge. It is a convenient place with lots of birds to keep my attention. Most days I also see lots of people and an alligator or two. Today I didn’t see any alligators, but there were still plenty of people.

Saturday March 4th 2023

The wind was almost as strong as yesterday, but it was out of a more southerly direction. It still resulted in a very nice day with a high temperature in the mid eighties. The trend over the last few weeks has been warmer than normal. The normal temperature in this area for this time of year is in the upper seventies.

It wasn’t a very active day. I spent most of my time doing chores around my RV home and a little bit of reading. I took two walks around the campground and out to the water access area. Since it is the weekend, there were a lot of people launching boats. I particularly enjoyed watching one couple from Minnesota launch a big double kayak. The arrived with the boat on the roof of their SUV. I thought it was strange how carefully the driver selected his parking location. He adjusted forward and back and left to right several times before he was happy. It seems they had an automatic kayak loader/unloader for the roof mount. With the push of a button the kayak slowly moved over the side of the SUV and down to the ground. The man and woman then had only a few feet to move the boat to get the water. Then he moved the SUV to a corner of the parking lot with the rack still in the down position. He needed the corner to protect the rack from other cars. All of this took time. I think I watched the activity for close to half an hour just for them to get the boat into the water.

One of the things I’ve been working on is the process I use to get photos ready for this blog. I always shrink them down in resolution so I can upload them on slow internet connections. Some of my pictures also get cropped to eliminate distractions and focus the viewers attention. The last thing I do is add the watermark. I’ve been trying to improve the automation of some of the tasks. In the process I broke some of the automation I already had, so tonight’s pictures are more manually processed than usual. Tomorrow I’ll try to fix my workflow again.

Friday March 3rd 2023

There were a few more clouds in the sky today, but the sun still won the battle for dominance. The temperature climbed into the mid eighties just like the past few days. The big difference today was the wind. A very strong wind out of the east blew until shortly before sunset. It was a hat catching day. I had to hold onto my hat a few times to keep it on my head and I participated in a catch that hat contest that another guy started against the wind. He recovered his hat after a fifty foot or more chase.

I slept in this morning. The battle for a state park reservation for next winter will resume tomorrow. There weren’t any good options available this morning. I had a leisurely paced breakfast this morning while watching many of my neighbors pack up to leave. The weekenders arrived in the afternoon to fill the empty sites.

In the early afternoon I ventured out along the Tamiami trail to the east. I was looking for another hiking opportunity that is identified on the map. Unfortunately it is currently closed. I ended up back at the Marsh Trail in the Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge. The birds didn’t disappoint me. Probably because of the wind they were in different locations, but there were plenty of them. Today I didn’t see any Rosetta Spoonbills, but there were a pair of Brown Pelicans to observe. The trail was very busy. I had to wait for a parking space in the relatively small lot.

Thursday March 2nd 2023

The smoke clouds from the prescribed burns that were overhead as Wednesday ended were gone this morning. The strong wind out of the south was probably the reason. There was a deep blue sky with only a few clouds late in the day. The temperature climbed into the mid eighties just like the last few days. We are in a great weather pattern, but today may be the last day. A cloudy day is forecast for tomorrow as a front passes west to east north of here.

I ended up working on my computer most of the day. It started with another failed attempt to book a reservation for next winter and progressed into a maintenance session. A complete backup of all my data was overdue. I maintain regular backups of my pictures, blog text and other things I create on USB memory sticks, external drives and cloud storage for some items. My internet access isn’t reliable enough to depend on cloud storage alone. Today I created two complete backups on external drives. With a measure of confidence that I wouldn’t lose anything important, I started to delete stuff in an attempt to improve performance. It was a combination of a trip down memory lane and some real computer sleuthing. Overall, once I get in the mood, I really enjoy this time of activity. It isn’t quick. After I get through with this blog entry, I’ll continue sorting through files, moving things around and deleting the junk.

In between sessions at my keyboard I took a couple of walks around the state park and cooked a little more complicated meal than usual using my slow cooker. It was a real stay at home kind of day.