Wednesday October 18th 2023

Similar to the last couple of days today started cool. It was around sixty inside my RV home this morning. Unlike yesterday the temperature climbed into the low eighties today. The humidity was still low allowing for a mostly cloud free sky most of the day. The wind was also less forceful today.

On my mid day walk around the campground along the Caloosahatchee Canal I spotted a brown disturbance in the water along the bank. On closer inspection in turned out to be a manatee. It was nosing into the bank to munch on the vegetation along the bank. I watched it for five to ten minutes and attempted to get a good picture of the mammal. It wasn’t really possible, but some shots are included below.

I wonder how the manatee got here. It is two locks and dams from the gulf and three from the Atlantic. It is possible to go through the locks by following a boat, but do they have that instinct. The alternative is it could have been born in the Okeechobee inland waterways and has never been to the open ocean. Either way, it was nice to see the creature in the wild.

The campground has become busy. The middle of last week was very quiet in the park. Tonight there are close to twice as many occupied sites than I recall from last Wednesday night. Last week most of the residents were from Florida. Tonight there seem to be a lot more travelers. I have seen license plates from Nevada, Michigan and Texas just in my immediate area of the park. Is it the change in weather that has caused the increase in visitors or has the winter travel season begun?