We left Greenfield on January 21st heading for Florida. As we don’t like to drive for long stints every day we took the opportunity to stop along the way and visit friends and family. Our first stop was outside of Philadelphia, in Bryn Mawr, to see friends we’ve had since we lived in Buffalo 43 years ago—Doreen and David. Although it was a bit chilly we still managed to take some lovely walks through the Bryn Mawr Campus and Haverford. Both of these universities have beautiful architecture with their old stone castle-like buildings. Nice relaxing visit with old friends.

We then moved on to Roanoke, VA thru some rather nasty snow and rain where we had dinner with our friend, Scott and his wife. We know Scott from paddling with the AMC. We went to a railroad themed restaurant that Scott picked out especially for Denny who is a train aficionado — fun.

The weather looked up a bit the next day as we arrived at Rudy and Audrey’s new house in South Carolina, just below Charlotte, NC. R & A are also old paddling friends who moved down to this area a number of years ago due to a change in jobs. We had stopped at their place a few years ago before they built their house so were treated to seeing their new construction which is very nice. We spent 2 nights there and visited Andrew Jackson State Park

Audrey with us at the Park

and the Museum of Transportation which is quite extensive. It’s mostly outdoors walking from one train to another, some of which you could go through and learn interesting things about. There was a mail car that had a story to it. It seems they always tried to find the addressee and once got a letter written to “Mr. Hot Dog”. They thought about that one for a long time then finally realized it was to go to Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter! There were other cars where you could be the engineer and operate all the different levers as a video played  where you were. It was a lot of fun and was enhanced by the fact that it was 70 degrees and sunny.

Next day we headed to the coast, stopping just south of Savannah after visiting the Savannah NWR.

Refuge and our first Anhinga

We stopped also at Altamaha WMA which is an area of former rice paddies that are good places to find birds.

Tri-colored Heron

White Ibis feeding

The weather was once again cooler and overcast so we moved down to Jekyll Island which was great. At the beginning there was a tower overlooking a marsh where we could see some shorebirds but the best birding was at Amphitheater Pond where we saw Roseate Spoonbills, Yellow and Black-crowned Night Herons, Wood Storks, Anhinga and the usual White and Glossy Ibis and Great and Snowy Egrets and Great and Little Blue Herons. There were some ducks and Grebes as well. The last thing we did on the island was visit the Sea Turtle Rescue Exhibit. We got to see them feed and talk about 23 saved turtles that were in their hospital area awaiting recovery enough to be released back into the ocean. They also were raising very young turtles until they were old enough to manage on their own and be released. I think she said they keep them for about 3 years.

Spent the night in Kingsland, GA not far from the Okefenokee Swamp where we spent the next day and night. Our friend Janice from out bird club had a connection with a woman, Sheila, there who knew the area and gave us all kinds of information about where to find birds. We were looking in particular for the Red-cockaded Woodpecker which is endangered and a lifer for us. Unfortunately it was another cold and overcast day so we didn’t find much in the way of birds. Had a nice tour of an old Homestead that a family had spent about 100 years living in and doing subsistence farming, mainly making turpentine but also having livestock and fruit trees and vegetables. It certainly was a hard life. We met Sheila for dinner and exchanged birding stories. She encouraged us to try again for the Red-cockaded by starting at dawn which we did.

Red-cockaded Woodpecker

At first we couldn’t see much as it was still kind of dark but once the light got better we found some—anywhere from 4 to 7 as they were hopping around we weren’t sure whether we were recounting the same ones. It was sunnier that day so we decided to drive the Swamp drive

Cypress knees, Spanish Moss, Mushrooms and Pitcher Plant along drive

and walk the boardwalk once more. It was a good decision as it was a lot birdier than the day before.

View of prairie from the tower

Pileated Woodpecker

Then we moved on to just below Jacksonville where we visited Amelia Island and Big Talbot SP. Big Talbot had lots of birds and a great boardwalk where one could see hundreds of little shore birds mermerating across the mud flats. Of course as soon as we went to get the camera they all flew away. We did get a few big ones that didn’t fly.

Little Blue Heron

Snowy Egret

Red-shouldered Hawk at the picnic area

We spent the night at Ormond Beach next to Daytona.

Our final stop on our way to our destination of Homestead,FL was in Orlando where our cousins Tab and Gail had just moved from Chicago. We decided it was warm enough finally to camp so we found this county park just south of the city call Moss Park. This was a large park with lakes and ponds all around and large wooded sites.

Cardinal who kept pecking at our mirror thinking it was another Cardinal

Sandhill Cranes

Great Egret

Pine Warbler under our picnic table

We have our pop-up camper which fortunately has a furnace as it got rather cold at night. Gail had made us a lovely supper that first evening and we had a nice visit. They seem to love living in the heart of Orlando and Tab was filled with info about its history. The next morning we walked around the campground until after lunch then went to the Henry P. Leu Botanical Gardens. That was really beautiful with acres of gardens ranging from tropical to rose gardens to color gardens, etc.

Green Heron and Turtles at the Lake area

They had a special dinosaur exhibit with different dinosaur sculptures amongst the plantings.

 

After that we all went to a wonderful Spanish restaurant for dinner.

On Feb.1st we arrived at the Boardwalk RV Resort in Homestead where we will be for the month.
Enough for now.

Peace,
Nancy & Denny