Heading North

We woke up early this morning in a hotel in central Florida (sometimes you just really appreciate embassy suites with their free happy hour and air conditioning). Florida has treated us well, with miles of warm water beaches and wonderful welcoming friends. There is no mistaking the feeling of getting antsy however, and we have begun dreaming of higher ground, cooler nights, and maybe a pine tree or two. 

The rest of our time in the keys was great. We made it all the way to mile marker zero on interstate highway 1 and the southern most point of the continental United States.

We enjoyed the charm of Key West and ate some great Cuban food. Key West was an interesting mix of super laid back carribean island culture and tourist town. We were able to see a lot of the Island from our bikes, which was a lot of fun.

Ben, always the problem solver, came up with solutions to both the heat and the bugs. We have a new appreciation for walkin beer refrigerators and target's arsenal of bug sprays (our natural citrus deet-free bug spray was just not cutting it).

After Key West we headed back up to Miami, checked out a Marlin's game, and went swimming at Miami Beach. The Marlin's stadium was very "Miami", complete with a night club and go-go dancers, as well as a fish tank behind home plate.

One if the biggest highlights of South Florida was visiting my college friend Niki and her husband Nick. I hadn't seen them since their wedding over 2 years ago. We saw them on the way down to the keys and then stopped by again on our way out. It was so great to see them both  and they were the sweetest hosts, cooking us a fantastic meal and letting us harass their two French bulldogs. They even graciously lent us their driveway and cleaning supplies so we could clean out the van. We had jokingly nicknamed the van "Muskey", a combination of our two last names. As we camped deeper in the keys, however, the name started hitting a little too close to home. I'm happy to report that after a few hours, a vacuum cleaner, and a bottle of febreeze, the van smelled good as new.

So Florida, it's been real, but it is time to get moving North. We will be camping a couple nights along the cooler springs and rivers in North Florida, stopping by Atlanta to visit our good friend Kelly, and then heading to the smokey blue mountains of North Carolina.

Camping in the Florida Keys!

 As we headed south from the Miami area, we set our sights on several days in the Florida Keys.  The Keys are a continuation of the coastal islands that are all along the Atlantic Coast of Florida.  However, the Keys don't have any mainland.  In the early 1900's a very wealthy person built a railroad across all these keys.  Apparently, the route was a flop, and the railroad failed.  The bridges were converted to a car route, in several places the road was built on top of the train trestle.  Since then, a new modern road has replaced the old steel structure.  However, the old bridge is still standing in many places and is sometimes even accessible to pedestrians. 

We didn't realize that school had just gotten out, so the campsites were quite booked.  Still we managed to get one night in Long Key and reservations in Bahia Honda for the following two nights.  Long Key State Park was nice!  Our campsite was right on the beach.  The warm water was calm and shallow.  People were fishing, floating, tidepooling, and kayaking.  We were excited to break out our inflatable watercraft.  Our armada consists of a Two Person Floatie and a Two Person Kayak.  We had never used the kayak before, a neighbor gave it to us.  He was getting rid of it to make room for something.  We were surprised and relieved that it was in excellent shape!

Noelle was quite eager to try fishing from our "sport" boat.  On our way to Bahia Honda State Park, we stopped into a bait and tackle shop.  $45 later, we were armed with a rod-n-reel, sinkers, hooks, and a package of frozen bait.  At the park, we towed the floatie, some beers, and our fishing gear out to a buoy.  I'm pleased to report that Noelle reeled in a horse-eye jack fish in less than an hour in Bahia Honda.  I took a shot at fishing and was less impressed with the honeycomb cowfish I reeled in.  We released both of these fish, but beers were not as lucky.  Great fun, and an excellent all-day activity in the sunshine.

Bahia Honda didn't spray for bugs, like Long Key did.  I wish they had!  At night I was the victim of No-see-ums.   These tiny insects are the smallest member of the mosquito family.  They are about the size of a grain of sand and were able to get through the bug screens on the van.  As I type, I'm covered with enough bites to suspect I have chicken pox.  ITCHY!
Not all the insects were as horrible.  The wildlife in the Keys in robust and colorful.  The island had beautiful butterflies.  We saw a hermit crab the size of a softball!  We were stunned by these glowing beetles at night.  You'd see in the bushes what would appear as two glowing eyes!  Another island boasts pigmy deer, 1/4 the size of normal deer!


All of the pictures below are from Bahia Honda.  Overall it was an awesome camping experience, rounded out by some real cool camping neighbors that treated us to a laser light show and gave us great tips about camp spots in Florida.

View of the old bridge from the boat cove on Bahia Honda.

Typical scene on the bridge.

In some places, the old bridge is quite dilapidated.

View from the campsite in Bahia Honda.

We were able to walk up onto the old bridge near our campsite.

Stunning colors during sunset!

Ft. Lauderdale and Family!

 Congratulations to Cousins Laurie and Miles for tying the knot!  It was great fun, thanks for inviting us!  I didn't get enough good pictures of the wedding, but this one shows the best man, brother of the groom, my cousin, Eric and his family, Nate and Kari.  Behind them are Laurie and Miles.  Sorry for the bad photo, I blame the open bar.  :P

Ft. Lauderdale area is pretty awesome.  It's all about the beach and the intercostal waterway.  Everywhere, there is a coastal island, a protected water channel, and then another layer of coast.  There are canals everywhere to connect to the water.  The best bars are outdoors on these channels.  Shown to the left is Two Georges, which is Miles and Laurie's favorite bar and the site of the rehearsal dinner. 
There are fantastic homes that are right on these protected waterways where one can park their boat right along their backyard. 

 Mid-June is the off-season for this area, probably cause it's hot!  Things slow down from 2-4pm here.  In wintertime, this place is jumping with folks from the Eastern Seaboard.  But for now, it's a little empty.  We stayed at this awesome room in Boca Raton with a view of "Lake Boca."  The "Lake" is a wide part of the Intercoastal Waterway, and the Atlantic Ocean is just beyond the tall condominiums shown.

Monday night we spent with Noelle's good college friend (rugby teammate) Niki and her husband Nick.  We were lucky enough to attend their wedding in Costa Rica in 2011.  Their home is furnished with the comfort of their French Bulldogs, Lola and Gus, in mind.  In this picture, Gus demonstrates that the only one who enjoys a dog-pile is the one on top.

New Orleans to Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Slightly sad, we left NOLA for Florida.  Hard to be too sad when there are nice beaches and a wedding in the near future.  Some last pictures of New Orleans seemed appropriate though!

One neat change I had to been an engineer and point out is that the street cars now have nifty LED external light systems.  For the same wattage as the old incandescent lights, they get a brighter headlight and two bright strobe lights.  Nice improvement for the oldest running street car line in the USA!

 We also decided to roll through the French Quarter on our way out of town.

 First night, we camped in the panhandle of Florida.  We got a text message from my mom advising us of an oncoming tropical storm.  We thought if we left early we could avoid it... I'd say we ran straight into it though...  See our location as the blue dot...  Dear readers, if you notice we are straying into a tornado, tropical storm, or some other act of God, please let us know.  The weather apps we have are great at letting us know the weather where we are, not the weather where we are going.

We managed to get to St. Augustine to wait out some of the worst of the storm.  We checked into a fancy motel where we could get some laundry done, nap, hit the mini-gym, and soak in the outdoor hot tub.  In the evening it cleared up and we went to town to check it out.  We had an awesome dinner at The Floridian and walked around.  Noelle was amazed at the oldest plaza in the US as well as the oldest masonry building in the US.

As I write this, we've already finished our weekend of wedding, and we continue to have a great time in Boca Raton and Ft. Lauderdale.  Tuesday we'll be heading down to The Keys! 

Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans?

Noelle has been much better at doing blogging in a timely manner.  She's a good writer, so I don't have much to add to her entries.  So, I've hidden her smart phone to ensure I get a chance to blog New Orleans!  :P

We got to NOLA yesterday afternoon.  As soon as we got settled, we started looking for food.  I'm staying at a friend's house close to Upperline and Prytania Streets. 

Yelp showed me that there was a dozen restaurants on Freret Street, between Jefferson and Napoleon Streets.  When I lived here 16 years ago, this commercial strip was different.  It serviced a large, lower-class, Black community.  In the years after Katrina, this neighborhood was all but abandoned.  Most stores closed down on Freret St.    Apparently, a couple of years ago, this area experienced a rebirth.  The street bustles with the creative energy of new, successful businesses.

We ate at Midway Pizza on Freret, and the food was phenomenal!  It's really hard to put a finger on why food is better in New Orleans.  At Midway, it was a couple of creative flavors in the salad, and a spot on deep-dish pizza, accompanied by some great local beer suggestions.


We took two full pints to go, and we walked down Upperline St to The King Pin and got destroyed in a shuffleboard tournament.  However, we met a bunch of really nice people who were fun to chat with... despite their aggressive shuffleboard tactics.

An omnipresent feature in NOLA is Video Poker machines, at least two in every bar and restaurant.  I have a fond sentiment for the old machines that I used to play in the 90's, and I think others do, too.  However, the old ones are on their last legs. 

 So far today, we've busted out the bicycles, and gone for a little spin.  We went to Tulane, where I checked in on the reborn Tulane Computer Science Program.  After Katrina, CS was cancelled at Tulane.  I got my CSE degree from Tulane in 2000, so I was always sad the department was canned.  I'm excited and supportive of their new start!

Then we went to The Fly to relax and watch the river go by. 

 We followed this up with a trip to the Daiquiri Cafe at the Riverbend.

 And then bicycled back to Audubon Park to enjoy our beverages by the fountain.

 Tonight we are going to Gautreau's for dinner, and possibly to Maple Leaf to watch Rebirth Jazz Band.

As long as I've got the blog, here's a couple pictures from Austin.  Noelle was a hot bridesmaid, and I toured the Texas State House while she was busy preparing. 

Buggin' out on the bayou

After a fantastic extended weekend in Austin, we headed east towards New Orleans. We decided to break up the 8 hour drive and camp at Sea Rim state park, just south of Port Arthur, at the border of Texas and Louisiana. As we pulled up to our campsite on the beach, overlooking the Gulf of Mexico with the bayou and marshlands behind us, we congratulated ourselves on finding such an epic spot. This was truly the goal of our whole adventure: the discovery of these magical, out of the way spots that we would otherwise have no reason to visit. As the sun drifted lower in the sky, we set up our beach chairs, waded in the warm gulf waters, and watched the various seabirds catching fish around us.

And then came the bugs....

Shortly after sunset we noticed the advent of mosquitos. We started putting on bug spray until it became clear it was doing little to deter the swarms. We finally gave up and ran for shelter in the van. Inside the van we were greeted by a swarm of mosquitos that had snuck in and the next 45 minutes were spent in a frenzied bug massacre. Afterwards we huddled against the window with our headlamps, staring at the swarms of bugs that reached biblical proportions and cheering for the occasional grasshopper that showed up for the feast. Bugs were hitting the side of the van tent with such fervor that it sounded like it was raining. 

This morning we hustled away from the state park, swerving to narrowly miss the 8 foot alligator that decided to cross the road. The lady at the gas station said the alligators were normal, but admitted the bugs were a bit more aggressive then usual. Onward to New Orleans!