In late January, Dan's Aunt Joan came for a visit. We left Faver-Dykes State Park on the Atlantic side of Florida and headed for Homosassa Springs on the Gulf Coast of Florida to meet her. Around here, the Gulf Coast is known as the West Coast. To us, California is the West Coast. It's all relative.

Homosassa Springs is known as a winter home for Manatees. We really wanted to see them, and thought about paying to take a boat trip, but ended up deciding not to. Glad we didn't, because it's not hard at all to see Manatees. They congregate in the natural springs in the area. There are several bridges and states parks where you can see them for free. The manatees like the 72 degree water and loll around in many of the natural springs in the area.. You'd think manatees would be cute, but they really aren't. They look like overweight seals, except goofier, and not as smart. Anyway, we all enjoyed seeing the silly creatures.

We did take a boat trip out the Homossassa River into the Gulf of Mexico. It was really fun and very beautiful. It was supposed to be a 2.5 hour trip, but I guess the captain liked us. He kept us out for 4-5 hours. It might have helped that it was Joan's birthday. Just the three of us and the captain, it was a day I'll remember for a long time.

We spent a day at an Old Florida tourist spot, the Weeki Wachee Springs State Park. They put on a mermaid show in the spring. They perform skits with only air hoses to breath from, and fish and turtles all around them.

Just like last time Joan visited, we had a great time. We are looking forward to more visits her in the future. Anyone else want to come sleep on our couch? We're a cheap vacation.

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When Joan left, we headed back to Faver-Dykes State Park. I had agreed to volunteer as a camp host for 3 weeks in exchange for a free campsite. We were a little leery of camphosting, wondering if people would be knocking on our door at all hours, etc. It turned out to be very enjoyable. Raking sites, cleaning bathrooms, taking out trash, and selling firewood were our main duties. We worked about 15 hours a week between the two of us and met a lot of really nice people. Everyone does talk to the camphosts, but mainly when you are out in the campground going about your duties. We would definitely consider doing it again. They have already asked us back for next year. We tried to explain that we don't usually plan that far in advance, but you never know.


While camphosting, we took two days to go to Cape Canaveral and NASA. We booked a hotel room instead of taking the trailer down. We missed our comfy trailer with all of it's conveniences. We did enjoy spending two days at NASA and learned a lot. Dan enjoyed the big Saturn 5 Rocket on display while I really enjoyed learning the history of the space program. I have a new appreciation for how difficult each and every mission is.

Even with travelling to Cape Canaveral, camphosting turned out to be great for the budget. Not only did we save on campsite fees, we saved on gas, food, and entertainment. February was the cheapest month we have ever had on the road. Rather reassuring in these tough economic times. We can do this cheaper if we need to.

We left Faver-Dykes around the 3rd week of February and headed for the Everglades. I didn't know what to expect, but was prepared for a large swamp, heat, and humidity. Dan has always wanted to go there and was excited to see it. It was more like a big prairie with isolated islands of trees and swamp. The expansive views were reminiscent of the west and a real treat after all the trees of the east. I felt like my soul could breathe again. I like the east and it has been fascinating to see how different it is, but I don't think I could live here. There is something about the western landscapes that speak to me. Maybe it is just what I am used to.

I could get used to February temperature in the 70's with low humidity. Apparently, the bugs are so bad in the summer, that you can camp for free in the Everglades. The bugs would probably carry Dan away with them. Florida has been one bugbite after another for him. He isn't complaining, but they really seem to like him. They weren't bad while we were there, but we did use plenty of bug spray on our hikes. We only spent four days as we had reservations in the keys, but, I think we will be back. We could easily spend several weeks hiking, birding, and canoeing the area.

We next headed to the Keys. Again, I wasn't sure what to expect. We were paying a lot of money for a spot for a week. In fact, we spent an entire month's worth of our campsite budget on that one week. Painful for the accountant in me. We were going to treat it as a scoping out trip, since we already have reservations for November in the state parks. Reservations can be made 11 months in advance and you won't get them if you don't try on the first day they are available. That is how popular the state parks are in the keys. They also cost about a third of the price of private parks, and the sites are much nicer!

Turns out, the extra money was well spent. We had a great time in the Keys. The water was warm enough to swim and snorkel. It was even warm enough that we could have gone diving. We didn't dive this time, but probably will when we return. The birds are great and there are even some bike trails. It was busy, but not near as bad as we expected. We are glad we made the reservations for later in the year. We can always cancel them if we need to, but I suspect we will find ourselves camping in the Keys again come November. There is a lot more to do and one of our reservations is for a beach front campsite.

After the keys, we spent a week at Kissimee Prairie Preserve State Park. It is a really quiet park about 30 miles north of Lake Okeechobee. Again, it reminded us of the west. Beautiful prairies, wide open spaces, and lots of birds. The main difference between Florida prairie and Western prairies are the alligators in every wet spot. It's not a smart idea to go tromping off trail in Florida. We spent several days birding and biking the area. Dan took the opportunity to get caught up with work as he had taken time off while we were in the Keys. People assume we are always on vacation, but that isn't the reality. Dan works on a regular basis. He only works part-time, and never a regular schedule, but he does some work most weeks. Occasionally, we go somewhere quiet, like Kissimee, where he can work a lot of hours at once. The fact that he can step outside to go for a trail run whenever he wants is a major advantage in our lifestyle.

Our next goal is to work our way back to Colorado. We need to be back in mid-April for work commitments.

Even though Dan has been working a lot, we have managed to get out and enjoy the area. Since we knew we were going to be here a couple of months, we thought we should treat it as just another stop and explore our own backyard for a change. Even though we lived here for 10 years, there is still a lot we haven't done. Late Spring/Early Summer has always been our favorite time of year in Colorado. It was a rainy spring and the hills are green and the wildflowers are prolific.