Today we took a little trip from Ft. Myers to Sarasota. If you've been keeping up with us you'll recall that some friends from Columbus visited us when we were on Sanibel. The gentleman friend is someone who works with Mr. Gerrie at the funeral home. During there visit they invited us to come spend a day at Myakka State park just outside of Sarasota with them. The 40 or so thousand acre park is part of the head water of the Myakka river that ends it's journey in Port Charlotte. You'll recall that we stayed in a complex that runs along the Myakka for quite a distance just before it dumps into Charlotte Harbor. This river does begin north of Myakka lake, but this lake is by far the largest collection of the water along it's route out to the Gulf of Mexico.
Our journey wasn't to study geography but more to enjoy the things the park has to offer. We met our friends, Susan and Judd in a shopping plaza just east of I75 in Sarasota, then drove about 20 minutes to the park, just six or seven miles the other side of the Interstate. Judd knew that we should decide quickly and get our tickets for the tours we wanted. It was obvious that crowds were already building by 10AM when we arrived. The park offers tours on the lake and on a motorized tram that takes groups into the back woods on old dirt roads. We choose both. The lake tour is boat that they pronounced to be the world's largest air boat. It's a 50 passenger flat bottom barge powered by a Cadillac V8 engine fitted with a three bladed air plane propeller. The seating area is enclosed with windows at each row of seats that provides excellent viewing for all on board.
The ride was nice and not as noisey as one would exect given the kind of propullsion it has. The tour on the lake lasted about an hour and was narrated by a tour guide. We began our tour along the south shore of the lake looking for bird life and gators. The tour guide pointed oput every gator he could see and perhaps they are the big attraction here. As I recall the guide said there were about 500 gators in that lake. I have no reason to doubt him since the gators were all but laying on top of one another no matter where you looked. He also said that the lake is 2 miles wide and 2.5 miles long and totals about 1000 acres. At it's deepest point it's about seven feet which means that one could wade through most of it.
The day was a bit windy and the guide said that gators didn't like wind given that it causes their eye and ear covers to vibrate and they find that annoying. He said that most of the gators were at the bottom of the lake waiting for the wind to end. However, we saw lots of birds but they were ones we always see here in our area with one exception and that was a Redlegged Stilt. That's a new bird for both of us. Our friends are not birders and all of the birds we saw were new to them. Judd seemed more interested in the gators and pointed out every one he saw.
After we motored along the south shore a short while the guide throttled up to full power (7 mph) and took us to the other side where there were even more gators. The reason he picked this spot was soon obvious....that's where we saw this really large gatore, oh yes, while there were lots gators there this particular one was dead. (Now that's new, somehing we've never seen before) The tour guide said that one of the smaller gators was trying to eat the dead one when he was there an hour earlier. In addition to viewing the dead gator we also saw about 2 dozen black vultures some of which were pulling flesh off the dead animal. I'll bet you've never seen that before, especially up close and personal. Aside from that we saw very little else on the tour. However, the guide kept us amused with stories and experiencing a boat ride on the lake was nice and worth the price of admission.
We had a few minutes to relax before our next tour left so I insisted that we all get an ice creme cone. It seemed obvious to me that everone's sugar levels were running low. I must have been correct because no one resisted that idea.
The next part of our trip was on what they called a tram. This thing consists of three or four wooden farm carts fitted with seats pulled by a Toyoto pickup truck. The guide drives the truck and speaks to the people via a speaker system. Along the way we did see lots of wild pigs, one Armadillo, two turtles, and one alligator. The historical information the guide gave was nice even thought it at times it seems that reading his speil. I'm wondering if reading a script and simultaneously driving could be a problem. The guide said that we were traversing a wilderness. My interpretation of wilderness is that it would take more than 10 minutes to reach on a farm cart, but maybe this is some kind of urban winderness and not the kind one would find out in the Rockies were it takes days on foot.
This tour lasted about an hour and again we saw very little that we hadn't seen before with the exception of the Armadillo. We saw the same pigs on the way into the park. Our friends had seen them before and knew just where to look.
From there we drove along the south shore a short distance before we spotted two Armadillos. I stopped to get some close up photos to share with all of you. You'll see those below...it wasn't very far from there before we spotted one of the live traps intended for the pigs the park is trying to rid itself of. We noted that a pig was about to get caught in the trap. Sensing another photo opportunity I jambed on the brakes and jumped out only to find that we had spooked the pig away. What a disappointment since I was hoping to get a close up photo of a pig for you. But then you've likely see pigs before and from what I could see this looks like every other pig. The difference here is that these pigs are completely wild. The park want's every one of them gone so they trap and sell them.
After the pig incident we found a pier that extends out into a bog or mud flat area. It was perfect for viewing the bird life there. Here we found some new species we hadn't see as well. The area was ripe with other wildlife and along the way we saw yet another Armadillo. It seems that there are lots of those fellers there.
Our last stop in the park was to see what they call the Canopy Walk. It's a tree top level tower that you walk up to. From this tower you can walk on a suspension walkway to a second tower. The second tower is much higher and allows you to climb another 50 or so feet to view perhaps 20 miles in every direction. You'll have to remember that this is Florida and it's all but totally flat meaning that there is little to see no matter where you look. However, it's a nice view. Now, I was very surprised that I could walk up that many stairs without pain. However, I did it very well...good for me!!!
We left the park around 5PM, driving into Sarasota to find some place for dinner. We made two stops only to find the wait times long. The last place we tried was called "Word of Mouth" and soon we found out why it's called that...the food was very average, and if everyone is telling their friends about it, they won't be open much longer. But that's just me talking here... Two of us had the rib special....the price might have been special but the ribs weren't anything to write home about...come to think of it, those ribs were so small they might have come from one of the wild pigs in the park. The ladies had the pasta special and just judging from what they didn't eat.....it must have been less than "special" too.
After dinner we drove to the Marina District of Sarasota and if you've been there you'll recall Marina Jack's Restaurant. There in the middle of town is where Sarasota has placed a statue of the couple that were featured in the newspaper the day that WWII ended. The photo is of a sailor kissing a nurse in the street (Time Square?) during the celebration of the end of the war...I'm guessing that was VE day in .....uhhhh....1946?? OK, surely you've all see the photo...it has to be among the 5 most famous photos ever taken....We weren't aware that someone has created a statue of this couple and for a short while it is in Sarasota. We have included photos below. They were shot at night in low light...so it's not the best.
We dropped our friends at their car, made promises to get together again at home and drove back to Ft. Myers to crash for the night. It was a very nice day and we all enjoyed it.
Hugs,
Jerry & Gerrie
