Relaxing in the Woods

We’re near Lake City Florida in a national forest called Ocean Pond. The place is absolutely wonderful during the week. We have a big site on the lake with water and electricity for only $12 per night. Cell phone service is good with several good TV channels. Squirrels are the entertainment. Several are in view at all times.

At a certain point of the evening, the quiet ends when the frogs start up. The first night we were inside watching TV when I heard this noise. Given the beat that I heard, I thought it was the neighbors with music blaring. Just the frogs!

However on weekends, the place is a zoo. Every site seems to have 2-4 cars parked along with 2-4 tents and RV’s per site. Kids are everywhere and the beer flows. We survived.

The campground is a good place for hiking and biking. There are quite a few geocaches within biking distance plus there is a swamp on the hiking trail.

Nearby is the Olustee Battlefield. It was the site of the largest Florida battle and one of the bigger ones during the Civil War. They filmed part of the movie Glory here during the annual reenactment. They had a controlled burn a couple of weeks ago, so it was interesting to see the palmetto plants already returning.

Panama City Goofy Golf and Magic World Skyway

We’re in Panama City Florida right now. There no ancient historical sites that I know in this area, it’s all about tourism. There’s the upside-down house (Wonderworks kids science center) and a building looking like a ship (Ripley’s), a bunch of water parks and rides in this area. Oh, and many of the stores have you walk through a large fake shark head or other creature as a photo op and to draw you into the store. 

The RV park we're visiting has an archeological site hidden within the woods. One end of a gondola lift ride is here, now under the trees and vines. We couldn’t find the other end, but we found some more cars/buckets in the bushes. I read online that this was Magic World Skyride by Von Roll in Switzerland (Type 101 GB2). Most were installed in the late 50’s and 60’s. They also built the Skyway in Cedar Point which I remember riding in the 70’s (I think that one still runs). This one was built in 1961 and destroyed in 1975 by a hurricane. There’s even a youtube of this ride from the 60’s. Pretty cool!  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nyBZ6yFn-eM  

We decided to visit Goofy Golf to play putt-putt. It appears to be one of the first “big” putt-putt golf courses with large creatures to pull in tourists. It’s a pretty good course with a dinosaur, an octopus, an alligator, and even a Tiki head that you can climb to the top with a good view of the beach.

The funny part is that the golf course was built in 19xx (I’m not telling!). It’s the same year I was born. Anyhow, my golf ball got stuck in the Buddha (not a sentence I would normally write). I had to have the guy working the place get my ball out. As we’re walking to the Buddha, he says “Well, you know the gal is getting pretty old and falling apart. I’m working on rebuilding this old thing.” I told him that I was born the same year so he was calling me old. He didn’t say much after that!

Intracoastal Park

We needed a one-night stop in Louisiana as we head towards Florida. I found this place. It is cheap at $12 per night with water and electric. To get a feel for this…state parks are ~$25 per night. RV parks have been $40-50 per night in Texas. Some of the fancier ones are $70 per night. So, twelve dollars is great!

As the name says, the park is on an intracoastal waterway. So we got to see barges traveling right past our RV all night.

Unfortunately, while the bridge was cool, we also got to hear car rumbling over metal plates all night. Nothing is perfect while RV’ing.

Mission San Jose

My absolutely favorite mission is down the road from the RV park. It is called the Queen of the Missions. I’ve been here many times (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) but always visit at least once during a visit to San Antonio.

I walked down one morning and walked the area before it officially opened for the day. Actually, I thought I might attend the morning mass. I’m not Catholic, but was interested in seeing mass. But when I got there, I saw only one person in the front rows that I think was a sister. There was no way to blend in! Instead I took some pictures outside and walked back to the RV.

The Rose Window is considered one of the finest examples of baroque architecture in North America.

The exterior walls of the chapel has portions of the original plaster and coloring. It must have been quite a sight.

We’ve had a lot of rain that flooded parts of Riverwalk for a day. But the spring flowers are out!