Kent is reluctant to allow me to include a picture but you ought to see him! He seems to have gotten into the poisonwood in the Everglades and has developed poison ivy like rash in lots of places. The calamine lotion seems to be helping. The dotted look becomes him. It seems that the Ranger’s prediction of 10 days to get it and ten days to get rid of it was right, maybe even a little conservative. He’ll be fine soon.
We continue to see cactus on sandy soil here in Florida. Always thought they were only in the desert southwest.
No camera along, of course.
We tried a local (Titusville) BBQ place; ribs and pulled pork. Yummy….the mac and cheese was pretty great too. There were cute plastic, glass, stuffed and neon pigs everywhere and checkered oilcloth table cloths. A real class joint. Exactly what we have come to expect for great BBQ places.
Ok, so maybe I get a little over the top on things of nature sometimes?! Both are awe inspiring trees. The Sequoia towers over and reigns over all that grow near it. The Live Oak seems to embrace and nurture all that find shelter beneath it. We wandered trough a Live Oak hammock today here at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. Look closely, nature is amazing!
Prickly Pear cactus grow here in this damp buggy place…just like in the driest desert of Arizona. All about crappy soil I guess.
From atop the 35 foot tall (yes, that is a high point in this FLAT country) shell midden called Turtle Mound the ocean is beautiful. Waves are rolling in with a rhythm of their own and a sailboat glides across the horizon. Canaveral National Seashore, this is a peaceful place.
The birth of thousands of stars in the arms of distant nebulae. Winds driven by the energy of the larger stars slam against smaller/forming galaxies creating the tadpole shapes as the materials of would-be planets are pushed into a downstream tail. The whole process is captured by the Hubble telescope as it peers deep into the far reaches of the universe. Absolutely amazing! We watched an IMAX film about the Hubble at Kennedy Space Center. The photography is fantastic and beautiful. The theories about creation and life of stars and galaxies are intriguing. Its one of those things I think I really need to spend some more time learning about…..
The story of spaceflight is one that I know I have read and heard about numerous times over the years not to mention having lived through a lot of it…. The Space Center exhibits and tours are a great reminder of how much was accomplished in so little time (yes, I do believe that man really landed on and walked on the moon). All pretty amazing. Makes me wonder what’s next. All this privatization makes for a totally different ball game. NASA’s spin is that privatizing the mundane, earth orbiting launches, frees NASA up to pursue the more spectacular and far reaching like trips to other planets and to infinity and beyond. Wonder what else we’ll see in my lifetime.
A Conch, you know, one of those harmless looking snail like critters that lives in that pretty shell we can hear the ocean in. Well, I got an up close look at an entirely different side of that fellow. It was hunting. They dropped a clam into his aquarium and he came after it. Purposeful, strong, strides of this bright pink appendage until it completely enveloped the clam. I would never have envisioned that thing as a predator. Life!