January 27-30, 2017: Guy Visits Dallas
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We left Dallas a couple days after Christmas to spend New Year's and the first half of January down at the condo in Fort Lauderdale. As these trips to Florida have become so commonplace, we tend to take fewer and fewer pictures, and so there is less and less need to divide up the drip day by day. Rather, I'll continue doing what I've done for the last few years- just divide the photo album page by topic, pretty much regardless of when the picture was taken.

Getting to Fort Lauderdale

If you've been through more than a year or two of this photo album, you are undoubtedly familiar with our route to Florida. Years ago we used to fly, but that has gotten to be such a hassle (and a good deal more expensive) that now we drive. This allows us to take all kinds of things with us- including, in twelve of the last thirteen trips, Zack, our Snowshoe cat. This trip will be his 13th trip to Florida with us. But he won't be alone this time; we are also bring our youngest cat, Bob, with us. If you've been through 2016, you already know that we got him in May, so he is 7 months old now, and a good playmate for Zack.

The trip is routine; we stop at the same places to eat and to stay- almost without exception. And it's an easy route, too. Getting out of Dallas is easy if a bit congested, sometimes. We usually leave about nine-thirty, and by ten or so are on I-20 heading east towards Shreveport. We usually turn southeast on I-49 about one in the afternoon, reaching Lafayette and I-10 east along about three-thirty. Baton Rouge can be very slow if we don't get through there by four-fifteen or so, and then it is another 90 minutes to get across Louisiana to the Mississippi border.

Mississippi and Alabama are an hour each, so we are heading east from Mobile about six-thirty or seven. This puts us north of Pensacola right about dinnertime about eight. After dinner, we have about two hundred miles to go to get to our new motel in Tallahassee- the Red Roof Inn.

We used to stay at a Super 8 in Madison, but we had to kind of smuggle Zack in and out. We learned, however, when we were planning our aborted trip to Washington DC last May, that all Red Roof Inns are "pet-friendly", and don't charge a fee for pets. So we have begun staying at the one nearest to Madison- about fifty miles west in Tallahassee. And so we could proudly carry both Zack and Bob in and out. Since we had the cats with us, Fred was on his phone taking pictures of them as I drove. Here are a few of the best of them:

(Click on Thumbnails to View)

We usually get away from the hotel in Tallahassee about nine or so, we cross I-75 ninety minutes later, and are stopping for gas just west of Jacksonville by eleven or eleven thirty. Then we take I-295 around Jacksonville to the south, going through Orange Park. This 14-mile stretch is kind of neat, mostly because of the long bridge that crosses the St. Johns River as it opens out into a large lake southwest of the city. (It narrows as it approaches and flows around downtown Jacksonville to eventually empty into the Atlantic.

I-295 connects up with I-95 south of the city and we simply take that south for another kind of boring 300 miles down to Fort Lauderdale. Sometimes, we stop for gas again before getting to town, but this time we drove straight to the condo, where we found ourselves arriving between three-thirty and five.

We unloaded everything at the condo, got Zack and Bob and the laptops all set up, and then retired to the dock for a celebratory frozen drink. Then, as is our custom, we headed down to the Floridian Restaurant for dinner. I wish we had transporter technology, but the drive is not a hard one- although sections of it can be boring.

We have been here to Florida so many times that we have pretty much photographed everything worthwhile anywhere nearby. The pictures we take now are just candid shots around the condo, at the dock or perhaps at an Art Fair or other event that occurs while we are here. So I've begun the practice of just grouping the pictures for these Florida trips by topic.

The Fort Lauderdale Art Fair

Sometimes, our visits here correspond with the Las Olas Art Fair, an event held three times a year (January, March and October) where Las Olas is blocked off and a whole bunch of art vendors set up booths along both sides of the street. It extends from the intersection by The Cheesecake Factory (located above the Kinney Tunnel that takes US 1 underneath the New River) right at downtown Fort Lauderdale four blocks east to the Colee Hammock canal that goes under Las Olas.

This time, the fair was held on the weekend of the 4th and 5th, and we went to walk along the fair on both days. It is always interesting to see the wide variety of arts and crafts offered, and perhaps every other fair we end up buying something for ourselves or for a gift.

We were pleased to see that our friend, Doug Fountain, had his booth set up, and we stopped to chat with him for a while. Doug used to do just artwork involving gourds and feathers, and it all had a "Native American" theme, but he has branched out, and now does artwork with an oriental theme as well. He divides his time between Fort Lauderdale in the winter and Colorado in the summer, traveling to art shows and to the galleries that have his work.

The Art Fair has been going on, three times a year, for at least twenty years, so I assume that the artists sell enough, or make enough contacts at the event to make it worthwhile financially, considering that they have to pay the operator of the Fair their share of all the expense of putting it on.

Here are a few pictures that we took on the Saturday afternoon we were at the Art Fair:

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The various businesses that line Las Olas (the Rodeo Drive or Fifth Avenue of Fort Lauderdale) also benefit from the steady stream of potential customers walking along the Fair route. As usual, all the restaurants and stores seemed busy, even though it was a bit chilly (even for Florida) both afternoons when we were there.

Some of the Art Fair Art

We walked the entire length of the Art Fair on this chilly but sun-lit afternoon. Today wasn't particularly crowded; moving along can be slow when it is. The three interesections involved in the fair route offer a chance to bypass the particularly slow walkers, if you want, and they are also the locations usually given over to the larger sculptures and all of the commercial booths (insurance companies, car dealers, the local newspapers and a couple of radio stations). There are usually also at least two or three musicians performing and selling their CDs.

Here are the rest of the pictures we took on our walks through the Art Fair this time:

Of course, what the many vendors are hoping for are sales, and while we hardly ever see lots of people carring away lots of merchandise, we assume that most people conclude their transactions like we do- buying things and then coming back at the very end of the day to pick them up. That's what we did this year for the few purchases that we made.

By far the most common offering at the Art Fair are paintings, which I guess is what most people would immediately think of when the term "art" is used. Some of the paintings are pretty traditional, using traditional media such as pastels or oils. Others use additional media to set themselves apart.

We always enjoy walking around the Art Fair when our visit includes one, and this first weekend in January was no exception.

Zack in Fort Lauderdale (for the 15th time) and Bob's Third Trip

It is really a pleasure to bring Zack with us to Florida, and this is his fifteenth trip down here with us. We don't mind leaving Lucky and Tyger at home, since they keep each other company and we have good folks like Lynne who can look in on them. We don't think that either of them would have enjoyed a second trip down here, but Zack seems to get along quite well making the trip with us. But this time, even Zack will have a playmate, as we have brought Bob as well. We were a little concerned about bringing two grown cats at once (as this is the first time we've done so), but they traveled well and kept each other company while we were here.

Bob and Zack Looking Out the Living Room Window

So what did the two cats do while they were here? Well, there are lots of cat toys to play with, and we take Zack out on his cat leash once in a while. We are trying that with Bob, too, but with mixed results. Both of them like galloping across the floor and across the sofa as I swing a plush toy around at the end of a string until I get dizzy. But mainly, they seem to like to be together.

Fred has also gotten most of our cats to drink out of the faucet in either the bathroom here or at home. This is fun to watch (and I am sure you've seen YouTube videos of cats doing that) but it can be something of a nusiance when every time one of us goes into the bathroom one or more cats are always on the counter waiting their turn.

Both Zack and Bob, will sleep just about anywhere. I suppose they like chairs, beds, sofas, and the like most of all, but all four of our cats will also just plop down on the floor if that's where they happen to be when the mood strikes. Bob, particularly, sleeps not curled up as one thinks most cats usually do, but often on his back with all four paws akimbo- sticking up and out in just about every direction imaginable.

It's nice to have one of the cats with us, and it was even better to have two of them along so they could keep each other company. Both of them turn out to be good travelers; Fred tells me that when he takes Tyger up to his house, a drive of only an hour, the tabby meows all the way there.

A Visit from Steve's Parents

Two of our friends, Steve and Mario, are Florida-born, and we have been to visit both sets of their parents before- Mario's in Miami Gardens and Steve's in Hollywood. We asked Steve if we might invite his parents to come up to Fort Lauderdale and have lunch with us, and that is what we did.

At the Riverview Gardens Dock

Steve's parents came up to Fort Lauderdale about eleven in the morning one Saturday. I cleared out my parking space for them, and Fred and I were happy to welcome them to the condo, as they have welcomed us before into their home in Hollywood (Florida). The couple spent more than three hours visiting us, and we were happy that they felt comfortable in staying for such a nice visit with us. Even the cats were on their best behavior, staying out of laps unless asked. It was such a nice day that we sat at the dock before and after we went over to Las Olas to have lunch at a Greek restaurant about a block from the condo.

At Lunch with Steve's Parents

We enjoyed Steve's parents' visit very, very much, and we are pretty certain they did as well. We took quite a few other good pictures during their visit, but we've narrowed them down to just a half dozen- taken at the dock, in the condo, and while we were walking on Las Olas. Here they are:

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Boat Traffic on the New River (Installment 37)

One of our best attractions of Riverview Gardens is its location right on the New River, and the attraction of the river is that there is almost always a lot of boat traffic going up and down- lots of normal-sized boats to watch and some really big ones. There is also the Jungle Queen and the Water Taxi, and the occasional sailboat. These water craft are such a staple of our visits here, that we don't take nearly as many pictures as we used to. Here are the ones we took this trip:

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Around Riverview Gardens

We always take some pictures around Riverview Gardens and in its neighborhood, although we didn't take that many right at the condo this time.

The Icon Las Olas

For the last year or so we have been watching the Icon Las Olas go up on a site that had been in legal limbo for almost fifteen years (where the old Hyde Park Market used to be). It is nearing top-out, and will be at its maximum height by the next time we come down here. You can see pictures of it in earlier stages of completion on previous Florida trip pages.

As for other pictures around the complex and neighborhood, here are the ones of note from this trip:

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Riverver Gardens is an old complex that was originally apartments. It turned to condominiums in the 1970s, and when it did, a few folks started renovating their units. This moved slowly until the 1990s when many of the original owners had died or left, and the new, generally younger owners started changing everything out. My unit is a good example; we renovated it when we bought it, installed central air in the late 1990s and then did a major renovation in 2006. Most folks have changed out the original windows and doors as well. So the complex looks pretty much the same, but most of the units are quite nice inside.

Sunset at Riverview Gardens

Every other evening or so we have a frozen drink down at the dock, usually about 7PM. Of course, it's winter, and so it is getting dark then. On one of those evenings, I'd just finished making a frozen drink and we were headed out the door to sit by the dock when we saw one of the nicest sunsets we'd seen here in some time. We put our drinks down, got out our cameras, and took a series of pictures, the best one of which (Fred's, of course) is at right.

In that picture, you can see that Fred caught a Water Taxi just leaving the stop next door to continue down the river; the stop is just on the other side of the property fence by our gazebo by the river at the corner of the parking lot.

The area where Riverview Gardens is located is known as Beverly Heights- the area just east of downtown. Las Olas runs through the Heights from east to west, and the area is bordered by the New River on the south, downtown on the west, Broward Blvd. and Victoria Park on the north and Colee Hammock on the east.

A Visit from Rick and Leroy

Occasionally on our visits here, our friends, Rick and Leroy, who live up in Okechobee, come down to visit us and also Ron and Jay; this usually occurs on a Saturday afternoon. They did come down for a visit on one of our Saturdays here. Usually, the four of us just meet them at one of the local restaurants they like and we visit over a meal. This time, Rick and Leroy met the four of us at Peter Pan- a classic diner up in Oakland Park.

But this time they came down early to come see us here at the condo, and we were able to sit by the dock for a while before heading off for an early supper. Fred and I switched off taking pictures at the dock:

Fred, Rick, and Leroy

Myself, Rick, and Leroy

The Trip Home

We left Fort Lauderdale on the morning of the 15th, and followed the reverse of our route down. It takes us literally all day and almost 700 miles of driving (Fort Lauderdale to Jacksonville: 320 miles; Jacksonville to Pensacola: 360 miles) to get out of Florida. As a matter of fact, when we finally enter Alabama, we are over halfway home.

In the winter, it gets dark before we get out of Florida, which is a shame, because the bridge-tunnel at Mobile is an amazing engineering achievement best experienced in the daytime. On this trip, the sun set about 80 east of Mobile, and that's where Fred got some sunset pictures.

Following out normal schedule, we typically eat dinner in Gulfport, Mississippi. This leaves us a manageable 160 miles before we stop for the night in Lafayette, Louisiana. In the morning, we have a comfortable drive home- 200 miles up to Shreveport and then another 200 miles over to Dallas. We usually arrive home between 2:30 and 4PM, depending on how late we sleep in Lafayette. When it's a nice day, as it was when we got home, Fred also likes to take some pictures of downtown Dallas. Here are the pictures Fred took on the drive home:

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As we came into town on US 75, Fred got out his phone and took a series of pictures of the north part of downtown Dallas. I have put the best of these pictures at right.

This was a long trip to Florida; in the winter, Fred can be away from his house a good deal longer, as there is rarely a need to worry much about watering to keep things alive. But it was a very pleasant one, as all the trips Fred and I take down there seem to be.

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	January 27-30, 2017: Guy Visits Dallas
	Return to the Index for 2017