July 5-8, 2024: A Trip to Big Bend National Park
	May 8 - June 2: Our Spring Trip to Ecuador
	Return to the Index for 2024

This year, we planned to head down to Florida a week or so after our return from Ecuador. The time was compressed this year because we were three days late getting back home from Ecuador due to the travel snafus that I talked about on the previous page. But we did get away from Dallas on June 8 for our trip right back to Florida where we had been just a week before.

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. On most trips, this allows us to take all kinds of things with us- including our two youngest cats, Bob and Cole. Now that our trips to Ecuador won't be from Fort Lauderdale, we have brought them again this time.

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. We used to go all the way to Lafayette to pick up I-10 east, but we have had so many slowdowns on that road leading up to and over the Mississippi River bridge, that we now go a different way.

About twenty miles north of Lafayette, at Opelousas, we take US 190 east. Although there are some small towns and a few lights along this route, we can still move pretty quickly. There is never a delay crossing the Mississippi River on the US 190 bridge, and we just take the same road until it meets up with I-12 east. There are some lights, but avoiding the I-10 Mississippi River bridge is worth it.

From where we get onto I-12, it is about an hour to Mississippi, and then an to Alabama. We pass through Mobile, passing under Mobile Bay via a neat tunnel and crossing the rest of the shallow bay on a 7-mile bridge, and then it's an hour to the Florida state line.

We used to stop in Pensacola to eat, but now we continue 50 miles to Marianna for supper. Just east of Pensacola, I-10 crosses a neat bridge over Escambia Bay:

After supper, it is another 150 miles to Tallahassee where we stay for the night, arriving around 11 or so. The cats are still good travelers, visiting us up front occasionally but usually sleeping most of the time in their cozy spaces. They don't eat while we are on the road, usually waiting until we get to our motel.

We usually get away from the hotel in Tallahassee about nine or so for the 150-mile drive to Jacksonville, which we usually reach about noon. 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 boring stretch of 300 miles down to Fort Lauderdale. We usually get to the condo around 5PM, depending on traffic in Fort Lauderdale on I-95 (which can be horrendous).

We unloaded everything at the condo 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.

Our Pictures from This Trip to Fort Lauderdale

We have been here to Florida so many times that we have pretty much photographed everything worthwhile anywhere nearby, and unless there is an Art Fair, St. Patrick's Day Parade, or some other unusual event, we don't take many pictures at all. And on this trip, we took even fewer than normal. So all this page will be is the few pictures we actually did take.

One afternoon, sitting at the dock after a shower, a complete rainbow arc formed. We first took two pictures of it from the dock:

Then we went to get cleaned up for dinner and headed out to the car. Oddly, the rainbow was still intact, and I got these two pretty amazing pictures of Riverview Gardens and the rainbow:

Here, in no particular order, are the other pictures from this trip:

Most boats are white, sometimes with a different trim color. But some boats, like this one, stand out.

At the end of a day, and after a frozen drink, things can get very mellow.

We touched base with Brent, and one evening the three of us and Brent's good friend Tony went to a new restaurant (for us)- Bravo Peruvian Restaurant in Wilton Manors. The food was good, but it was the attention-getting back wall mural was worth a couple of pictures:

We were in the Home Depot one afternoon, and while I was standing waiting for Fred, a man came up to me and said he thought he recognized me. It took a moment, and then he got it: he recognized me from the Riverview Gardens dock. He was the guy we often saw in the early evening paddling his kayak with his little dog (wearing a life jacket) on the front of the kayak!. We'd always called him "Captain McDaniel" as he told us once while passing by that he taught courses for yacht captains. We hadn't seen him in some time, and the reason was that he'd changed to kayaking in the morning instead. The dog we'd seen him with had died, and his new companion was riding around Home Depot on the cart he was pushing. When Fred rejoined me, we all talked for while, and I got a Home Depot employee to take a photo. I have his phone number now, so he'll be someone else we'll try to touch base with on trips here.

Coming out to the car one evening, there was something different. In place of the boring, silver sedan that is usually parked to my left, we found this tricked-out Corvette. For some reason, this picture suggests that someone waved a wand and turned my boring red sedan into a definitely-not-boring sportscar. The contrast was interesting enough to get me to take out my phone and snap the picture at right.

Here are the last of this trip's pictures:

I had a crown come off (thanks, Tootsie Roll) and visited a local dentist to have it recemented. It must have been "Bring Your Pet to Work Day" for the receptionist had brought her two identical bulldogs with her.

This is the only picture of Bob from this trip. He is in one of his classic poses.

Not to be outdone, Cole's only picture catches him in his own classic pose. How he balances himself on his back, puts all four paws into the air, and dozes off, I cannot imagine.

One evening when we were on our own, we walked to The Downtowner restaurant south of the river at Andrews Avenue. It was trivia night, although we didn't participate. Fred did, however, want me to take this picture as we were leaving.

You can use the links below to continue to another photo album page.

	July 5-8, 2024: A Trip to Big Bend National Park
	May 8 - June 2: Our Spring Trip to Ecuador
	Return to the Index for 2024