I decided to break my travel plans of moving every day in order to give myself a break, and perhaps have a little more time to experience Key West. It is clearly a different sort of place that requires a little more time to get the feel of it. Actually, it would take a LOT more time for that. I will just be scratching the surface.

I realized that I would be missing a lot if I didn’t take in at least one beach side restaurant. Therefore I went to Dog Beach which has free beach side parking. I parked at a memorial beach honoring AIDS victims, which was right next to a slave cemetery. The sign on the slave cemetery told about a pre-civil war situation where a couple of American ships were illegally bringing in loads of slaves. The American navy caught the ships and rescued the people on board, but conditions had been so bad on the illegal ships that something like 300+ men, women and children ended up dying from illnesses they contacted on the journey. Those people were buried on this beach. The remainder were cared for in the hospital on the island and eventually returned to Africa – but not necessarily to where they had been. Yet another sad chapter in the story of American enterprise.

Next to these two beaches is a “garden club” garden located in an old brick fort. Beautiful garden, well laid out and signed. Finally I came to a beach side restaurant, and took a table facing the Atlantic Ocean.

After lunch I headed back to my hotel, stopping at an old fort that had been made into a museum. The museum had some interesting displays concerning Cuban refugees from the past sixty years or so. Other than that it was the normal collection of old pianos, old tools, old cannons – old stuff. The evening I hung out near the hotel pool and met a couple of very interesting people. In a place such as Key West perhaps the interesting people are the “tourists” – they come with interesting tales of their lives. One of the guys I met is an ex-marine. Finally having gotten his fill of the adventures that come with carrying guns into war zones, settled down, had children and is now one of huge “army” of utility workers re-wiring America. He was in Key West working on that project. Another guy that I met was a commercial airline pilot but got into a horrible automobile accident that put him on the injured-retired role. He now just travels to interesting places, having been in this hotel for about two months on this trip. There were other, much briefer, discussions.

I am going to spend another night in Key West, meaning another day. I am not sure what I will do with my time, perhaps go to some other keys and poke around a bit to see what I might see. The weather has been good; not too hot, mild breezes, almost bearable humidity, and no rain.

I decided to turn right for a little bit and check out the Keys, particularly Key West. Perhaps this is not the best choice for which Key to hang out in, but it seemed obvious at the time. The drive down from South Miami was different than I had anticipated. I expected the bridges connecting the string of keys to be much longer than they actually are. There are many similar bridges around the word, some are called causeways, which seems to be a better term for the road to Key West. The entire road feels like a 130 mile long causeway, even the parts that are really just roads on the keys. Interesting experience whatever it is called. An interesting feature are the old bridges paralleling the current bridges. They have just been left there as a rotting eyesore. Some parts have been fixed up so they form very long fishing piers, but mostly they are blocked off and crumbling into the sea.

I ended up staying in the hotel on Key West that is furthest from “the action” (the old town). That means it is necessary to take some sort of vehicle to see anything of interest. Parking is a nightmare, I haven’t found any reliable public transportation, and the “tours” are more expensive than I want to pay at $85 a person. The hotel provides a shuttle service every hour – that was my choice. Unfortunately the pick up point is a very long walk to Duval Street, which is the hub of activity. I was pretty worn out by the time I got to the place that I wanted to walk around and see things.

The concierge at the hotel explained the reason for the large distance between the hotels and “old town.” He told me that the key used to be less than half as large as it now it. The old town was the entire key. At around 1980 it was decided that more room was needed for the hotels, fast food joints and knock off shopping centers. They then built the other half of the island! It is huge, considering the effort that must have been required to move so much sand, and the monumental environmental destruction that undoubtedly accompanied that project is mind boggling. I assume they dug the sand out of the nearby water ways, they wouldn’t have trucked it in. I wonder who paid for that effort. In any case, now the normal cluster of hotels exists on the part of the island that is not “old town,” and everything of interest is several miles away. I am rather sorry that I missed Key West in the days before the monster hotels and easy highway access.

I don’t know exactly what I expected to find in the old town, perhaps I found it – plus a lot of other things. It seems that perhaps 60% of the stores are woman’s dress shops. Perhaps 10% are stores selling mementos and there are many art galleries. One end of the street is packed with restaurants and bars. If I were looking for a partner my feeling was that it would be easy to connect up with a man, but not so easy to find a woman. My impression was that the women were with their families, I didn’t see many single women. However, single men were very obvious. I chose to remain a sightseer. My takeaway was that I found the entire experience to be mostly boring. The building architecture was interesting, but the “vibes” were just another tourist trap dressed up as a used to be turn of the last century get-away. Perhaps it is still a place conductive to writing or art, just not for a tourist like myself. I don’t know what else I could have expected.

I decided to stay a couple more nights to give myself enough time to investigation other things on the island, or perhaps other nearby keys. Throwing myself into the center of the beast on Duval Street did just what I should have expected – it is more like a funky Disneyland than a “real” place. Perhaps some place, such as Ram Rod Key or Marathon Key with the Boys Scouts adventure camp would be better choices.

I spent an hour or so at the hotel pool last night, enjoying a wine at the poolside bar. Once again, I believe it would have been easy to pick up a guy, but that was not exactly my goal. It was sort of too bad, I would have liked to talk to someone but there were no women to talk to, and the guys were clearly making eyes at me. So I just enjoyed the warm weather and the wine.

Yesterday was a shorter travel day than I have been averaging. The distance from Okeechobee to my hotel in South Miami was only about 125 miles. That gave me a little time to look do a few other things. One of these was a shopping trip looking for tee shirts to wear in the hotel gyms. I thought that would be a simple thing to purchase given the large number of malls. However, while I got to see the inside of quite a few large stores, I wasn’t able to find tee shirts that fit “normal” sized people (I mean my size). I found plenty for tiny people (up to XX), but none for me. I’ll keep looking.

The trip was pretty because for a lot of it the road skirted Lake Okeechobee along the “moot” surrounding the levee. I realize that the moot is the hole created to get the dirt to pile up for the levee. It is a long “borrow pit.” At one point I managed to get up onto the levee to get a view of the lake, and was surprised to see a vast, open water, lake. It was not full of brush and trees as was the case on the northern part of the lake that I had seen previously. I have to retract my comments that I made yesterday. It all depends upon your vantage point when observing the lake. However, from what I have read, it is a very shallow lake.

The weather report called for strong winds, heavy rain and flooding. That was true, sometimes and at some places. There were many large, dark clouds filling the sky and obvious rainstorms popping up in small areas. I drove through several of these, lasting for perhaps ten minutes and then I would be out in the sun again. The region wasn’t raining, just spots that moved around with the clouds. One of the problems that I encountered was that the windshield wipers didn’t wipe the glass clear, they left what appeared to be an oily residue. It wasn’t bad enough to hamper driving, but it was a bit irritating. I don’t know if that is a build up of road gunge after driving over 5,000 miles, or something local. I hoped that the rain would wash it off, but that didn’t happen.

Having not much else to do, I spent a lot of the drive watching the clouds – noticing a couple of things that I hadn’t seen before. One was a common condition where the clouds actually had dark lines defining their edges.

A couple of days ago I had been playing around with attempting to sketch clouds and came to the realization that they need to be sketched “backwards.” I can’t sketch white, so in order to get white I need to make the other parts dark. Darkening the sky is the only way to make the clouds white. For well defined clouds such as the background cumulus clouds in the photo, there is no “line” separating the white of the clouds from the dark of the sky – the two colors just bump up against each other. I convinced myself that is what happens within the clouds also, it is all about shading, there is no “drawing” of lines. However, yesterday I noticed that there actually are “lines” in the clouds. The clouds in the upper part of the photograph have actual dark lines surrounding the puffs of clouds, it is not all just shading – parts of it can be drawn. Of course the drawn lines are slightly fuzzy, not sharp edged – but lines nevertheless. That is a bit of a relief to me because it is much easier to outline the clouds with a line and shade inside than to just use shading to indicate the edges.

The second thing I noticed was the appearance of orange clouds. Being somewhat color blind I am not positive that orange is the right color, they might have been green, or even brown – but they definitely had a color, not just white and grey. The colored clouds were shaped line the regular cumulus clouds, seemingly behind them off in at a distance. I have no idea what was causing that effect, but it was striking and persistent. I tried to take a photo of them but I was on the freeway without any way to stop to take a photo. I snapped one out of the window, but it wasn’t very useful. Perhaps it was something to do with my dark glasses, I didn’t think to take them off to check on that – because I forgot that I was wearing them.

The hotel web site gave the address as being in Kendall. However, my GPS didn’t offer Kendall as an option. Not only that, but my map of Florida doesn’t have enough resolution to be useful as a street map. It is fine for the State, but not so great within towns. Not knowing a solution I just set my GPS on “South Miami” knowing that is in the general vicinity of Kendall, hoping that I could figure out the rest when I got there. I drove into town on wide, four lane road – heading toward the beach because I knew that Kendall is near the shore and south of South Miami. I figured I would at least bump into the correct town, and since I had the street address would eventually find my destination. However, while sitting at a stop light I noticed the top of a hotel peaking over the top of a large department store – I could see the hotel logo and it was MY hotel, right there waiting for me. What luck!! I haven’t been able to find any sign of a town called Kendall, but the street I drove in on is called Kendall Avenue when it gets closer to the ocean.

The hotel and room in South Miami is FAR better than what I have been staying in lately. Everything is nice and clean, the furniture isn’t banged up and chipped, the paint is nice, and there are no stains in the carpets. Not only that, but the lobby is open and comfortable, very inviting. Even the pool is better. For one thing it has water in it which was rare on my trip, but there is shade and some landscaping in the pool area – it isn’t just a bucket of water surrounded by bare concrete. The price is the same, but the feeling couldn’t be different. I don’t even hear any hammer drills or sledge hammers being used in the surrounding rooms as I did at my last hotel.

Since the drive was so short, I had time to go exploring before dinner time. The ocean is located due east from my hotel, and the main drag was headed east so it seemed like I should be able to just drive a few miles and see the ocean. That was a mistake. It turned out my hotel is about seven miles west of the ocean, I thought was a mile or so. However, the road almost got that far before degenerating into a neighborhood road rather than a main drag. I went as far east as I could, finding a N-S road paralleling the coast. However, I was never able to find the coast because the is a solid line of mansions between the road and the water, most of which had big iron gates with guards. Many of these “houses” were bigger than the hotels that I have been staying at, perhaps averaging 20,000 sq feet or so – some tiny 5,000 square foot homes, but most much larger, grander and expensive.

The architecture that I could see through the surrounding vegetation was uniformly outlandish, reaching across the spectrum of grand old colonial styles to modern art forms. There was so much wealth surrounding these streets that I actually found myself getting sick to my stomach realizing just how be the gap is better the “well to do” and the wealthy, and how many people have acquired vast amounts of the nation’s wealth. It was just sickening, literally.

I had been traveling north along the coast and finally reached Miami. The architecture that I saw there was equally as wild, but a lot was much older. Quite spectacular, what with the curved lines, bold colors and just plain interesting shapes. Even the sky scraper are crazy, doing things like twisting like corkscrews as they reach for the sky. The streets were filled with cars and the sidewalks filled with pedestrians. It all looked interesting, and perhaps even a little exciting. I attempted to find parking so I could join the pedestrians, but none was to be found. I saw a sign offering parking spaces for $20, but I didn’t feel like doing that for the hour or so that I wanted to spend. I finally arrived at a marina where the boats mirrored the wealth of the homes. Of course there was no parking there either, and no beach.

Running out of time, energy and interest I returned to my hotel having failed in my search for a beach. Perhaps I’ll try again on my way up the coast from the Florida Keys. Miami appears to be one of those places that you just have to immerse yourself in, on foot, for a few days. I heard on the news that today is the last day of the city providing tram service. Up until today they have offered free tram based transportation, but that is no longer going to be the case. It is now going to be Uber based, using normal cars. I wonder how that is going to work out.

This morning I will start down the long bridge to the keys.

I found that this is such a pleasant little town of about 5,000 people that I decided to spend an extra day getting caught up on laundry, some business, and just kick back. That plus the dire warnings about torrential rains, strong winds and massive flooding. Apparently those are local weather events, one town might get walloped and the next one five miles away get nothing. Right now the storms are localized, high energy events (not yet tornadoes I hope). I have been dithering with my decision about whether or not to go down the keys. Weather reports of the area make me a bit nervous. I am putting off that decision until such time as I actually have to make it.

Yesterday I decided to see if I could actually find Lake Okeechobee. My GPS says that I am perhaps a quarter of a mile away, but seems to be very difficult to access because of the giant 130 mile long levee around it. There are a few wide sections of the levee where you can drive high enough to see the lake and launch boats. However, in most cases even that doesn’t allow observations of the lake because is almost isn’t a “lake,” it is more like an enclosed swamp. The name Okeechobee means “big water” – which is true, but not a lake like Lake Tahoe for example. The lake is 10 feet or less in depth, often much less. From what I was able to see, it is more like watery paths through trees and brush with very little open water.

I drove about 40 miles along the shoreline finding three boat launching facilities. The giant circular levee has what appears to be a large moat along the outside edge of the levee. This “moat” appears to be the primary source of boating and fishing activity since it is easily accessible almost its entire length. There are very large groups of single wide trailers and small houses almost the moat, giving many water front access with small private docks. There must be several thousand people living in these “adult” communities on the outskirts of Okeechobee – probably accounting for much of the vigor of the community – there is likely lots of retirement money to buy things without flooding the job market.

I tried to imagine what it must be like inside, and almost scared myself out of going in. But in the mood for an adventure, I found the door and just walked on it – wondering what to expect. It turned out to be almost deserted, a couple having a beer and eating corn dogs and the waitress. I ordered a beer and a cheeseburger – which was good, but so sloppy that it was almost impossible to eat. Frog legs were on the menu, perhaps they would have been easier to eat.

I noticed a lot of garbage cans and big pots sitting on the floor in front of the bandstand. When I asked the waitress about them, she replied that “they had a bit of a leak during the storm two days ago.” Then she acknowledged that it was actually more like a waterfall. The pots and garbage cans were more or less permanent features that get moved aside when it isn’t raining and people want to dance. She indicated that the locals know when to come and when to not bother.

I when to an interesting restaurant that evening. It was obviously a well liked local establishment serving a wide variety of meals, mostly centered around fish in one form or another. I had excellent shrimp fettuccine with a side of a wedge of lettuce. The “wedge” of lettuce was an entire head of lettuce sliced in half, then smothered in excellent blue cheese dressing. As usual, I sat at the bar to eat and got into nice conversations with the folks on both sides of me. It was a pleasant and tasty evening.

The only other issue today is that I am finding my legs are starting to object to too much sitting in one position and not enough exercise. I started an exercise routine this morning. I hate to “exercise” but find that I have to do something or it will undoubtedly get worse. Most of the hotels that I stay at have little rooms with few exercise machines. I need to start using them. But first I have to get some “gym clothes” (mainly tee shirts). I’ll get some this morning since there are two big shopping centers almost next door to my hotel. Other than that, things are going along just fine. Long days of driving sometimes, but interesting things now and then. I am off to Kendall this afternoon. It is just a few miles south of Miami, perhaps it will be a fun place to visit. After that it will either be south down the keys, or north up the Atlantic coast. I won’t know which it is until tomorrow morning.

The drive east from Punta Gorda to Lake Okeechobee was a refreshing change from driving through dense jungle to much more open farm land with cows, sheep and various crops including citrus trees and sod farms. I could finally see the homes and farms, and see a bit of the landscape. I only drove about 100 miles yesterday, so not only was it pleasant from the point of view of the scenery, but because it wasn’t just a hard drive to get to the next hotel room.

The town of Okeechobee was an even better refreshing change – it is actually a “town” in the old time town sort of way. The area feels very rural, but the town has a lot to offer – there must be a much larger population than it feels like. I wonder how this place managed to maintain its feeling of community while so many others have not. I think it might have to do with a few subtle, but important, design features. Apparently someone thought it all out, or maybe it was just an accidental sort of thing – but it appears to work.

The first thing that is apparent when entering town is that it is chopped into four quadrants by intersecting four lane highways. It is chopped into big pieces, but not bypassed. The speed limit on these highways is reduced to 30 mph through town with several sets of stops lights, so they can be crossed easily with vehicles or on foot. The main east-west road parallels the “town” main street, perhaps 200 feet to the north. The main street still functions as a main street, but has easy access to the highway. There are two large shopping centers less than a 1/2 mile to the south of town on the N-S highway. Main street has many shops that are too small, or too different, to have competition from the shopping centers. There are perhaps ten little eateries of various types. There is an old-time style cafe, an organic restaurant, a Mexican place, a sweets place with candy and coffee, a coffee shop, and others. There are three pawn shops, and a second-hand store next to “Hippy Haze” which is a consignment place with beads, crystals, tie-dyed things, bells, incense and that sort of thing. There are two dress shops and a western wear store. I am sure I am missing several other offerings, all of which appear to be thriving.

The center strip between the highway and main street was a long, green park containing an interesting art display featuring full sized bronze statues of a couple of working cowboys, a cow dog and a bunch of cattle being driven though the park. The sculptures were created by a guy named J. Michael Wilson from Lehi, Utah and cast in Alpine Utah. Obviously these are important art works for the community, they must have cost a lot. The town must be pretty “sensitive” and appreciative of much more than seems typical in their part of the world.

The other side of the highway is more “industrial” in nature, including city hall, the sheriff department, some granaries, the schools and a few larger restaurants of the “bar and grill” nature. All of these are part of “the town” just not on main street. Everywhere I went people were relaxed, friendly and inviting. I felt none of the tension that I have been experiencing for the past few weeks, it just felt comfortable. The bar and grill that I went to for dinner last night appears to be a “gay bar” given the clientele and the signage on the walls. Even that is accepted in this little town.

I had a pleasant meal watching them enjoying themselves playing pool, or just sitting around chatting with each other. Once again, it was just comfortable and inviting. I also stopped in at a more rowdy appearing bar and grill, just to get a feeling for the “macho” side of things. Once again, although it had all of the appearance of being a “western style” rough and tumble place, it was very pleasant and friendly. I enjoyed my visits with the locals, just talking about “things” in general.

During the afternoon I went to the lake to see what I could see. The lake is not very accessible because it is contained by a 15 or 20 foot levee all the way around. There is a road surrounding the lake, built at the bottom of the levee so you can’t see the lake except at the few locations that are built up as parks with lake access. I found one of these and just settled down to watch it for an hour of so.

The road from Steinhatchee was long and boring. So far the roads I have encountered in Florida are very different from what I am used to in California. They come in three varieties (1) Major four-lane freeways cut though dense jungle with no view of anything, (2) small paved roads servicing the towns, (3) dirt roads. The road system is functional, but quite limited. The dirt roads are usually just cuts through the overgrowth, revealing white “dirt” (I suppose it is limestone). The “freeways” are interesting in that they aren’t freeways like in California – rather they are two-lane divided roads usually with a 55 MPH speed limit, with side roads entering directly onto the highway, I have yet to see an on-ramp or overpass. They often go past the little towns, but the speed limit slows to 30 MPH in the “business” districts. When entering an area with increased population density stop lights are common – they just stop all four lanes of traffic for the cross traffic. It is quite “primitive” in comparison to California or Arizona norms, but I suppose it is functional and inexpensive.

After driving between two walls of trees for a couple of hours I got bored and decided to turn off on one of the white, dirt side roads. My GPS was indicating a grid of roads just beyond the main highway, so thinking that perhaps the community was “hiding” behind the trees I went to see what I might see. It was a main road for the local community, but barely wide enough for cars to pass. It went straight into the jungle. At first I assumed that I was in an uninhabited area, probably mainly used by sportsmen or loggers. However, it turned out to have a lot of houses, perhaps on five to ten acre plots. Most of the houses were hard to spot because they were nestled back in the trees and had been pretty much overgrown by the jungle. Old, single-wide trailers were the norm, along with old cars, new cars and piles of stuff. It felt very much like what is depicted on television programs such as the “Swamp People.” I managed to get out of there unscathed, which felt like success!

After surviving my excursion into the Florida jungles, I then stopped in at a roadside diner for lunch. The most noticeable customers were the now common group of men in bright orange shirts, part of the utility crews that seem to be swarming the southern half of the USA. The walls were decorated with several very large mounted fish, wall plaques with funny sayings, and photographs of the proprietor’s children and grandchildren. I ordered a Rubin sandwich that turned out to be quite good, along with a bowl of inedible potato salad. Everyone was friendly and cheery.

The next stop along the route was a State Park Nature Preserve that promised manatees. That seemed like an easy way to spot one of those critters, so I pulled in. It turns out that the place was set up to care for injured animals, all of which had something happen that prevented the being returned to the wild. The park was accessible by a nice, 15 minute boat trip through the jungle where we viewed an alligator, a turtle and a “snake bird” (Anhinga) sunning itself on an old snag. I saw two manatees, one was cruising the little lake having lunch, the other was in the “hospital” recovering from a nasty encounter with a propeller.

This all put in into the Tampa area during the “rush” hour, waiting at the many stop lights spaced about a 1/4 mile apart. On top of that, it started to rain pretty heavily. I finally finished my planned three hour trip after about eight hours of travel. The motel operator indicated that I might like to try the restaurant located almost directly across the street. He said it was a rather “high end” place with high prices, but none of his customers ever complained. So that was my choice.

When I got there I was surprised that there were no cars in the parking lot, and even more surprised when I ended and found that there were no customers. None. It was a big restaurant with several large rooms full of tables, a nice big bar area, and all of the decor I expect in a nice restaurant. Everything but customers. I asked the receptionist if it was open and was assured that it was.

As usual, I sat at the bar for dinner. I looked over the menu, which had a wide variety of delicious sounding items as high, but not unaffordable, prices. I noticed several items that were described as Croatian specialties, so instead of just ordering what sounded good I asked the bartender/owner if he was from Croatia. He was. Feeling in a of an adventuresome mood, I asked his advice for a selection that I would be sorry if I hadn’t ordered it. He immediately said pork or lamb chops. These were $50 each, more than I really wanted to pay. I looked again and found pork and lamb shanks for only $30. I asked about them, and he really lit up! He said it was his favorite piece of meet and his wife (the cook) did a wonderful job of cooking it – slow roasting it for five hours with all the right seasonings. I couldn’t resist, so ordered it along with my normal glass of chardonnay. Soon a giant chunk of pork shank was served alongside a huge serving of seasoned rice and marvelous fresh homemade rolls. I was in hog heaven!

While I waited for the food to be prepared, he stayed at the bar and we talked. He told me that he left Croatia immediately after the war with Russia was finished, having been given the choice of going to Germany or the USA. He choose Germany, thinking it was closer to home and perhaps he could return to his home one day. He told me of many family and friends who died during the war, told me about how hard it was to fight and try to survive. He pointed to the places were he had bullet holes, and the scare on his neck when someone tried to kill him with a knife. He was very sad when talking about those things.

I asked him why it was worth all of that just to avoid living under Russian rule. Afterall, the Russians won and that was the outcome – what was the point? He said it was very simple, Freedom. Freedom from living under a despot in a dictatorship that prevented personal or political freedom. He was sorry they lost, but hopeful that somehow, some way, some day it would change again.

When if got to Germany he found that they totally control refugees. His only job opportunity, the only job he was allowed to have, was cleaning. On top of that, he was prevented from having an income that would give him any sort of acceptable living. So he left, and ended up in Clearwater Florida in 1998, with a wife, two children and $600 in his pocket. Whatever organization helped moved him to Florida helped him find an apartment and got him a job driving a forklift. The apartment cost $1400 a month, the job paid $175 a week. He instantly recognized that wasn’t going to work, so after two weeks he quite and started a side business fixing big rig trucks. (I didn’t dig deeper into what sort of background allowed him to make that switch.) His truck repair business was a success, he hired 6 mechanics and did well until one day he happened upon an old out of business restaurant for sale, cheap. His wife was excited about doing that, so he switched his attention to fixing up the restaurant and all that. I was in that restaurant. He said it is normally very busy, usually packed with waiting lines. He didn’t know what happened on that day, but being empty just didn’t happen.

About this time the conversation turned to the food and menus, he pointed out that almost everyone ordered the inexpensive house variety of wine. At that point I recognized my error in ordering, and apologized for not asking his advice along with his advice for the meal. He chuckled and said he had a lot of other “house” wines that they could have ordered.

At that point I recognized my error in ordering, and apologized for not asking his advice along with his advice for the meal. He chuckled and said he had a lot of other “house” wines that they could have ordered. He then did an interesting thing, he brought out an unlabeled bottle of wine, set up two glasses and we each had a glass – mine was complementary. He then leaned back against the back bar and we started to talk, just a friends! We had moved past the customer/bartender situation and moved onto real topics.

He asked me about my trip. I told him that it has been a sad thing to see all of the almost ghost towns, sad to see how gutted the freeways and strip malls had left the communities, and how dangerous it felt in Arkansas and Alabama.

He was interested in all these topics, and agreed with my assessment – including Florida into that category of dangerous places. He asked if I preferred Trump of de Santis. I expressed horror with either choice, and then we were off to the races! He knew we could talk, talk about the dangers of what is happening in America right now. He agreed with my assessment of the danger that the rebels present (I can’t think of another name for them right now since the main point of their anger is a desire to crash the entire political system.)

He finished up the evening with the story of the beginning of the war in Croatia. He said it had changed so that it felt exactly like it now feels in America with the “moderate” Democrats and Republicans trying to find a way to operate in the midst of a vocal group of people attempting to set it on fire and burn it to the ground. He said one day it just started, it started small with some little riots and demonstrations but that by the second day all of the store windows had been broken out and the merchandise stolen. At the same time the guns came out from hiding, and there were dead people in the streets and Russia invading by day three. It was all out war from then on. It only took a day to turn, and he is scared. He said it looks exactly the same to him here as it did there then. His fear isn’t that as shift in political control is coming, his fear is that civil war is at our doorsteps. He saw it before so knows how quickly and easily it can change.

Wow!!! No wonder everyone is so afraid to talk to me, why the whisper that they are on my side but can’t talk about it, no wonder they shy away from any discussions that might be overheard. It took this guy over an hour in an empty restaurant before he felt comfortable enough to talk. I pointed that out to him, and he said he had to do that because he needed customers and he would be boycotted or worse if he said what he thinks.

Yesterday’s drive was exhausting, I planned on driving about 160 miles, but ended up closer to 250 miles. That perhaps doesn’t seem like all that much, but it was on winding, 35 MPH roads most of the way. The extra miles were due to my mistake. I planned out a stopping place for the night that was going to be quick and easy. I reserved a room in Steinhatchee based upon those plans. However, once I started on the road I realized that my route was on a main interstate down the middle of the state where there were no towns, nothing to look at, and just blasting along with dense forests of both sides of the road. That is definitely not my approach for this trip.

I rerouted going directly south to the gulf instead of east. I got to the coast at Port Saint Joe and then took hwy 98 along the beach toward the east. This was a very pretty drive. It is known as Florida’s “lost coast” because the main highway bypassed it with the freeway that I had originally planned. It was pretty, but a lot longer and a lot slower – hence it is one of those routes less taken. The little towns reminded me a lot of California’s little beach front communities such as Mendocino, Bodega Bay and others. They had a lot of little, boutique stores bustling with tourists and vacationers. Lots of restaurants and things of interest. I didn’t stop to partake of these because I knew that I had made the mistake with my hotel reservations by then, I messed up my planning.

My route took me along the beach, then looped inland to avoid a road-less section, finally returning to the coast at Steinhatchee.

My room was in one of the little cabins facing the highway. It was very small, but kind of cute and a nice change from the cookie cutter rooms I have been in lately. The biggest problem was that there was no breakfast, or restaurants open for breakfast in the town. Steinhatchee is a vacation town with lots of marinas, vacation rentals, bait shops and restaurants. However, almost all of the restaurants are closed on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. The only open on the weekend days, and not at all for breakfast. Not only are there lots of marinas, there are lots of commercial and sport fishermen. It is the first time I have seen a place that caters to fishermen, but doesn’t have wonderful little cafes to serve them breakfast. Oh well, luckily the grocery store was open so I could get an apple, yogurt and fruit drink for breakfast. It worked, but I had fantasized about sitting in a little dock-side cafe, watching the boats while having a nice breakfast and hot cup of coffee. So much for fantasies.

Last night I stopped in at a little bar and grill (without the grill part because it was Tuesday night). They were testing a new idea of having taco Tuesday, so I could have gotten a taco – they only offered oyster tacos which didn’t sound all that interesting to me. I got to talking to a couple of recently retired people. A couple of years ago they moved from the big city to this tiny town. Their report is that it is wonderful, they really enjoy it and claim to have made more good friends in the first year than they made in their entire life in the city. Their appearance fit the location, slightly rough, longish hair, beard, weathered complexion. Most of the locals that I have seen look a bit like that. I don’t know how to judge their politics based upon dress, in California they would be the “old hippy” crowd, or the motorcycle folks. I didn’t get a chance to figure that out, but everyone I have run into is friendly, open to talking, and comfortable feeling. That is certainly a welcome change!

There would be a lot to do here if you wanted to rent a boat, or charter a fishing trip. It looks like you can also rent scuba gear and swim with the manatees. I am going to press on.

Yesterday’s trip through south-eastern Alabama was the first time that I have felt uneasy, and perhaps not as safe as I normally do. My “danger” receptors were activated by several situations. The first is that the area that I traveled through is clearly in economic distress. That was evident from all of the closed stores, poorly maintained houses, older cars and just the sort of run-down nature of things. While this made me a little more cautious than normal, it wasn’t all that new to this trip. Beyond that, there is clearly a general disregard for highway safety evidenced by a LOT of speeding well in excess of 30 mph over the posted speed limit, as well as an almost purposeful disregard for the no-passing lanes created by blind corners and hills. It felt more like an intentional “I dare you to make me follow the law” approach because instead of passing on long straight sections with good visibility, they wait until the double yellow lines to make their move. I found it rather scary, and wonder how much the intentional flaunting of laws extends into the rest of their behavior. To top it off, on the few occasions where I encountered people out of my car I always felt, and saw, their dislike for my being “in their territory.” Those times were definitely uncomfortable. I was relieved when I finally crossed the border into Florida, although I am not so sure that I may have jump from the pan into the fire.

I decided to spend the night in a Microtel in Marianna, Florida. It is apply named, the Microtel has micro-rooms. They work, but certainly don’t give a feeling of spaciousness. This is in the panhandle of Florida, quite close to the Florida Caves. Perhaps I will check them out today, although I am a little anxious to get back on the road heading south toward the keys.

Last night I had a hard time finding a place to eat. There are many fast food places, and closed restaurants, in Marianna. I finally found a steak house very close to my hotel and settled for that. It was nothing special, apparently a rather “low end” place, but they had a small bar – just what I was looking for. There were three “good old boys” sitting together at one end of the bar, and a lady bartender. I sat a few seats away from them in the empty section of the bar. They eyed me suspiciously, but since I only felt slightly threatened I decided to stay and see what the evening might bring. I ordered a glass of wine and dinner. The wine came in a small wine glass, carefully filled to the half-way make – it was small but I have come to expect that.

The three guys were talking loud enough that I could easily overhear them talking about fishing, the weather, their jobs, just the normal chit-chat of friends enjoying each other’s company. I got a little bold and injected a comment or two when it seemed safe to do so. They accepted my comments, and pretty soon I was sort of drawn into the conversation. At this point the bartender offered me another glass wine, but it came about 3/4 full – I guessed that was some sort of indication that I was not being rejected. The conversation soon turned to them asking about where I am from, and then because a little political. I tried my best to tread carefully with that topic, but without backing away from pointed questions.

Somehow or another things changed at that point in time. The group of three changed as a couple left, being replaced by others. Soon I was sitting in the middle of the group, engaged in pretty fun conversations. The bartender lady brought me yet another glass of wine – this time filled right to the brim! I knew I was “in” at that point. (That also put me precariously close to my wine limit.) At about the time that my wine glass was filled, one of the old boys leaned over and whispered to me that he agrees with all that I am saying, but he can’t speak up like that because he has to live with the other guys.

One of new guys joining the conversation works for the nuclear power industry. That got us into talking about nuclear power, how safe the new systems are, and all that. Of course I could just let that be without expressing my opinions – we had a very enjoyable dialogue. The conversation finally turned to energy in general, then into economics, the prices of houses, gasoline and a little (very little) politics. I don’t know if I changed any minds, but I got a lot of thoughtful replies and considerations from the entire group. A lot of “hum… I never thought of it like that, maybe there are different ways to do things” responses.

It turned out to be a fun evening, talking to people with very different backgrounds and points of view, but certainly open to my other ideas and opinions. I kind of wonder if they all wanted to whisper the same thing to me, that they agree with my points of view but can’t express them because they have to live with the others.

This was the kind of evening I had hoped for when I started my trip. Something similar has happened four or five times over the last month. Perhaps that is much more than I should have hoped for, having a real conversation once a week isn’t all bad.

After leaving Jackson on Friday the 26th things got a little busy and I didn’t manage to add another page to my blog. I went from Jackson to Hatiesburg, traveling most of the way on a “normal” highway cutting a lot of time out of my usual approach of wandering around on whatever small roads looked promising. Before arriving at Hatiesburg my friend Lee told me that there was likely to be “a little” discussion about baseball in town. Hatiesburg is the home of University of Southern Mississippi and everyone I talked to had something to say about the baseball games going on at that time. I haven’t kept up with college baseball, but obviously this is an exciting year for those living near “Southern Miss.” My hotel was almost surrounded by the campus, so there was no missing the excitement. The little bar and grill that I stopped in before dinner had 40 televisions that I could see from my seat, there were undoubtedly more – all tuned to the same game!

The main thing that I noticed about the difference between Mississippi and the other states I had been traveling through is that it feels a lot more prosperous. The small towns are still vibrant, the houses in the country are more likely to be modern homes rather than small older homes or single-wide trailers. It just had a feel of “prosperous” instead of impending ghost-town.

The following morning I had some “homework” to take care of, leaving my room right at check-out time. I got to the home of my friend Lee and his wife Shirley’s by mid-morning. The trip was quite pretty, traveling the freeway down through lush forests, but with very few signs of civilization. Just forest, the people must have been all hidden by the forest. The Lees live about 30 miles north of Pascagoula on their 45 acre piece of the forest. They carved out an amazing place, beautiful in every sense of the word. Their house faces a five acre pond, which is surrounded by acres of well kept lawn. The bought the property about 25 years ago and slowly cleared the land and finally built a really nice home by the pond.

In the evening we went to a really neat old-timey seafood restaurant on the gulf called Bozo’s. Lee gave me a copy of a print by Dena KcKee showing the place about twenty years ago. It has expanded since that time, but looks pretty similar even today – but with a much larger restaurant located to the right of the building, behind the Christmas trees.

My travels through Mississippi was memorable for the large number of “Blacks” everywhere. As a Californian I am of course familiar with many races of people, or whatever the politically correct term is these days, but seldom find myself in places where I seldom see other white folks. At first it felt odd, but quickly it just became comfortable – and fun because they seem to like to be more creative and flamboyant with their attire. The only times that I felt uncomfortable were when aggressive white guys were there – not physically but standing in “fight” posture, glaring at me and others. They felt like the radical right folks in California, just angry and appearing ready to pick a fight. I found them to be quite scary, I can’t image having to live amongst them on a regular basis. I was told that that the theater in that part of town used to have two drinking fountains, and three bathrooms. One for white men, one for white women and everyone else could share.

One of the fun things about Lee’s place is that he has a lot of little “get-ways” scattered here and there. There is his shop where he tinkers on fixing up old John Deere tractors, sharing space with an outdoor kitchen set up to entertain his large numbers of family and friends. Upstairs is his official office space, I am envious about the size and beauty of it done up in natural wood for paneling and decorated with may interesting trinkets and momentos. There are a few other outbuildings housing more tractors, wood storage, blacksmith tools and more. On the far side of the pond he has an elevated structure that make perfect viewing of whatever wildlife might be enjoying the pond. Overall, it is a really neat place. I consider is an amazing work of art.

As might be expected, Lee and I talked about many things – but perhaps mostly about our shared profession of System Safety Engineering. I don’t think we solved anything, but we commiserated on the problems.

The drive from Lake Village, AR to Jackson, MS was uneventful. Instead of taking the direct route I turned north as soon as I crossed the Mississippi River, going north along the river road (Hwy 1) for a few miles just to see what I could see. What I saw was a flat, very productive agricultural area. I assume this whole area is filled with silt from thousands of years of periodic flooding. There are lots of big fields, a few scattered homes, and once in awhile a small community. To me it looked like many of the small town areas in the Sacramento Valley. They look sleepy and slow, without much going on – but that is just the way it is in those kinds of little towns. At least they didn’t seem to be 75% on the way to being ghost towns, they are just small and slow.

I had hoped to turn around and go south on hwy 61 through old rural towns, but somehow missed most of that and ended up in Yazoo City, and then on a big interstate highway to Jackson. I gave up and decided to take the “normal” route. It was pretty, very green and lush with wide mowed strips of green “lawn” along the highway and dense forests beyond that.

After a hour or so of needing to take a “bio break” I finally come upon a rest stop, located in the center divide. It was a combination rest stop archeological l museum located at an ancient mound site. Apparently between about 1000 AD and 1300 AD the local inhabitants took up the process of building very large mounds, similar to those that I visited in Arkansas. They decided that this particular mound had a flat platform on top where a ceremonial building was located. A few people used that building (the priests?), while the community lived in the surrounding clearing. I suppose I should have been excited about the site, but it really just looked like a pile of dirt to me. According to the signs, there were many more mounds in this area until they were leveled during highway construction. They saved a couple of them by going around them with both directions of the freeway.

The best part of the site for me was a nice concrete footpath that went to the mounds, but then continued for a half mile or so into the wooded area beyond. Even though highway traffic was on both sides it was a nice stroll into a wooded area, a nice break from hours of sitting in the car.

My route took me right through the middle of the big city of Jackson. From my vantage point in the driver’s seat of my car, Jackson appears to be a vibrant, busy city. I went by the university, a very large hospital that was probably a teaching hospital associated with the university. My hotel room was located in a nearby town of Flowood. The only way I knew I was in a different town was the sign next to the road. Apparently the hotel is located near the airport since their promotional material promised that I would be able to hear the airport, but I didn’t.

Dinner was at a restaurant called The Iron Horse Grill, located on the far side of Jackson from my hotel. That gave me a chance to see a bit more of town and go through some very well-to-do looking parts of the city, with what I would call large mansions set well back from the street with broad lawns and fountains out front. The IHG is a restored Armour meat packing plant from the early 1900’s. From the many signs around it this is an apparently attempt to revitalize the old-town of Jackson, the part of Jackson that was instrumental in the creation of Jazz music. It was a fun venue, kind of funky old building. When I arrived their very large parking lot was packed and I feared that it would be difficult to find a seat for dinner, but the opposite was the case. The building is cut up into many smaller areas, some in separate rooms, some in balconies and a few on outside areas. All of the areas were being used, but none were crowded. Each had a very different “feel” about it because of the building and the decor.

As usual, I sat at the bar for dinner. A guy was playing a guitar and singing, but I got busy talking to the person sitting next to me and didn’t pay the musician much attention. My neighbor was a young man from India taking tech classes at the university. When I asked him how he liked it there, he said he was getting homesick, the city is fun and friendly – but WAY too hot and humid. We had a nice talk, just friendly chatting.

The humidity is starting to get to me. All of the things made of paper have become limp. My cloths never quite dry out. In the morning it is cool, so the humidity is barely noticeable but by mid-afternoon I find I feel drained. It is rather oppressive feeling, I am happy to get inside where there is air-conditioning. I am wondering what it will be like when I get further south, and the summer heat finally arrives. So far it has been mild spring weather and that is getting to me. It will undoubtedly become a challenge in a week or two (if not sooner).

I haven’t plotted my next path yet. My approach has settled down to measuring off about 150 miles on the map in the general direction of what I am headed. I am now headed for the gulf coast of Mississippi. Then I look around to see if anything looks appealing for that night’s stay. Once I get that settled in my mind, and perhaps make a reservation at a hotel I try to find the most interesting path, meaning the one that avoids big city’s when practical. It is daily process because I never know when I might deviate wildly from my intended path. Planning ahead just ends up with reservations that I can’t cancel and therefore pay for even though I don’t use the room. That is not an economical approach. I’ll stay someplace between here and the gulf tonight, and then go see my friend Lee on Saturday.