Sat -Tue - Feb 19, 2008
Saturday Still at E.G. Simmons County Park on Tampa Bay. we went to the flea market at the park, not too good. They were cooking the chili for the cookoff but hadn't started serving. It looked good but we decided we would rather have a steak for dinner so we went back to camp.
Sunday it was fairly warm but we took an early morning bike ride to the town of Ruskin to do some grocery shopping. Did a short canoe ride at high tide when we could get back into the water passages amongst the mangroves.
Monday we broke camp and took a short 25 mi drive back to Lithia Springs County Park. We like this campground and got a nice site on the Alafia River next to where we had camped the previous week. We had a nice book reading rest day. We decided not to bike or canoe as rain was predicted. The rain hit around supper time but cleared in the evening.
Tuesday, another cool morning so we decided to combine a nice long bike ride in the trails through Fishhawk Ranch with another grocery shopping trip. We did 17 mi on our bikes. It was around 70^o but sunny and breezy.

A Pretty Heron

Wood Stork

Wed - Feb 20, 2008
Decided to paddle on the Alafia River once again. We paddled 2 mi downstream from camp until we got to a little rapid that we didn't think we could paddle back upstream against. We then we went upstream from our camp to the road bridge before floating back to our campsite. We paddled up into the outlet of Lithia Springs. The water flow from the spring must be down from a few years ago since much more beach was showing. We saw lots of big fish swimming in the warm spring water. Tomorrow we will head back North to Silver Lake.

Paddling our canoe into Lithia Springs

Fri - Feb 22, 2008
Thursday, we got to Silver Lake early but they said that all their campsites were full. I decided to take a walk through the campground and found someone packing up on the very site we camped at when we were heading South. I discovered the problem, when I looked around and saw all the same campers that were here over three weeks ago and the park has a two week limit. It turns out that the rangers don't enforce this 14 day limit which is good for those looking to stay at a nice campground and not have to move but bad for those who like to move on from time to time.
Friday, was a nice warm partly cloudy day. We decided to get an early start to a bike ride on the Withlacoochee State Trail. The last time I had talked Peggy into making it all the way to Floral City which was a 29 mi round trip bike ride. She still is complaining about that. Today we cut it short and biked a total 21 miles. We got back to camp by lunch and read our novels for the rest of the afternoon.

Cardinal admiring herself

Dean's Cardinal Story

Sitting on my sideview mirror

Tue - Feb 26, 2008
Saturday morning a heavy rain fell but before noon it cleared and it got warm & sunny. We decided to take another ride on the Withlacoochee State Trail heading south this time. Peggy decided that a twelve mile bike ride was far enough, so when her odometer hit six she turned around and headed back.
If you like Rails-to-Trails don't miss the 12' wide paved Withlacoochee State Trail. It is 46 miles long running from from Citrus Springs to Trilby and is presently the longest paved rail trail in the state. The trail corridor runs through small towns, ranches, the Withlacoochee State Forest and close to the Withlacoochee River. It has many parking lot access points along it's length.
On Sunday we left at 8 AM and by 11 AM we were setting up camp at Ocean Pond campground in Osceola National Forest in Northern FL near I-10, 45 mi West of Jacksonville. Since it was a Sunday we had no trouble getting a site with electric hookups. We saw another small RV with Ohio plates from Cuyahoga County. We stopped to ask where they were from and found out they lived in Westlake about 2 mi from us, small world.
Monday was another bright sunny day with temps in the high 70's. We decided to take a bike ride around the lake. The forest roads were a little firmer this year. We covered about 13 miles, then had a relaxing afternoon at camp.
Tuesday we leave early to head back to Atlanta since we have to catch a plane to Roatan on Thursday.

The weather was a little cooler this year compared to our trip 2 years ago. We were lucky, most of the rain showers either occurred overnight or were very short. We bicycled about 300 miles and canoed about 115 miles. Good work outs but we ate so well that we only lost a couple of pounds each.