Homosassa Springs and Boating

The wildlife park at Homosassa Springs is just down the road from the park we stayed at in Crystal River.  I wanted to visit but was all on my own doing it.  Jerry and Janice had already been and Terry wanted to watch football.  However, I assured him I’d be back in time for the Seahawks to beat the Cowboys.  That didn’t matter. He still wasn’t interested.  I went anyway and this was the highlight of my day.

It’s not a real large wildlife park but it certainly was a nice one and I enjoyed the visit.  There are choices on how to get there.  One way is to drive directly to the front gate and the other is to take the free boat ride from the main center.  I took the boat ride with many others who chose to see the animals at the zoo other than the ones on the football field.

 

The majority of the animals are native to Florida.  You could call this place almost a wildlife refuge because most of the wildlife here have been rescued and treated. 

Some are returned to the wild when they are healthy.  However, many wouldn’t survive in the wild if released so they are kept at this center, fed and cared for.

I was back in time to see the Seahawks barely beat the Cowboys.  It’s tough watching your two favorite teams.

The weather is warm in central Florida.  I hate to say this but it’d certainly be nice to have a smidgen of a front come through just to cool the temperatures down.  The temperature hit 92 on Wednesday and that’s just way too hot for November.  The problem is there are many more of those hot days to come.

We were originally going to rent a pontoon boat but were reminded that tides control the times one can get in and out of the canals around here so we thought it just might be best to leave the calculating of those tides to those who know more about it.  Besides, it’s nice to have someone do the driving for us.  Instead of renting just a pontoon boat, we rented a captain who just happened to have his own boat ready to go.

First, it was down the canal from our park to St. King’s Bay.

We weren’t the only ones out on the bay.  There were other boaters and kayakers taking advantage of the hot weather and cooler breezes off the water.

We weren’t out long.  Our captain was having problems with the motor on his boat.  However, we did have a good time and enjoyed the ride.

Thursday we move again.  I must admit that the four of us are ready to put our levels down for more than a couple days.  We’re looking forward to the three weeks we have booked at Orlando while we visit with Mickey and his friends but we have one more park before we get the down time.  However, not so sure I can say being with Mickey is down time.  We'll have four days of running around and trying to see everything in that time period.

‘Tis life on the road.