Tarpon Springs

Tarpon Springs was once known as the Sponge Capital of the world because of the harvesting and processing of natural sponges from the gulf. To create a successful business in the area, many Greeks experienced in the sponge business were enticed to move to the area. With the large Greek population comes EXCELLENT food!!! I had the best gyro I had ever had at Helles in Tarpon Springs. The pasteries for sale in the bakery were also fantastic.

While in Tarpon Springs, we went on a nature cruise with Sun Line Cruises. It was a fun and inexpensive way to get a cruise on the gulf and watch the bottlenose dolphins. This cruise is highly recommended because of the naturalist on board.

Fort De Soto Park

The two things we enjoy the most when traveling are nature and history. We were able to enjoy both at Fort De Soto Park. The park is south of St. Pete's beach and has great beaches on Tampa Bay and on the Gulf. There are also a lot of trails and of course the actual fort.

Fort De Soto was built during the Spanish-American War. The fort has the only four 12-inch seacoast rifled mortars (model 1890 mounted on 1896 carriages) in the continental United States. Also at the fort are two 6-inch Armstrong rapid-fire rifled guns (model 1898) which were originally mounted at Fort Dade, and are the last two guns of that model year in the United States.

For more info about the fort, check out http://www.pinellascounty.org/park/05_Ft_DeSoto.htm

Florida Aquarium

Kevin and I love to go to Aquariums when we travel. I read that the Florida Aquarium in Tampa is very highly rated so we decided to check it out. If you go, there is a discount ticket booth right across the street that sells the tickets for $3.95 less than the buying the tickets from the aquarium. Also, there is an excellent Thai food restaurant called Thai Thani within walking distance of the aquarium.

Although we have been to bigger aquariums, the Florida aquarium was very well done. We were able to to see the training and feeding of a river otter named Penny and get up close with some penguins. The also had some unique fish and a nice area with many Florida native birds. My favorite was the Roseate Spoonbill pictured above.

The Gulf Coast - Indian Rocks

We are back in Florida on the gulf coast. My husband's parents have joined us for a week in a Condo at Indian Rocks Beach. The condo is a great place for two couples. It has two bed rooms, two living areas, and two balconies (one over looking the gulf and one on the intercoastal). It is a great place for walking on the beach and a central location for exploring Tampa, Clearwater, and St. Petersburg.

Here are some sunset photos from our balcony and a picture of Kevin and his folks at Clearwater beach.

Where I have been so far

As we were getting ready to head out for adventure #2, I was checking some info on TripAdvisor. I found that I could make a map of the places I have been. I started working on my map and thought it was pretty interesting so I added it here along with some of my favorite places.

I am looking forward to adding more places to the map in the next 5 months.

1. Queenstown, New Zealand


2. Bruges, Belgium


3. Heidelberg, Germany


4. Copenhagen, Denmark


5. Barcelona, Spain


6. Durango, CO, USA


7. Springdale, UT, USA

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Life's a Beach

My favorite thing to do in Florida was to walk on the beach, watch the waves, and watch the birds.

WKU Schneider Girls - Miss Brown and Miss Lawrence

I was very fortunate to have made excellent friends in college. Even if I don't see them very often, we pick up right where we left off and have an excellent time. While in Florida, I visited a fellow math major from WKU. Seems like we see each other about once every six years.

Miss Lawrence and I (Miss Brown) spent many hours together studying Abstract Algebra and Partial Differential Equations. 20+ years later, we don't remember much about the properties of infinite fields and sub-rings other than they exist in some dimension of the universe that we no longer care about. We do remember how much fun we had at WKU.

Blue Spring State Park

We spent a day visiting Blue Spring state park to see the manatees. The park is a refuge for manatees during the winter months because the spring (top picture) remains a constant 72 degrees. The day we were there, the park officials had counted 188 manatees. We were truly amazed at the manatees and the other wildlife at the spring. In addition to the manatees, we saw 2 gators, a heron, a woodpecker, several other birds, turtles, and fish.

If you are ever in Florida the winter, I highly recommend a visit:
http://www.floridastateparks.org/bluespring/

Universal Studios

It is fun to act like a kid again. We spent two days going between Universal Studios and Universal Islands of Adventure in Orlando, Florida. The roller coasters at Islands of Adventure were excellent.

St. Simons Island

My husband I started our first adventure in our "time-off". We headed to Florida with plans to go to Universal Studios and a Shuttle Launch. We decided to take 2 days to get to Florida from North Carolina. On the way down, we stopped in Brunswick, GA to check out the area and the barrier islands. The coolest thing about Brunswick was a 900 year old oak tree. I didn't get a picture because it was covered in tourists. We also enjoyed going out to St. Simon's Island. This is a picture of the light house there.

January Snow

We had a beautiful snowfall in North Carolina this year. This is a picture of our backyard after the snow.

This is only the 2nd big snow we have had in the 12 years we have lived here. It is really special getting snow in the south. You don't have to go anywhere because everything is closed and you don't have to shovel because it will melt in a day or two. All there is to do is watch and enjoy.