Monday morning the “train” was hooked up and the blue truck
headed east into the wind, towards the Atlantic side of the state across forty miles of sugarcane fields. At times there was not even a palm tree in sight. We pulled into John Prince County Park and Campground in Lake Worth and H backed into our site on the edge of Lake Osborne. For the next two weeks, the big back window will be about 10 feet from the waters edge. The resident neighbors are Muscovy ducks, long legged, spotted brown Limpkins and even a big green Iguana!! Check out the tree trunk! John Prince Park is named after a well-liked county commissioner who served for 18 years back in the 1940’s. There are almost 300 campsites and over 700 acres that include miles of paved bike trails, mulched exercise/running paths, space for soccer games and a golf course. Lake Osborne has a parade of pleasure boats and small fishing boats that cruise by each day. The lake connects with a myriad of channels, where lots of kayaks and canoes hang out.
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| Lake Osborne |
H was restless to see the ocean and inspite of the impending
heavy clouds we traversed the arched bridge that crossed the Intercoastal
waterway and found the Lake Worth beaches. The sandy shore was sparsely dotted
with tourists and the sidewalks and benches were empty because the storm was
coming across the aqua water at an increasing speed. Even the seagulls were struggling to fly. We made it back to the truck just as the
deluge began!
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| Palm Beach |
Early Tuesday morning the real storm hit with a vengeance –
thunder, lightening and strong winds that rocked the trailer. By 9ish it was beginning to settle and H did
not want to sit around and watch it rain, so we headed south to Fort Lauderdale
and an indoor flea market that H and another friend used to go to before my
days in Florida began. It is called
Swap Shop and looks like a large yellow warehouse sitting in the midst of a
half dozen drive in theaters! The
interior of this multi level “warehouse” has an arcade, a restaurant, a car
show, and of course rows and rows of cheap jewelry, clothing and shoes. H says it even used to have a circus! Surrounding the main building are canopies
covering long rows of produce, clothing
- - - and shoes! The shopkeepers
were struggling to keep the puddles of water in the walkways from damaging
their wares. Other small shops
surrounded the outer edge of the buildings and in the parking lot were even
more venders with piles of their “wares” laying on tarps or just on the wet
ground.
We had noticed several areas on Fort Lauderdale and Pompano
that had tree damage and palm fronds down.
It was then we heard on the news that more tornadoes had touched down in
the area! Several buildings had roofs
torn off and a stable had damage and horses injured. Are we following the tornadoes or are they following us?
Down A1A we found the Boynton Beach Inlet parking lot. The tide was rushing to get thru the narrow
cement lined “inlet” canal as we walked up and over the bridge to the other
side. The long jetty was lined with
fishermen – and hungry pelicans! Fancy
big white boats seemed in a big hurry to get thru the narrow gauntlet of cement
so their wide crashing wakes threw pounding waves against the walls of the
canal. On the way back to John Prince
we bent our necks and tried to peer into the fancy gates that protected the
homes and castles on the other side of the tall concealing walls. Did one of them belong to Rush? Or Trump? – His big jet was sitting at the
airport when we passed by on our trip to John Prince last Monday!
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| Day at the Zoo |
We read online about a “Dual Discovery Pass” for BOTH the
Dreher Park Zoo AND the South Florida Science Museum and Aquarium which seemed
like a good deal. Thursday we went to
the zoo! Also called the Palm Beach
Zoo, this zoo is 32 acres of trees, jungle, winding streams of water and board
walks lined with what looks like thick bamboo lashed together with heavy twine
ropes. The animal groups are divided into continents and are set around a big
circle of dancing fountains like thick spoke sections on a wheel. We sat in on
a “Wild Things Show” which included an introduction and a small talk about each
animal. An Australian Dingo and an
African Porcupine were just 2 of the animals. A Two Toed Sloth was hung on a
horizontal pole – like a hanger in a coat rack and we all watched her creep
hand over hand – ever so s l
o w l y to the post at the other end! A “Wings Over Water” Show included a Macaw,
a massive black and white vulture and a Harris Hawk which landed on a post
about 5 feet from me! Even tho there
are no lions, no elephants and not even a giraffe – the highlight of our visit
was 2 half grown grizzly bear cubs!
Remember the news report last spring or summer about a momma Grizzly out
in Yellowstone that was killed? She had
2 cubs that were rescued. These preteen
bear cubs played and splashed in the water and scraped with each other like any
pair of sisters would! I must have
taken a hundred pictures in order to get a few good shots!
Friday was not going to be a good day for the beach (again)
so we chose to go find the Museum/Aquarium.
Standing guard in front of the museum was a huge animated dinosaur that
roared as it’s huge mouth opened and shut.
The visiting display, called “Dinosaurs Around the World” promised to
turn us into globetrotting explorers, along side 13 life-size roaring,
breathing, animatronic dinosaurs as we learned about the creatures that roamed
the fierce plains of Africa to the once tropical beaches of Antarctica. The aquarium was interesting but not as
magnificent as the new aquarium at our own Toledo Zoo. From the museum we ventured to downtown West
Palm Beach and found an antique boat show being set up. So far there were two
long docks lined with some of the most gloriously restored wooden grand ladies
as you could ever find. The vessel at
the end of one dock was the
“Honey Fitz”. She was the presidential yacht for 5 US
Presidents from Truman to Nixon.
Although each president changed her name, JFK named her “Honey Fitz”
after his maternal grandfather – John Frances Fitzgerald and that name has been
given back to her.
