Mosspark Orlando area

Moss Park!  We’re Home!!   Or are we?  The camp roads are the same white grit packed, yet potholed, sand roads; the campsites are still spacious and sheltered by tall Slash Pines and Live Oaks; and the bathhouses are still tiled and clean.  Yet, it’s different. 

Something is missing.  George isn’t here on his site.  We weren’t greeted by begging, squawking Sandhill Cranes.  I looked ALL week and never saw an Armadillo, a Sherman Squirrel or any turkeys!  George was the park’s resident photographer/wildlife expert and was one of the reason’s we came here and always parked next to him.  As we all get older, health becomes an issue and now he stays up in New York close to family.  A lot of us miss you George!

Two deer did come wandering thru our site the first morning we were here but there were only 2 and not the half dozen that used to mosey thru each morning AND each evening. Each time we rode the bikes or drove out in the truck, my eyes searched the wooded areas along the roadway for any gray rocks or tan clumps of dead grass that would move and finally look like the armor of a armadillo.  No reverberating Jurassic Park squawks from the handful of mated cranes – just one pair that only called out on occasion. But one evening they did call out from somewhere in the swamp grass behind site #29 – were they nesting out where they used to?

The tiny songbirds were much more friendly!  One afternoon while I was sitting at the picnic table with the sewing machine busily

buzzing away and H was nestled in his lounge chair with his tablet in hand, a tiny yellowish bird came to see if there were any tasty morsels to pick up from the table area.  It’s tail bobbed the entire time it was there!  Soon a matching bird in shades more of tan with soft stripes on her tummy joined him.  My Audubon Book confirmed that they were Palm Warblers!  The crust from our loaf of wheat bread kept them happily gobbling up crumbs.  A pair of shy Cardinals even joined in on the banquet!  The Fox Squirrels got shooed away.  Now – if they had been Sherman’s . . . . . . .

SPFB!  We’ve already done the Disney “thing” –including riding the transportation means from one resort complex to the next, Downtown Disney, Disney Springs, and even Disney itself. We’ve seen downtown, the Orlando Eye (the huge ferris wheel) and beautiful Lake Eola that is featured as the backdrop on every evening news program.  We’ve played tourist up and down the road from St Cloud to Kissimmee to Celebration and back.  This time we visited Old Town that is a remake of a fake old town, but is just a collection of quirky restaurants and over priced shops.  Right

behind it is Fun Spot - the amusement park with its bungee rides and roller coasters.  It was a cold windy morning so no one was there yet.

One evening, H had his nose in his Nook Tablet and I was in the bedroom, on the phone, when a persistent knocking came at the door.  It was friends that we had met at Trimble Park a few years ago - during the tornado warnings while we sheltered in the bathhouse!!!  They had just arrived in Moss Park and had read our blog saying that we were headed there/here!  While out for their evening walk they spotted the bright blue truck and came to call!!  What a treat!  We reestablished our friendship and shared travel stories during the rest of our stay as neighbors!  They even joined us for our last visit to the Catfish Place for lunch the day before we were to leave.  Cheryl and I both love to take photos.  Don and H looked like bookends as they stood with their backs to us, hands in pockets, discussing Jeeps, Ford trucks and all the other problems of the world!!

Titusville had the rocket launches; Mt Dora had the seaplanes; here in Moss Park in SE Orlando we are within 5 miles of the Orlando International Airport which brings visitors from all over the world to visit the theme parks, and this year the Super Bowl!!   The sleek beauties in the sky above circle the airport and when they are up over the campground, line up with the landing strip out in front of them and then slow their powerful engines in order to lower their massive crafts - like hotrods downshifting - whining and then rumbling, deeper and deeper - until the aircraft’s sleek bodies touch down on the solid land once more.  Sometimes this would happen every few minutes – as soon as one plane would land; yet another was in line to slow and drop gently out of the sky. 

Our week of doing almost nothing has come and gone.  It’s time to head out again.  The weather has been cool and we are heading farther south – Lake Worth – south of all the “Palm Beaches” and north of Del Ray Beach.

Sun – Sand and Beaches is what we are hoping for.