We are now at Jonathan Dickinson state park for the night. We left Christmas Rv park just before noon today and got here about 2:30 or so. It was a 142 mile ride. We did have a few shots of rain, and we will expect that for the next 10 days or so . The park is right off historic Route 1, that runs along the east coast. We are just above Jupiter Florida and 90 miles north of Miami. It has 90 rv spots, with all hook ups, and is 8,000 acres in size more or less. The park was given to the state of Florida, by the Federal government in the late 40’s and opened as a park in 1950. Before that it was called Camp Murphy, opened in 1942 as a top secret radar training school. It cost 5.3 million dollars to construct, and about 6000 enlisted men and 800 officers lived here. It had over 1000, buildings including schools, houses and everything you need to run a city.  In fact where the 90 Rv sited are used to be the hospital. By summer 1944 as it seemed we would win the war shortly it was closed and all the buildings demolished and equipment taken away. Then in 1947 turned over to Florida.

 

Our spot

Very Nearby is the north fork of the Loxahatchee river. In the mid 30’s a  young guy named Trapper Nelson arrived and set up camp there in the wilderness of it all. He became a local legion, and known as “Wildman of the Loxahatchee”. In 38 years he managed to make a living, construct a much visited wildlife zoo and acquire large land holdings. It was quite the popular place in the 60’s. Then one day a friend found him dead, with a shotgun blast to the chest and a shotgun nearby. No one knows if it was suicide or not. In his will, all of his land was to be turned over to the park, and that area now is where you rent boats ,canoes, go for guided tours and  the like.

This is the part of the river Wildman lived on.

A cute little trailer we saw, about 8 feet long.

A sunset Melissa caught.

Tomorrow we head to Key Largo

Today we went back to the Kennedy space center. Earlier in the year we were here and at the time of our visit there were a few things closed. So , we knew we would be back in the fall.

The Heroes and Legends building is now open and it was pretty neat. It goes through all the astronauts, but mainly on the original 7 who paved the way.

The front as you enter, with the original 7 depicted. The building is forty feet high

Part of the early original Mercury Control center.

This really makes you wonder, how they did it.

Another building we got to go in was the Heritage building of the early days of Florida, up to NASA coming in. That was neat too.

In the 1890’s Melissa would have worn this outfit, in the Florida heat.

After that we went back to the Atlantis building, for the grand entry program they have to get you in the mood.

Then we took a bus tour, which is included in your ticket, ( We took an extended behind the scenes tour last time, which was extra.). The tour takes 45 minutes, and takes you out to different areas of the center, like launch pads, buildings, and the like. We did see a few things this time we did not see last time.

This is not a building, but a covered bardge, it just got in the other day with a huge part of a rocket set to launch in Oct. It’s 250 feet long, and is called Pegasis. It came down the Mississippi river, into the gulf, around the keys and into the bay here, and is now docked. Most if not all the major pieces of a rocket are built along the Mississippi, and brought here for assembly.

The  bus tour drops you off at the Saturn 5 building, which is my favorite. We saw the entry program again and really did not stay to see the Saturn V, as we did that before. We did however see the new Apollo garden walkway, that just opened for the 50 th anniversary, this year. That was also pretty neat.

Apollo II statue, with Collins, Armstrong and Aldrin, they are facing out toward the launch pad where they took off to land on the moon.

This morning we left Silver Springs and made our way down toward Titusville, it was a 125 mile drive, and we are now here at Christmas Rv park.  I am bummed out, when I looked up at the cap of the Rv, it was loaded with lovebugs, tons more than before. All I did was put hot water on it with the mop and got off what I could. No more cleaning the cap till we are in place at Key Largo.

We were here in spring when we visited the space center. It is an OK place. There were a few places closed at the space center, so tomorrow, we are going there to see them. Then Monday we leave and head down toward Miami, to stay one night at Johnathon Dickenson state park.

Today was a mere 92, so we decide to go see Juniper Springs, which in the Ocala National Forest. It was about a 30 minute drive. The springs is a national Recreation area, run by the federal government . The springs is a day use area, and was developed in the mid 30’s by the CCC. It is a really nice place and you can swim in the springs, which are only about 1/4 as big as silver springs. We first took the 1/2 mile boardwalk trail that leads to the boiling springs area, where springs come up from the bottom and disturb the sand, hence the name boiling.

Part of the boardwalk.

Here, there is a couple of small boiling springs but hard to see. In the background the bridge we crossed.

In the middle is the boiling sand, the water here is about 10 feet deep.

Back at the main springs, there is a millhouse, where there is a water wheel turning, bringing water out of the main spring. Again built by the CCC, back in the day. They say the wheel is for not letting alligators into the main spring,????.

This walkway, stone bridge which is covered in growth, was built by the CCC, and could still be used but the approachs need fixing.

Could not decide which floatie to use.

 

The main spring, with the wheelhouse in the background. Stone and concrete barrier surrounding it, built by the CCC.

Yep that’s me in the background. There is as two foot wide ledge around the springs, then it drops off to the sandy bottom about five feet seep, and drops off fast to about twenty feet deep in the middle. The water is crystal clear, and stays at 72 degrees. May seem warm but is was cold. There were only about 20 people here today, most days it is packed solid.

This beautiful mermaid popped up, from the depths of the water, right in front of me.  I think Dave is trying to butter me up for something Big.

 

We stayed in the water for about an hour or so, it was refreshing and quite a nice surprise. The whole area is very clean and neat, with nice bath houses and a small visitor center. They are looking for work campers so we grabbed two applications and will send them in.  We then went back to our Silver springs campground. We leave here tomorrow for Christmas Florida, near Cape Kennedy.

Saw this gopher turtle in our campsite this afternoon, about two feet wide.

 

Today, was very humid, but only 91.  We went to breakfast at Eggs Over. Then we went to Fort King right in the heart of Ocala. It is now a National Historic Landmark, all 37 acres of it. It is surrounded by urban sprawl. The fort which is a reproduction of the original, is about 160 feet square with two blockhouse redouts. There is not much to the fort, but there is a nice visitor center, and soon they will be doing a major redo of the whole place. The fort, which was hacked out of the vast Florida wilderness, was built in 1827 by the army on a bluff overlooking a natural spring. It was built to protect the Seminole Indians from trespassing settlers, but in 1832 President Andrew Jackson, demanded the Seminols leave Florida. So a war broke out after the Seminoles wiped out a unit of about 110 soldiers, and shot the Indian agent. This war which is called the second Seminol wars, lasted 7 years.  After all this the fort was turned over to Marion county and not long after it was called Ocala, after the Seminole chief and the city of Ocala, was born. It was a nice visit with a one mile interprative trail.

The springs

After that, we went back to the Rv ,and I decided to clean off the front cap with all the lovebugs on it. It took me over two hours. Melissa in the meantime cleaned and vacumned the truck interior.

Later in the afternoon we decided to go back to the springs park, which we have been to before, where they have the glass bottom boat ride and all that. We walked the two mile trail they have there, which part of it is on a boardwalk. We heard the boardwalk was closed earlier in the day because the monkey’s were active and on the trail. Yes they have monkey’s there. We made a post about them. As we were leaving the park, what should come running by in front of us, yep a monkey.

Tomorrow we may go to Juniper springs for a swim.

We left Stephen Foster state park today about noon and got to Silver Springs state park, near Ocala, about two today. It was a 105 mile trip, we have been here before and I made a post about it in March. This is the place where they filmed Sea Hunt the TV show, with Lyodd Bridges. We will be here till Saturday. A few things were closed when we were here last, so we may check them out in the next few days. It was sunny and humid here today and only 95 degrees. It is getting closer and closer to Key Largo time, for work camping. Since we have come into Florida, we have noticed these bugs flying around connected to each other. Find out they are love bugs, and it is mating time right now. They fly around with there butts connected.  There aren’t just a few they are all over the place, everywhere.The front of the Rv is full of them and they say they are hard to remove. Will work on cleaning them off tomorrow.

This morning we went out to breakfast, you guessed it to Fat Belly’s, just down the road from the park. It is a quant little mom and pop, rustic diner. Seats about 40 and really nice inside. The breakfast was good, 2 eggs, home fries, lots of em, toast, and bacon, for $4.99, plus coffee, Melissa had grits instead of home fries, yuk.

We then came back here and for the rest of the day, we cleaned the inside of the 5er, and some of the outside, mostly real dirty spots. We also went for a 2 mile walk. It was sunny and a nice 94 today. For dinner , yep you guessed it, we went to Fat Belly’s, I wanted a half chicken dinner but they were out, so I got the pork dinner, it was good, Melissa got the 20 schrimp platter, and all the ice tea we could drink. Once we got back here we went for another walk, and getting ready to leave here tomorrow morning. Melissa took a great picture of me with the sunset.

And then there was light! Or Dave saw the light..???

 

Also today while working outside I found time to shark hunt for teeth at the site, found a good many for only a couple hours. In fact one really big one over 1-1/2 inchs.

Staying two nights here at Stephen Foster state park in Florida, we were here early in the spring and wrote a blog post about it then so will not now. It was 240 miles of driving today, not a bad drive traffic was light. Tomorrow we are going to do a little inside cleaning of the Rv, and laundry. The Rv outside is dirty, dirty, but you cannot wash any vehicles here in state parks, so for now it stays dirty AARRGGGG. This is also the place where I have found a good many shark teeth here at the site. I have already found 15 today. The gravel here comes from a quarry that gets its stuff right out of dredgeings from the ocean. They are over a few million years old so its pretty neat to find them. Anyway may make a post tomorrow night. Leave here Wednesday for Silver Springs state park.

Back in GA.

When we were still in High Falls Park in GA. we came across this family in the woods. I think they have been waiting for dinner way to long.

 

Today was a nice day, this park has been a nice surprise. It was sunny and a comfy 91 out today, we hiked a total of 5 miles or so. Our first hike was on the tranquility trail. It was about 2 miles in a pine forest , up and down through ravines to grandma’s house we go. The next hike was the river hike, up and down through the rocks and boulders near the river, and looped around. That showed great views of the river, which is very low. Last year it was almost at flood stage. Just after the dam there is an 85 foot falls, which is pretty neat.

Let’s go tubin!  Be neat to take an inner tube down here, but someone would get hurt.

I kept bumping into this very pretty lady, with her dog.

Back in the day after the Indians scalped you, say mid 1800’s settler’s put up a grist mill here, and a small town started to spring up ,and soon was pretty big for the day. During the civil war it was producing a lot of grain and stuff, and even the confederates burned it down so not to fall into union hands. After that in the 1880’s the main railroad bypassed here and soon it became a ghost town.

Ruins of the grist mill.

As it looked in the day.

In the early 1900’s they built a dam to contained the water and create a lake ,and to harness the water for electricity.

Manmade dam in the background.

Then in the 30’s they built a hydro, electric plant and harnessed even more water for electricity. By the early 60’s it became obsolete and all the property was turned over to the state for a park.

Water rushed through the tunnels to create power in the turbines.

All in all it was a nice visit here. Tomorrow we leave and head to Steven Foster state park where we have been before.

 

We are now at High Falls State park in Georgia, which is between Atlanta and Macon. We left this morning about 9:30 and got here at 2:30. Atlanta traffic was bad, glad we were not in the north bound lane as there was an accident and at least a 10 mile back up. The park here is pretty nice, it has paved roads although narraow and a little curvey. They have 90 spots or so, we are in the last loop, which runs right along the Towaliga river. The Creek Indians lived here and in the early 1800’s , scalped many a white settler. They would come down to this part of the river and dry or smoke them. The name “Towaliga”,  means roasted scalp. Yep, not pleasant. Pics of our site below.