Road Trip

3 Gargoyles and a Potato

It came down in buckets all morning, so we watched some DVDs to pass the time, TDTVS Season 5 Episodes 2 & 3 and Disc 1 of Series 1 of an English police show called Blue Murder.

About mid afternoon we couldn’t bear to stay inside any longer and hopped in the car with GPS in hand. There were several new caches on the north side of town that were begging to be found. And we found 6 of the seven attempted. One was in a magnetic key holder, another in a Jack Daniels bottle, three in small gargoyle statues and another in plastic potato. The one we missed must have been hidden using a Romulan Cloaking Device.

Tomorrow a road trip is planned to continue our state challenges. We are aiming to fill a couple of holes by bagging the elusive Sumter County and DeLorme Pages 45 & 47.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 514

101,000 Gator Fans

Pardon My WakeReturned from home Florida today in a marathon 13 hour 607 mile drive, making 8 pit stops along the way. Two for meals, one for a snack, two for gas and 3 just for driver changes. Somewhere south of Orlando the Emperor passed through the 101,000 mile mark. Total mileage for the trip – 1608 miles.

We are always careful about checking for Clemson home football games before heading into the SC upstate, but completely forgot to check for a University of Florida game before planning our route home. We were “forced” off of I-75 near Ocala by the rapidly multiplying Gator fans on their way to the game. Turns out it was for the better though, as we got to retrace some of our route down along some fantastic rural central Florida roads in the opposite direction.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 499

Black Friday

Jolly Mon SongDid the sane thing and avoided any place that had anything to to with shopping today.

We went 1 for 2 in local Palm City geocaches in the morning. There is another that we started after, but we aren’t counting either way – it was 120′ into a swampy area that neither Donna or I could see a non-watery path towards.

In the afternoon we went sailing the St Lucie River around Palm City, Stuart & Port Salerno aboard Jolly Mon Song the 34 foot “yacht” of Sandy and Paul. It was a 3 hour tour with a stop at Finz Waterfront Grille for lunch in the middle.

The evening was spent playing a variation of Oh Hell and watching JJ Abrams reboot of Star Trek in Blueray on the Tomlin’s ginormous flat panel TV.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 497

Made It

Lakeside InnWe arrived at our destination in Palm City by lunch time today. A slight mis-turn in the town Okeechobee and two trips to the local Publix put our mileage for Wednesday at 203 miles instead of the 160 Google maps advertises. This brings our total mileage from Aiken to Palm City at 958.

It rained pretty much the whole day so the closest we came to geocaching was a virtual one in Okeechobee, but it was coming down so hard that we did not even get out of the car to answer the questions. I’m not going to count it as a DNF.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 493

Pond Water

Mud HenWe drove a whopping 76 miles today, to Winter Springs and back and we finally ran into the Florida we love to hate, 6 lanes of heavy traffic interrupted by traffic lights every 1/4 mile. We did find an alternative route back that involved a toll road (best two bucks we spent today) and a two lane back road. The trip over was to have a quick visit with the fellow who lived across the street from us in Aiken. Oliver was the neighborhood historian as he lived there from the beginning and made friends with everyone he met. Unfortunately a couple of years ago his family moved him down here to be close to them when he and his wife began to show their advanced age. He enjoyed our visit and we enjoyed brightening his day.

Did minimal geocaching today, striking out on the one that is actually only 350 feet from our room at the Lakeside Inn, but we did find the one that was in a park a short walk away.

This evening we walked into downtown Mt. Dora for dinner. Last night’s dinner at the dining room at the Inn was fantastic, but we were looking for something a little lighter. Donna wanted ravioli so we walked up the 5 blocks to a pizza place thinking that they might have something Italian as well. They did. but no ravioli, so we backed back down the hill looking for likely suspects. After dismissing a couple we ended up at the Frog & Monkey Pub. No ravioli, but they did have a small flat bread pizza that was the perfect size for us to split. Donna got a bottled water and I got some Pond Water – Guinness & Root Beer. Don’t laugh, it is actually pretty good.

Started up, went down, went up, down again, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 493

Faded Florida

Florida TrailWe are spending the next two nights at the Lakeside Inn in Mt Dora, FL and while the place is nice it would probably have been in its prime several decades ago.

Today it took us only 147 miles to go the 136 Google told us it would. We stopped several times to do some geocaching, finding 7 of 8, and walking along several trails of the Ocala National Forest.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, back up, down again, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 489

Church On Sunday

Emperor Goes To ChurchThere is a sign on US17 in South Newport, GA that proclaims “The Smallest Church in America.” With our love of Roadside Americana we would have stopped to look at it even if there hadn’t been a cache nearby. Donna went inside and read a sign that said you can have your wedding here, it had better be a small party as it would be a tight squeeze with just preacher, bride, groom, best man and maid of honor. At 10′ x 15′ it is pretty small and I’d have a hard time fitting the Miata inside, but someone has found even a couple more churches littler – Smallest Churches in America.

We didn’t do a lot of extra driving today, Google says it is 197 miles from Pooler, GA to Lake City, FLORIDA and we only took 244 to get here. It was raining when the day started and for most of the trip it varied from drizzle to downpour until we entered the Sunshine State. Then true to it’s nickname the skies cleared and within a few miles we had the top down. Found 7 geocaches today, including our first one in Florida, DNF’d only one and that was another Florida first.

Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 483