The family was great. Florida was disappointing. Last year the weather in Florida was great in January ... this year it was gray, cloudy, rainy and cold. So this year we had only the warmth and love of family.
Overcast skies do have one advantage: they make certain types of photographs more compelling. Here are my efforts to take lemons and make lemonade ... uummm, to polish a turd ... or .... to make a silk purse from a sow's ear ... aaah, let's see .... well ...
Hell, I just tried my best.
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| The office of the RV park we stayed at. A typical cracker shack. There is a concept in photography called "framing and cropping" I relied heavily on these concepts to make this look attractive. |
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| The lake near the RV park and the in-laws' winter nest. |
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| The many lakes in this area are inter-connected by canals. |
Broken Manatees
The state has a wild-life refuge at Homosassa that houses numerous animals that have been injured and are unable to survive in the wild. Manatees are the main attraction, but they have red wolves, Florida panthers, various raptors, snakes and more. A group of us headed there for the day. |
| Today's Harem. Auntie Peggy, Sis Betty, Wifie Cyndi and Mumsie Jeannie |
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| Manatees float around in the water, making it pretty hard to get a decent picture. Cyndi volunteered to stand-in for the manatees. |
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| We arrived at the manatee's feeding time. Seriously, we did. |
Here are some of the things we saw in the refuge.
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| If you look carefully at the nesting pelican in the center, you will see a baby pelican poking its head out from under her. Awwwww, so cute (click to enlarge) |
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| There is a story here, but I'll leave it to the Reader to provide it. |
Sunken Garden
A few days later some of us headed to St Petersburg to visit the Sunken Garden which has semi-tropical plants from around the world. |
| Today's Harem |
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| Betty took these last two photos |
Walk in the Swamp
Betty directed us to a reserve near-by, where we took a short walk one morning. We would have taken a longer walk, but it was pretty cold. The park promised us alligators and snakes but it was too cold for them, too. |
| My harem is significantly diminished today but she is the best part of the harem |
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| The walking path was mostly a levee built from local materials and the local materials are mostly shells like this. |
While we were out in the rain, the cat stayed home in the RV and slept. The cat thinks she got the better end of that deal.
