Sunshine State Tour

March 1st seems like a good day to begin a ride in Florida.  The temperatures at home are in the teens and while we love snow, we are pretty excited for warmth and sunshine.   Our plan is to ride from the Punta Gorda area across the middle of the state and generally northward to St. Augustine.  From there, we will travel south along the Atlantic Coast until we run out of land and reach the Florida Keys.  It should take us less than a month and expected total distance is about 830 miles.  Thanks to Adventure Cycling Association maps this was a very easy trip to plan.  Tom's parents live in Naples and have agreed to drive us up to our starting point.  They are also letting us park the car at their condo so we don't have that to worry about.  Packing for this trip is way easier than our Newfoundland adventure.  Our panniers are lightened by the lack of warm clothing and the fact that we don't have to carry multiple days of food.  Vacationland awaits!

Thanks, Mom and Dad Euclide

Day 1 :  Port Charlotte to Zolfo Springs, 45 miles
We rode through cattle ranch areas, orange groves all the while paralleling the Peace River.  There is lots of empty and wild area in this central region of Florida and we saw sign of armadillo and wild boar.  There was a bald eagle hunting and lots of raptors - kestral, red-shouldered hawks, red tailed hawks, black vultures , and turkey vultures.  There were sandhill cranes in the open areas and lots of ibis and cattle egrets and multiple other types of egrets.  

Our lunch stop included a $4 expenditure for boiled

peanuts and the best pint of strawberries I have had in awhile.  I give two thumbs up for the berries and a thumbs down on boiled peanuts.  They are alot of work and just taste like you would expect boiled peanuts to taste. 

  Pioneer Park in Hardee County was crowded since our arrival coincided with the 51st annual  Pioneer Park Days. https://pioneerparkdays.com Steam engines, old tractors, old lanterns, bluegrass music and a gospel sing along under a live oak tree kept us busy for the evening.  I was trying my best to blend in with all the Trump 2020 folks.  We slept next to the river where we had watched alligators cruising up and down a few hours earlier.

this local band was pretty good

A collection of old lanterns lit our way home from the restaurant

Day 2:  Zolfo Springs to Lake Wales, 40 miles
Since we haven't ridden much since last autumn we are keeping our mileage reasonable for this trip.  We passed many, many orange groves today.  There are oranges that look ready to pick and other groves which are in full bloom.  The blossom scent is amazing.  It just lays on the air for miles.
For at least ten miles we cycled past a phosphate mining operation.  The biggest cranes I have ever seen were digging up the ground.  The entire landscape was denuded and sand and dirt were piled up 100'  It looked like the area had been farmed before the phosphate mines came.  Cattle guards remained in the roadway from the ranching days.  Once we got beyond the mines we saw miles of row crop fields.  Workers were picking the strawberries

Young men from Mexico pick strawberries. 

and others were planting whatever crop is next.  We stopped and talked to a family member of the farm owner.  He told us it's the biggest farm in the county and that most of his oranges go to the Florida Natural Plant to be made into juice.  Their little farm store makes homemade strawberry ice cream which was excellent.  The actual riding was uneventful - the roads were relatively quiet and dead flat.  The sun was hot, but I am not complaining.  It's Florida.