When In South Florida...

I guess do what the other tourists do...  

Hop on airboats and go to alligator wrestling shows, right?

Sounds like a plan. 

My mother-in-law was extremely excited all holiday weekend to go visit Everglades Holiday Park, which is a tourist trap if I've ever seen one, but still full of fun stuff to do at the same time.

The main attractions are alligators, and you can view them in many ways. The first way was an airboat ride through the Everglades. We didn't see a lot of gators "in the wild" on our hour boat ride, but the two we did see swam right beside the boat, so that was pretty neat.

After the airboat ride, we also had the opportunity to watch an alligator wrestling show. The "Gator Boys" of television fame have a small alligator pit behind the Holiday Park gift shop. 

Paul Bedard, easily recognizable from the Animal Planet series, put on about a 20-minute show, teaching everyone about alligators, particularly how nuisance alligators are dealt with in Florida, and showing some pretty interesting handling techniques.

Finally, my mother-in-law really wanted to get her picture taken with a baby alligator. Everybody else in the family wanted to leave. Lilly wanted nothing to do with touching alligators. I ended up going with her for the photo. She got to hold her gator, I held an albino boa. 

It was my Britney Spears VMA moment, and also an excuse to post this photo.

In the end, it was pretty fun afternoon. Not sure if there would ever be a need to go back again, but definitely one of those attractions worth stopping by once. If you're ever planning on being in South Florida, you can learn more about Everglades Holiday Park HERE.

Buffalo Bill, Einstein, & Rambo Walk Into A Bar...

If you're ever in St. Augustine, Potter's Wax Museum is a must see...

Exploring Florida: Bass Pro Shops Stick Marsh Outpost

Spent last night in the land of the Mouse and had good intentions of writing a blog post from the hotel room, but the damn Wifi was absolutely crawling at a snail's pace.

So instead, here are 3 pictures of one of the nearest Bass Pro Shops to my house. They just happened to be on my phone from when we went in July and were easy to upload via the Blogger app. Does your local BPS have pens out front with alligators and hogs? I thought that was very Florida...

Exploring Florida - Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse

Would it be strange if I told you that I didn't go fishing at all over the long Memorial Day weekend? Well, strange but true.

Instead, we kinda did family stuff near the house, with the exception of Monday, where it was time to escape for a mini road trip down I-95 to Ponce de Leon Inlet, and more specifically, its lighthouse.

Now this isn't the first time this particular lighthouse has appeared on the blog, rather a photo from afar during a fishing trip to New Smyrna Beach popped up two years ago, however this time we were going to visit the attraction, and perhaps learn a little bit about it in the process.

Here's a tour of the lighthouse grounds, in captioned photo form.

The ominous, shadowy lighthouse. Or just a really bad photo.
You'll notice there are some smaller houses on the grounds,
they were where the lighthouse keeper and assistants lived.
They've been converted into some really neat museums.

There were all sorts of interesting artifacts inside the houses.
Everything from local maritime, aviation, Native American, and of course, lighthouse history.
One house didn't have displays, rather was preserved to look like it did in the early 1900s.

There were also some interactive exhibits.
K.C. & Lilly reviewed a touch screen where you could pull up
 a "bio" on any active lighthouse in the world.

One of the things I learned was that I wouldn't have wanted to be a lighthouse keeper.
The lighthouse wasn't electric, rather lit with a kerosene lamp.
The keeper had to lug 40 gallons of kerosene up those stairs every day. Yikes!
Just looking up the middle of the spiral staircase from the ground floor is enough for vertigo to kick in.

But the view of the inlet from the top was awesome.
Looks like a place I want to explore a little bit more with a fishing rod.
If you squint (click to zoom), you'll note a fishing pier / jetty on the left,
and in the foreground, some nice calm water & sandbars to tool around in my kayak.

A slightly better picture of the lighthouse.
It happens to be the tallest in Florida at approximately 175 feet.
It was built in 1835 back when the area was called Mosquito Inlet.
Glad they changed the name, probably not good for tourism...

Besides scaling the lighthouse, the highlight of the trip was visiting the small museum they had set up that housed various types of lighthouse lamp lenses. These circular ribbed lenses are called Fresnel lenses. Invented by French physicist & engineer Augustin-Jean Fresnel, the prismatic rings focus the radiating light to a central point, making for very powerful beams. They quickly became the standard for all U.S. lighthouses.

Interestingly, if you're into a bit of lighthouse & fishing fiction, check out "A Salty Piece of Land" by Jimmy Buffett (yeah, that Jimmy Buffett). It's a pretty good read that focuses partly on bonefishing the tropics and partly on restoring a Fresnel lens lighthouse. I happened to read it 10 years ago before I knew much about either. I'd like to read it again.

Exploring Florida: Ravine Gardens State Park

Not gonna lie, silence has been deafening around here. I don't pretend that my readers sit with bated breath waiting for the next Troutrageous! blog post, but I've been blogging for so long, it still bugs me when I go a little while without a semi-consistent stream of content.

Mid-January to mid-February do it to me every year - as work really kicks up around a few prominent sporting events. Add in the work I've been doing on the upcoming issue of Tenkara Angler magazine, and I've been a bad blogger.

I was fortunate to be able to get out last weekend with K.C. & Lilly for some decompression. We headed to a new spot that we hadn't visited in our area yet, Ravine Gardens State Park in Palatka, Florida.

Most of Florida is relatively flat when it comes to topography which makes Ravine Gardens quite the sight to see. Ravine Gardens was carved deep into the ground by the constant flow of natural springs, creating steep walls that drop over 100 feet straight down. Beautiful azalea gardens were planted around the perimeter walls and trails of the ravine in the 1930s as part of a beautification project, and in the years since, it has enjoyed additional enhancements such as the addition of suspension bridges, an amphitheater, multiple playgrounds, and a civic center.

Leisurely walking and exploring the Azalea Trail took us about an hour and half, but one could easily spend the entire day in the park. I highly suggest visiting should you ever find yourself in the Palatka area. 

Exploring Florida - The St. Augustine Alligator Farm

Haven't written an "Exploring Florida" post in a while, (heck haven't written much at all as this has been one of the least inspiring fishing years I've had in a while), so I figured this would be a good time to revisit the theme since it's 100% independent of any fishing pursuits.

A few weeks ago, Lilly & I took a little trip down to St. Augustine, particularly the St. Augustine Alligator Farm. It's just one of those places we've sort of taken for granted in the almost three years we've lived in Florida. We'd always say, "we should go check that out sometime," yet we never did, at least until recently.

That was a big mistake on our part, and we both left pleasantly surprised. This attraction has far more to offer than alligators (the lemurs were Lilly's stars of the show), so if you're ever in the St. Augustine area, it makes for a really neat 2ish hour diversion. My pictures below probably don't do it justice. Highly recommended!

Exploring Florida - Kennedy Space Center & Ft. Walton Beach

It's been a fast & furious past four days...

Was lucky enough to play hooky from work on Thursday & Friday to make for a long weekend, which was also the start of Lilly's spring break.

However, before the kids got off from school, they had their "big" class trip of the year to Kennedy Space Center which is about 2 hours south of Jacksonville. I volunteered to chaperone, and totally geeked out big time and turned into a 9 year old again instantly. I mean a real freakin' space shuttle!

After that we headed across the Florida panhandle as a family for a few days. I brought the fly rod, but didn't end up fishing at all. We were busy. Spent some time at the beach, then the "Gulfarium" (where the sea lion show is a can't miss), and finally watching the wife's roller derby team beat down the locals (the reason why we headed 5ish hours west in the first place)...

Man, what a weekend. Absoultely no fishing...so much driving...but so much fun. 

Maybe I can play hooky from work tomorrow too...