Christmas Eve; Hiking Day Pond

Hiking with friends in Day Pond State Park...they don't make woods like these in Floida.

Ode to a brand new 12 year old!

Mason? He's almost as tall as his mother, smarter than anyone in our house and the kind of superbly brilliant and talented young man who can become anything he wants. I don't know anybody with a bigger or more passionate heart than our son. Happy Happy Birthday Mason!

TailGating Swindal Family Style

This is Tillie K Fowler Regional Park in Jacksonville, right across the street from NAS. An excellent spot to stop, eat supper and also nabbed us 3 L'boxes too! We used to kind of do this in the station wagon but a truck gate down makes the best table on the go.

Nantahala Gorge Zipline

Ziplining in the Nantahala Forest (Bryson City, North Carolina). Been wanting to do this for 4 years and now we can cross that off the bucket list!

Road To Nowhere

The Road To Nowhere starts on Lakeview Drive in Bryson City NC (Great Smokey Mountains National Park). Make sure to pull off at one of the lookout points for a breathtaking view of Lake Fantana.

Six miles in and the road ends at this 1200 ft man made tunnel.

We got about a third of the way in and was so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of your face.

This is the story of The Road To Nowhere, "A Broken Promise". Back in the 30's & 40's the government and TVA  was busy busy busy making plans and flooding valleys. One of the promises made here to the displaced families was that a road would be made providing access to the old family cemeteries where generations of ancestors had lived, died and were buried. By 1969, 6 miles were completed before the project was abandoned. All is good though now. The county got $52 million buckaroos in 2010 and the rest of us got a fabulous place to spend an afternoon hiking and letterboxing!

Last day of summer camp, what now?

Forget Camp Mom...One week of Surf Camp w/RonJon, One week of VBS, TWO weeks of Marine Biology Camp w/Brandon and THREE weeks of Nature Camp w/Susan. The bar has been set high!

The 5 weeks of camp with Susan and Brandon alone culminated in a whopping 25 field trips, these pictures from the last one, the Florida Aquarium in Tampa.

Supper by Perigee Moonlight

I totally did not want to leave....How come we don't live at the beach?