Tuesday at Long Point

We had another great day at Long Point.  We finished off yesterday by making a drive to Melbourne Beach, where we ate dinner.  On the way, we found a gas station to get the propane tank filled, so now John can start grilling our dinners.  On the way back, we stopped at a beach on the ocean side and walked the sand -- it was too late and too cool to get wet.  Andrew loved the sand and was in no hurry to leave.

Joe found a deflated balloon on a string lying on the beach so he drug it around to get it back to the trash.  It looked like his own little puppy.

 
And on the way home, John found an ice cream shop, so it made it a perfect day, except that Andrew toppled over in a little plastic lawn chair, and in the process of cushioning his fall I dropped my sundae and lost all the whip cream.  But he didn't get hurt, so all was well.  But he was wound up when we got back to the RV, and he finished off his evening with his chain saw, buzzing all of us.  It has full sound effects, so it got a little noisy in the RV.

 This morning we went back to the little restaurant out on the main road and had a delicious breakfast, bought our bait, and loaded up the boat for a day of fishing.  John had scoped out a new spot and he headed over to the mangrove trees.  Bridgette and Andrew headed over to a beach area to get in the water, and I got my line in the water.  I caught two fish on my first two casts before John and Joe even got their lines in the water.  I was really catching them for a while, until suddenly both of them were in my hot spot.  I think we probably caught about 25 fish, and I think there were 5 different species:  catfish, pinfish, mangrove snapper, jack krevalle, and I forgot the other one.

 

We took a long boat ride up the channel, then stopped for fuel on our way back.  Andrew fell asleep, so John just kept driving.  Finally, we stopped again to try our luck at fishing but it was 2:30 by now, heat of the day, and we were all tired. We saw several dolphins on our long ride, and another manatee when we were back in the shallow water looking for a fishing site.   I caught one more catfish, the biggest of the day, but we were all ready to quit.  John grilled dinner tonight, bacon-wrapped pork loin, corn on the cob, and potatoes.  We have plans to get up early to try to catch some big ones tomorrow, so we will see how that works out.

And Another Monday (5/11/205)

These days are just rolling by, and all of a sudden, another week has passed.  Not too eventful a week. Bridgette finished up her teaching for the semester, got her finals all graded and the grades posted.  John just put in another week, but no travel right now so that's good.  On Tuesday, Joe, Andrew and I took the boat down to the dealer at Bradenton to get it fitted for a cover.  We left it there, and headed back home. Andrew found a boat seat there that fit him pretty good.

 Joe and I got to spend some quality time with Andrew this week.  We did some writing.  And he and Grandpa hung out waiting to get seated at the restaurant.

We stopped at the farmers market on our way home and Andrew picked out a watermelon.

 

  Joe and I drove up to Dade City on Wednesday to have lunch with Sherry and John Hedge, another Decker Chapel friend of mine from our school days.  We had a nice visit and a good drive.

  Joe and I shopped a little for things for their boat, Joe got the faucet finished and I think John shoveled most of the dirt back over the line he put in.  Mostly, we spent our time getting ready for this week's trip (John and Bridgette's vacation).  One day some of Florida's white birds visited the back yard -- the dogs about went crazy but we kept them inside until the birds left.

Saturday morning Joe and I went to a Flea Market looking for a new phone case for him.  We picked up some Ruskin tomatoes, fresh corn on the cob, and some other items at the farmer's market there. Then we got back and started loading. I saw a mirror that I thought John could try, with pieces of driftwood decorating it.

Andrew was a big help, both with the loading and helping Grandpa wash windows.

Sunday we left Tampa about 10:00 and drove 3 hours over to the East Coast, to Long Point Campground near Melbourne Beach.  On the way, we saw several converted school buses that look a little different than the Indiana ones we are familiar with.  Maybe they just do convertibles in Florida.

It was a nice drive across Fla 60, and when we got to Vero Beach we headed north for a little while, then east over the causeway to our campground.   We crossed the bridge and saw the swimming beach and the jetty where we hope to fish this week.

We drove over in the RV, and John followed in his truck, pulling the boat.  Joe researched campgrounds before we made these reservations, and he picked a good one.  Grassy sites, the boat ramp is right in the campground and puts you into the Indian River Lagoon, lots of roaming room for the little guy. We walked over the wooden bridge and there's a clearing with a floor of pine needles that opens up into some fishing spots too.

After we got settled in, we went up to the restaurant right outside the campground and had some lunch.  They had a few gift items for sale --Andrew got two new books.  I saw this fish that I thought John, with his new woodworking skills, could make for me. 
 
Then we headed back to the RV, hooked up the boat and took a little boat ride.  We hadn't bought any bait, so although we threw our lines in the water, we didn't have any luck.  The lagoon here is really shallow, with lots of seagrass beds.  We came back in at low tide and had to stop a couple times to work our way around the seagrass.  We found a little island to beach on, so we waded out in the water for a little while.  We saw some interesting things on the boat ride -- a sea turtle, a sting ray, various other things I usually missed.  And Bridgette found an awesome starfish, oops, not a fish (a brittle star) where we docked the boat on the island. A brittle star does not have a backbone, nor a urochord, or a placenta, and therefore, they are a sea star, a penta radial symmetry (which means 5 sided, equal sides).  Anything on them is in groups of 5.  OK.  Lesson over.  I don't know why I see 8 legs (instead of 5), but I'm not asking!~!!

Being raised by biologists, Andrew gets to touch lots of interesting things, and he is usually not afraid of any of it.

Captain John is liking his boat.

 I stopped an osprey in the top of a tree -- at first I thought it was an eagle, until it flew and we saw it's white belly.  There are always lots of birds to see in Florida.

We headed back to camp just before sunset.  It was low tide by now, so John had to really look to keep us in the deeper water.

After a quick dinner of cold sandwiches, we called it a night.  But Monday morning we were ready to go again.  After breakfast, John and Joe went out and got some bait (shrimp and crabs), and we loaded up the boat and hit the water again.  We saw a bull shark right off the boat ramp, and John spotted another turtle, and some other fish (I have to get tome polarized sunglasses because I don't see very much of what he spots).  We drift- fished the seagrass for a while with no luck, so he drove us over by the jetty.  And just inside the swimming area, Bridgette spotted a manatee!  We watched it for a while, and spotted a second one.  Some people waded out right next to them, which is against the law to be that close, but it didn't seem to bother the manatees.

Some pelicans were guarding the entrance to the swimming area. 

Andrew likes the boat, and it's roomy enough that he can play.  He even has a water table and swimming pool on board, and he likes to play with the shrimp bait in the pool.  Then we went back to our "island" and got back in the water.  We caught some small fish here -- 7 of them, mangrove snappers.

After lunch, Andrew took a much-needed nap, and John went fishing while I worked on the blog.  Joe was going to take a shower, but they turned the water off to the campground, so he had to delay it a little.  We checked the water a little later and it was back on, so he went off to take a shower.  John came back and said he was catching some things, so I headed down there.  I pretty well put a stop to his successful fishing.  My first 4 casts were 2 in the mangrove trees and one catching his line.  I finally did catch a little catfish.  John caught catfish, pinfish, puffers, mangrove snapper, and a southern kingfish.  Joe never did catch any, but we helped John use up all the bait (as well as a few hooks).  John mentioned that fishing with me and Joe was a lot like fishing with Shooter.  It was really hot and humid, so we all finally headed inside the RV to cool off.