We made our way south to Clewiston for research and exploring. We made a lunch stop at the Orange Box Cafe in Frostproof. The restaurant is part of Frostproof Groves orange juice packing and juice palnt. Above are cabbage palms I saw outside the restaurant window.

We made it down to Clewiston and stayed at the Clewsiton Inn. We learned when we got there that the legendary ‘Old South Bar-B-Q’ had been revived by the owners of the Clewiston Inn and made a part of their restaurant. Better yet is that the owners were able to secure one of the original cooks from ‘Old South’. WHAT GREAT BAR-B-Q!!!!!

Our first stop during our Volusia County tour was Ponce Preserve. It’s a park that has a combo of opportunities to experience the original natural Florida tidal area of this part of the east coast. See the site for details. It’s a GREAT park and well worth the trip whether you take the boardwalk, the natural trail or head out to the beach.

Our next stop was Sugar Mill Gardens. It is the site of a sugar mill, a theme park, a Civil War site and a Seminole Indian War site. It covers it all. There is no doubt ‘Bongoland’ is the most interesting. I’ll let this site explain it as I run out of time to type all of this. By the way, I counted 7 dinosaurs. Above is one of them.

We continued our Volusia County tour with a stop at the Daytona Beach Museum of Arts and Sciences.WHATTAPLACE!!!!Everyting from greek statues (See right) to antique cars to Florida history to pirates to actual train cars to….It’s an amazing place!We made a stop at Zeno’s, a favorite of ours,

We next stopped at a favorite of our in Volusia County, Zeno’s. They have two locations. We stopped at the one on A1A. Got ice cream and salt water taffy. Above is cover of the box of the saltwater taffy we picked up. I love the historical photos.

After Zeno’s we wandered up A1A to Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area. The park, that includes beach access, is named for the Florida troubador, Gamble Rogers, who sang and told stories of Florida’s history, environment and a series of characters that dwelled in our state in the fictional area of Ocklawaha County.I got to meet and work with Gamble back in the ’80s when I was working with Florida music and storytellers festivals and groups. He was a sight to behold. A very calm and steady performer. I’m reading a number of books about Dean Martin. Gamble was the easygoing come-what-may Dean Martin on stage.It was a tragedy he died in the surf at the very spot where this park is. He was trying to save another person caught in the rough waters. We happened to be there when there was a red flag warning of the rough surf and dangerous waters at the beach as it was when Gamble died. The difference now is an actual red flag atop a pole flapping in the wind, see the sketch to the right. At the time of Gamble’s death there were no flags there. Too bad the story of Gamble’s death isn’t at the park. I felt like chasing after the people in the surf and warning them of the dangers and of the reason why the park area is named after Gamble.

We finished our trip in Marion County and had dinner at Lena’s Restaurant, where you can have a “whale of a meal”.To the left is the papertowel holder on every table.

We spent the day visiting Sarasota and the bookstores there. From the old Charlie’s Newstand (or whatever it’s called today) to Parker Books to Helen’s Books to The Main Street Bookstore. We had  a very good lunch at El Greco Cafe. I drew the drawing on the right looking out the window to this building down the street.

We drove out of Sarasota and through Parrish into Plant City where we met my Aunt and long time friends Susie and Russell Noel and their family at Fred’s Market where we had another Fred’s outstanding meal. Many thanks to them for joining us. Getting home we had cake, ice cream and presents.

We had lunch with Tom and Glenda Armstrong at the 1945 created Linger Lodge. Known for it’s fine Southern fare, it’s been recently bought by others and now has a “chef”. The food showed it. Worse, no fried chicken that I was looking forward to.

Though less than what was once there, the Linger Lodge can still boast quite a collection of stuffed critters that decorate throughout. To the left is a mounted water moccasin that hung near our table. Just above us on the wall was a ten foot gator. There is also a bar that has no mirrors from which to sit across. Instead various snakes and wild animals stare back at you. That seems like a great opportunity to me. One who gets tipsy might experience something else still.

Though the food was average we had a great time with the Armstrongs.

I was in Tampa to speak to classes at the St. John Greek Orthodox Day School. I had a great time and I hope I inspired some young folks to be more creative. Above is a drawing I was handed by “The Boys”, as they called themselves.

Afterward we had a good lunch at a restaurant on Howard Avenue, ‘Seven 17 South’. Another restaurant that isn’t creative enough to name itself beyond it’s address. Afterward we went to a place called ‘Daily Eats’. It’s in the place of the legendary ‘Meeting House’ diner. The newer place has kept the interior and, as was obvious when there, a very popular spot. There’s a small sketch I made of a tiled doorway corner. Below is a - Sorry- blurry interior shot and a photo from the outside.

We wandered Apalachicola for the early part of the day. Visiting many shops and meeting lots of folks. Among those met was Gil Autrey whose wife runs her own photography store. The last name begged me to ask if he is any relation to 1920s Mayor L.M. Autrey of Orlando. He’s Mayor Autrey’s grandson. What’s more Gil was a Mayor himself of Valdosta, Georgia. We had a great talk.

Then the storms came. I needed to get back to the Gibson Inn to work on a project. The storms had another idea. The intense storm blew through and blew out the electricity. Not just to the hotel, but to the entire city. I could have worked on the laptop computer anyway. The concern was that we had no idea when electricity might return and what if I drained the computers battery? The storm raged on and we took a nap.

Later the electricity returned and left and returned and left and seemed to finally have returned for good. We made our way to a restaurant named Verandas Bistro at about 8:30. The folks at the restaurant said our timing was good because their electricity had returned only twenty minutes earlier.

I had earlier finished the sketch book that the sketches in this blog come from. I had started it April 12th of last year and it almost made a year. I began the new one with the drawing of Sandra above. There was a fellow playing saxophone on the outside veranda. Karl Dappen is great and we were shocked that he had the Jimmy Van Heusen tune, ‘Apalachicola, F-L-A’ was on his song list. The song opens the Hope and Crosby film, ‘Road to Rio’ and it was on our song list during our wedding. Dappen adapted the tune for saxophone and despite the tricky notes in the music Dappen played an incredible rendition! Here are a couple sketches of Dappen playing.

We made our way to Apalachicola to celebrate our anniversary. Sandra had us staying at the historic Gibson Inn and we had dinner at the restaurant inside- Avenue Sea. The sketch is of a table setting in the restaurant.

On Friday we wandered Apalachicola. I had to go back to the room for a while as I had a project to work on.  Later we had dinner at Papa Joes Oyster & Grill. The sketch here is of a dredging crane that sat still in the bay.