I helped Sandra take crowds out through the swamps of Big Cypress for the annual Muck-A-Bout. I did some sketching while out in the swamps, as to the right .

We headed south to be a part of the Clyde Butcher Muck-A-Bout. We took backroads to get there. A stop we made was at The Cool Place, an ice cream shop in Bartow. There Sandra and I had sundaes (See above).

For dinner we stopped at the 75 year old Flora and Ella’s in LaBelle. I had great Southern fried chicken and Sandra loved the chicken and dumplings. We also finally found pecan pie. we’ve been looking for a year and a half for home made pecan pie throughout Florida and during our trips to North Carolina, New Orlenas and throughout Arkansas. All of the restaurants we stopped at had pecan pie provided by a store of food service. Flora and Ella’s has folks come in at 4:30 every morning to make new pies. It was great!

Above is one of the antique cash registers and adding machines at Flora and Ella’s.

We later settled in Everglades City to get ready for swamp trompin’ Friday.

Took a trip for tooth cleaning. The lady who cleaned them, Linda, is an Ocala native and have all kinds of connections to Sandra’s family.

When I sketched the biohazardous bag above, I thought it’d be neat to color. After talking to colleague Ed Hall yesterday, I realized I need to try and color some of these sketches sometimes.

Sandra and I headed to Orange County. Her for a conference. Me for a haircut at Jim’s Barber Shop. Unfortunately for me, Jim’s ill and his shears are taking a break, too.

That gave me time I didn’t expect, so I hit the bookstores. Picked up lots of goodies. Below are the best covers. All books I’ll probably never read. I’ll just admire the covers. I really like the layout of ‘Native Stone’. The Frank Lloyd Wright-ish structure with teh red tree-ish image and the placement of the T-square, also with red. All that imagery and the artist puts a watch on the guy. Interesting choices. I wonder why. The artist who created the very bottom art put no watch on the pirate. It seems to me pirates would want to know what time it is…Just wondering…

Later I picked up Sandra and headed to Sweet Tomatoes in Altamonte Springs. There we joined our good friends G.K. Sharman and James L. Saunders. Also joining the healthful buffet was my father. Good talk and plenty of cooking hints from Mr. Saunders.

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.

Sandra, myself, my brother, Jeff, and our father made our way to Lakeland to the Florida Air Museum. I was feeling lousy, the illness still godding me. We purused the various planes and the history of air flight in Florida. This is a great historical compliment to combine with a trip to Fantasy of Flight. I did what slketching I could. There’s a plane above.

We had some time before dinner and wandered into Downtown Lakeland and settled for a bit in the Black and Brew coffee shop set in an historic building. Above is the inside doorway I sketched while we were there. We then went to dinner at Louie Mack’s Steakhouse.