Contents

Rearview Mirror - Summary of the past week
Pups Across America! - Jerry in the prairie
Headlights - Our schedule as to where we will be heading

(Note: click on any photo for a larger image/slideshow)

Rearview Mirror

Island Walks
Early morning St. James City walks produced a few interesting pictures. Here are a couple of reflections taken from the pond behind the post office and two Wood Storks--one perched and one in flight. Also, here is a hawk that hangs around an eagle nest, a neighborhood orchid, a soaring osprey, a standing ibis, a really handsome vulture, plus the resting pose of Chico, the last of our Mexican gatos.

























The Pot Roast Caper
Our long-time friend Patrick has an interesting description of his ideal camping experience--he envisions traveling along the scenic highways of America, taking in the great vistas of our land while inhaling the all-American smells of a bubbling, cooking pot roast that will be his evening meal. So when Jamers brought up the idea of a Pot Roast Caper, Jan and I were all for it. Several false starts and changes in plans jeopardized the escapade, but it finally came together. Here is the scenario: Unbeknownst to Patrick and Friz, Jamers was down visiting us on the Island. Jamers told us when Friz and Patrick would be flying into Punta Gorda, so Jan phoned them saying that she had to go to Bonita Springs (where they have a home) anyway to shop for a rug, so why don’t they let us pick them up at the airport and drive them to Bonita? They readily agreed. Our plan was quickly formulated: Jamers, Jan, and I (along with the Pups) would drive BERT (our motor home) to the Punta Gorda rest stop, a mile from the Punta Gorda airport. While driving, the pot roast would be cooking in the slow cooker, accumulating the appropriate degree of doneness. At the rest stop we would unhook the car, Jan and I would drive to the airport to pick them up, tell them we needed to go to the bathroom, drive up to our coach, tell them to go in and be surprised by seeing Jamers sitting in the coach and smelling the cooking meats and veggies. Next we would hook the car back up and drive to our campground a little past Naples. Sounds like a great plan don’t you think?



However, we had a couple potholes on the path to pot roast progress: (1) We left the house early to prepare the coach for our trip (we keep the coach a few blocks away). When Jan pushed the button to raise the leveling jacks, one would not go all the way up--the coach would move but made a consistent, obnoxious, irritating alarm--not tolerable. We spent about an hour working on this problem (including lots of me laying under the coach urging it to act in the way I wanted it to). Finally, with Barry’s help, we used his jack to raise the coach jack enough to cancel the alarm. OK, we are running a little late, but all was still fine. (2) As we got ready to pull out, Jan smelled not the delectable odor of cooking pot roast but the metallic smell of burning wires--somehow the pot roast cooker got fried in the fix-the-jack melee. We stopped along the way to try and buy another cooker, but no luck. So Jamers and Jan modified the cooking methodology and polished the process to make things work. We arrived at the rest stop later than planned but luckily Patrick and Friz’s plane was late, so all worked out. We were there when their plane arrived, we loaded the car, lied about needing a potty break, and both of them were very surprised upon entering the coach. After a social break, we hooked up the car, drove to the Collier-Seminole State Park, set up camp in the dark, but by 9 p.m. we were enjoying the delicious, long-anticipated meal--MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.







Note that the planning for the original caper was much more complex and sophisticated. For example, it also included flying in PK Tours from the Caribbean.

Pups Across America

Here is a shot of Jerry, enjoying a romp in a meadow in the early morning light.

Headlights

See you next week.

Tags: Bird photography