The Ray Adventures: Patrick Airforce Base - Kingsbay Submarine Base May 9

In the early 90's we met a fun couple, Ray and Joey, from Edmonds, Washington on Roratonga, Cook Island, we got word from Ray that Joey had a stroke and passed away in April. What a special lady she was. Our heartfelt sympathies go to Ray and his family.

Tuesday, May 9 We took a 2 (not 3) hour tour aboard Island Boat Tours. We traveled the shores of the Banana River, across to Merritt Island and along the 520 Causeway back to the dock. We hadn't gone too far when a bottle nose dolphin joined us for a while, they love to swim behind the boat in the wake, then we saw a group of Manatees close to shore, I saw an alligator submerged with just his snout peeking above the water. We saw so many birds, the Double Crested Cormorant on a post spreading his wings to dry, Egrets, Great Blue Heron, the snake bird Anhinga, called that because when they swim their body is submerged, all you see is their neck and head, very snake like looking. ICKY We watched an Osprey dive into the water catching a fish with his talons and fly off, our tour guide told us 3 seconds after the osprey takes flight it "shakes like a dog". Our guide also told us they shift their catch in flight so the head of the fish faces forward as they fly. Who knew? Of course we saw the crazy Brown Pelicans dive headfirst into the water for their dinner.   A couple of Mangrove islands had pelicans roosting on top, many juveniles, they have brown heads and the adults have white heads. I told you we are "wannabe" birders. We saw several beautiful homes, some still repairing after Hurricane Matthew last October and a few were condemned. Cocoa Beach is 6 miles long but has 26 miles of shoreline. Can you tell we really love this place.

Wednesday, May 10, We drove up to Port Canaveral, not to sure where Cocoa Beach ends and Port C. begins, to the Exploration Tower, a 7 story tower that features interactive maritime and historical exhibits, the 7th floor gives you sweeping views of the port and Kennedy Space Center, unfortunately no cruise ships were in port. We had a great lunch at Fish Lips, right on the water, I had Tuna Porte and Gary had a blackened grouper sandwich. After lunch we drove to the Canaveral Locks that separate the Banana River from the port. On the way home we played another round of mini golf, we each had a hole in one, Gary won by 5.   Man am I in a slump.

Thursday, May 11, The washer repairman was due between 8 & 8:30, quite early for us to be presentable but it just didn't matter as long as he could get the machine operating again. I left for Yoga at 9:00 and when I got back WAHOO! It is working! I did 6 loads of wash. In the afternoon we took Luci to the river to swim.

Friday, May 12, We left for St. Augustine by 8:30, we took Luci to Pet Paradise there, a franchise doggie day care and boarding business, you get the first visit free. We were surprised, we'd taken her to a Pet Paradise in Tallahassee so we figured we'd have to pay but it was free again. Good deal. St. Augustine, population 13,000, elevation 7, is the oldest continuously occupied European settlement in the US. Our first stop was the Visitor Center. We decided to take the Red Train Tour, a hop on and off ride with 20 stops. We took the entire tour to get an overview of the area, since we were just spending the day there we had to decide what we wanted a closer look at. We had lunch in the Old City and looked around a bit before heading to Castillo De San Marco, built between 1672 -1695, made out of coquino, a soft shellrock. The fort is basically square with 4 massive diamond-shaped bastions at each corner. I'm always amazed at centuries old construction, with walls 35 feet high, how did they manage without cranes, backhoes, etc? Next! A MUST! The Ponce de Leon's Fountain of Youth Archeological Park is claimed to be Leon's landing site and the original location of St. Augustine. The park contains The Timucuan Indian Spring that Ponce de Leon hoped was the Fountain of Youth. We tasted the water from that same spring, yuk, it tasted "musty", give me good old chlorinated city water any day unless is truly is the F of Y. Florida's 4th graders study their states history, at the end of the school year they take field trips to St. A. and needless to say, we were surrounded by 4th graders everywhere. At the park we watched a cannon firing demonstration, walked thru the Menendez settlement (1565) and through the many exhibits on the property. Many beautiful peacocks and peahens roam the grounds. A beautiful white peacock was strutting his stuff, we'd never seen one before. Running short on time, we missed many attractions at the Fort and Old City. We had to pick up a very tired Luci at Pet Paradise, arriving back at Patrick AFB around 8pm. While Gary was walking Luci I walked down to the beach to watch the sunset, one of our neighbors was kayaking close by, I watched as a manatee swam under her kayak. Cool.

Saturday, May 13 After waking at 5am to "potty" and finding a palmetto bug (cock roach) in the bathroom, I chased it up the wall, how, as big as they are can they squeeze into the moulding? We decided to "bug bomb" the coach - full time RVing does have it''s challenges. After lunch we set it off, we had to off to 4 1/2 hours. We did some geo cacheing, spent time at the dog park in Cocoa Beach before heading to Port Canavaral for more gc'ing. No luck, so we thought we'd talk Luci for a walk - dogs are not allowed in any city parks in PC. Crazy! We noticed a couple of cruise ships in port, we found a parking lot just to look, the Carnival Magic was readying to depart. It was pretty cool to watch the pilot boat and tugs maneuver her around to get underway. We got back home about 5:30 - Gary found a palmetto bug still wiggling. Yuk!

Sunday, May 14 Happy Mother's Day, a beautiful Chamber of Commerce day, mid 80's with a slight breeze. Gary fixed his famous potato, sausage and egg breakfast. Yum! We played our last round of mini golf in Cocoa Beach, I lost again even with a hole in one. A trip to Ron Jon Surf Shop was on our list of must "do's", since it's our last day here we had to go. The Cocoa Beach flagship store has 52,000 square feet of retail space and is open 365 24/7. There are 17 other stores in the US and 3 internationally. I'm guessing but probably 75% of the retail has Ron Jon's trademark. Gary made shrimp, chicken and beef shish kabobs for dinner, delish! We packed up our outside stuff, preparing for departure. We sure hate to leave, it's beautiful here.

Monday, May 15 Moving day, we left about 9 for our 211 mile drive to Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base near St. Mary's, Georgia. We arrived at Eagle Hammock Fam Camp around 2, Navy bases have the nicest camps usually in primo locations, well kept and here it's only $19.00 daily. KBNSB is the US Atlantics home port of Navy fleet ballistic missile nuclear submarines armed with Trident missile nuclear weapons. A very secure base, there is a gate inside the base to keep "riff raff" like us out. I would love to see the subs but not allowed. There is a loud speaker warning at the bay that states it is a military installation and if you approach deadly force is authorized. A few months back a Russian spy ship was hanging around the area - hmmmm considering the current events maybe we should move on. We drove into historic St. Mary's for dinner, had an "interesting" dinner at the hotel's saloon. The bartender Cindy is quite a character. After we ate we walked around the historic area and even picked up a geo cache.

Tuesday, May 16, Didn't do much, familiarized ourselves with the base and town.

Wednesday, May 17, What a bummer! This is a great area for bike riding, it's very flat and they have bike trails. So I decided to get some exercise, riding a couple of miles up to an intersection, in the process of turning around I fell off the bike, of course in front of several cars, and as it turned out sprained my foot. The x-rays were negative for broken bones thank goodness.

That's it for this week, enjoy the pic's,

TTFN

Gary and Pam