We made it to the Keys!

I can’t believe I haven’t posted since Monday!

Wait. Of course I can. It’s been a whirlwind kind of week here in Florida! So let’s start the recap:

After returning back to my Aunt Jean and Uncle Vaughn’s house for the weekend, Michael and I did take the opportunity to discover Castillo de San Marcos, the only 17th century fort in North America (it was built in 1672).

We got to see a cannon being fired, and saw dolphins fishing in the bay while we waited. They don’t use live cannonballs, by the way…

Here’s the view from the back of the cannon.

After checking out the fort, we took the dogs for a walk around St. Augustine’s entertainment district. The dogs needed the exercise, and having them with us prevented us from buying anything. Both dogs were very popular and got lots of attention.

Sunday night (February 26th), Jean and Vaughn had a little dinner party with one of their business partners (Mike), and Michael and I cooked.

I’m sure you know what this means – it means that Michael did most of the work, although the bacon farotto was my idea, and I did help my Aunt Jean make the dessert, a banana parfait. Mike brought three bottles of lovely Italian wine. Great food, wine, and company – it was a really nice night.

We had a hard time leaving the St. Augustine area. We had such a wonderful time with my Aunt Jean and Uncle Vaughn. Plus, we loved their house. But onward we must go. Or southward, as the case may be.

At least I got a picture with my Aunt Jean:

So – as we headed south – and inland – we found a free campsite just outside of Ocala National Forest. And it was a pretty site, with gorgeous old trees.

But it was fairly dirty, and a few people appeared to be living there. We spent the night and moved on.

At that point I’d been dealing with a pain in my shoulder for a few days. It seemed to be recurring, occasionally, actually, and for about 2 weeks. The day before the dinner party I could barely get dressed. I could feel this giant knot under my shoulder blade, and it seemed to be connected somehow to my neck. As in, when I moved my neck it hurt in my shoulder.

I started on the ibuprofen, although it didn’t make much of a dent. When I woke up in the middle of the night at our Ocala NF site, it was a stabbing pain no matter what position I lay in, and I couldn’t go back to sleep. It’s how I can tell you that the Ocala site was one of the darkest we’ve stayed at.

When we resupplied in Jupiter I broke down and bought Midol because it has a muscle relaxer in it. Michael took things a step further and got me these pain patches. He even picked out the Tiger Balm one with capsaiscin in it (which I know all about from watching the first few episodes of Orange is the New Black).

So Tuesday I was on a combination of Ibu’s and Midol, I was using something called a painball every few hours, and I had Michael put on a pain patch right before I went to bed. Honestly, the patch reeked of Vick’s Vapor Rub, but I was tired so I tried to ignore it.

I haven’t slept that well in days. That pain patch was wonderful! And Wednesday morning – my birthday – I woke up without any stabbing pains. Yay! My neck was still pretty tight, but much improved.

Wednesday and Thursday we camped at Jonathan Dickenson State Park, just north of Jupiter. If you need a bigger reference, that’s north of West Palm Beach. JDSP is great! The campgrounds are clean, as are the bathrooms and showers. There’s a ton of stuff to do here. We went mountain biking (although I use that term loosely, it was still a blast) and stand up paddleboarding in the same day.

Except for the no-see-ums that were eating me alive, this place was fabulous. I was practically drinking the deet and those little fuckers wouldn’t leave me alone. Now, in case you think I’m being a pansy, let me tell you something.

Ah, you’re probably right. Who am I kidding?

But I’m telling you, I looked around at all the other sites around us. (The campground was full.) At other sites I could see people sitting out in their chairs, drinking coffee, talking with their neighbors, etc. And none of them even so much as swatted at a bug. Around the truck, this was a constant battle. They were landing on the part in my hair, FFS.

As a test I walked both dogs separately that last morning, over to a dog run area. And while I waited for each dog to poop, I didn’t get a single bite. As soon as I got back to our rig I was swarmed. I’m not sure what happened, but I sure hoped those nasty little things wouldn’t follow us to Bahia Honda.

Ah, Bahia Honda State Park. I’ve been there once before. It was about 20 years ago, in fact. You probably don’t know this about me, but in 1996 I packed up a few belongings into my Ford Ranger and hit the road. I left Illinois and went east, through Ohio, upstate New York, and into Maine. I went down the east coast as far as Key West, then turned west, through the Gulf Coast, into Texas, then New Mexico and Arizona. In the end I moved to Colorado to go back to school. Now on this trip I didn’t camp or cook, so my total time on the on road was only a few months, but it got me what I wanted: to get out of Illinois.

Anyway – on my solo trip I spent almost 3 weeks in Florida. A week in the Keys alone. Why? Jean and Vaughn had a house on Cudjoe Key at the time. Hell, I loved Key West so much I was ready to stay. And it was my Aunt Jean who gently told me that the cost of living in the Keys was extremely high… and the payscale exceptionally low. She suggested I keep going.

So part of me was just interested to see how much things have changed in 20 years. I remember white sand and warm water, water that felt like silk.

This time around Bahia Honda State Park did not disappoint. The beaches have a lot more seagrass on them than they used to, but it’s actually more environmentally friendly anyway. The water is still warm and it still feels like silk. We jumped in the water before we even went to our campsite. This is the view I’d been dreaming about in Fayetteville: