Staying close to home

Friday Jan 8, 2015:  since we only have two days off we stayed close to camp.  Today we headed East to Shark Valley Visitor center in the Everglades.

We walked about an our or so before our bike ride and we lucked out and seen bird #525 a Purple Gallinule.  we have been looking for this guy for 2 weeks..

It was a bit rainy but cleared up enough for us to bike the 15 mile loop.  Lots of alligators on the road

this tower is 7 miles from the entrance, since the return path is curvy it is 8 miles back...

the crows are pretty smart.  they wait for people to go to the top of the tower then raid the bikes for food.  He was opening the zipper on the pack..  I kept closing it and he would open it...

In fact we were standing right by our bikes, eating some crackers,  Eric put the back pack on the ground, we seen an American Bittern, walked about 3 feet from the pack and one of the crows swept in and took a sleeve of crackers!!!

the 15 mile ride really wore us out!  I don't think I have been on a bike ride for about 2+ years.  It was a fun day.  We had a Ranger led campfire program from 7-8 on Wildlife Myths that was pretty interesting.

although the temps were only in the low 80's the dew point was too high, had to put the A/C on to sleep..

Sat Jan 9:  with the high dew points it was very foggy this morning. We stopped at

this Gray Catbird wanted his picture taken

Momma and Baby Alligators:

time for lunch...  we really love our shrimp and oysters...

as usual the food was great..

Mosquitos bad tonight.  tomorrow we begin our 4 days on....