QC01-04 From civilized to roughing it

January 16, 2010 (Sat) Ortona Lock CG (4) 61/77° - After a nice day yesterday, that we pretty much missed because it was such a busy day, it clouded over today and the wind began to pick up. Forecasters say that there are thunder storms coming across the Gulf of Mexico and should be upon us around midnight. That sounds like fun. About mid-afternoon we folded up the chairs and stowed them under the motor home, secured the bicycles to the picnic table and brought in the flags and door mat (which has been know to blow away). Thus battened down, we walked over to the lock to watch the activity there.

We have been to Ortona Lock campground twice before. Both times the gate at the walkway across the dam to the lock itself has been closed and locked. We expected the same this time but it was open. So we crossed the dam and stood by the lock watching as boats passed through. We timed our visit just right. In the hour or so that we were there the lock processed 9 boats - probably the most activity it has seen all day. Most were small but apparently expensive yachts on their way from the Gulf of Mexico to Lake Okeechobee or vice versa. It was interesting to see how different "captains" handled the almost identical tasks of easing their boats up to the bulkheads and holding them while the water lifted or lowered them to their new level. The lock attendant obviously needed his relatively short activity period. It appeared that he must spend the rest of his time slouched in a chair in the booth, snack food readily available.

January 17, 2010 (Sun) Ortona Lock CG (5) 70/80° - Tails from the department of weird: When Mark went into the rest room to take a shower this morning he found the curtain of one of the two shower stalls closed, apparently occupied. The curtain of the other shower was open but it was occupied by a completely balk guy, obviously naked, doing something indeterminate. Studying the situation to determine what that might be seemed inappropriate. Thinking that one shower would probably soon be available, he decided to wait. As he waited the man kept peering out and down the passageway at him. That was strange. If he wanted privacy, he could close the curtain. The occupant of the first shower soon pulled curtain back and came out - fully dressed. Mark picked up his stuff preparing to take his turn there but before he was able to take more than a couple of steps, The naked guy began to move his stuff from where he was to the newly vacated stall. Actually he wasn't totally naked. His face was completely covered with what looked like shaving cream - not just cheeks, chin and upper lip as if about to shave but forehead as well!

The obvious question remained unasked, instead Mark asked, "Is there something wrong with that shower?" The answer was unintelligible. A request for a repeat yielded no better information. Mark asked Clothed Man if he knew of anything wrong with the shower. "Mine worked OK," he said. Time to ask a different question of Naked Man. "Is that shower working?" "It's fine," the man said as he transferred the last of his things into his new shower stall. And it was.

The thunder storms predicted for last night never materialized. In fact it barely even rained. But the wind remained fierce and has lasted all day.

January 18, 2010 (Mon) Ortona Lock CG (6) 51/77° - The winds have quieted down but the chill has returned. Well, 51° isn't bad but we did need to pull up the extra blanket during the night. But it warmed up quickly. By mid-morning it was warm enough to debate whether sweatshirts were necessary for our bike ride out to the main road. We wore them. In the afternoon we crossed the dam and lock to the road on the other side. There are five or six houses along that road, most for sale, and a small park about a quarter mile west of the lock. It was very small but pretty. It had two pavilions with four picnic tables, five or so single picnic tables, rest rooms and a boat launch. The pavilions can be reserved if anyone is interested.

January 19, 2010 (Tue) Ortona Lock CG (7) 50/68° - Frustrating day. We spent the morning waiting for it to warm up enough to sit out without sweatshirts. It didn't happen.The sun was warm but not quite warn enough and it was not out enough. This afternoon was better - more sun, more warmth. There's always tomorrow and we'll be moving a little further south.

Sometime in the last 24 hours several truckloads of frost ruined (we assume) rotting oranges were dumped as food for the cattle roaming the fields between the campground and US 80. We can't smell them from here but it made our morning bike ride interesting. The cattle didn't seem interested. We can't say we blame them.

Q057635 Ortona Lock South Campground. #50 w/e $12g A (x7)
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January 20, 2010 (Wed) Ortona Lock CG to Monument Lake CG (95/1806 miles) - The first order of business after getting off at 9:45 was to find the La Belle post office. That shouldn't have been a problem with our hand-dandy Garmin GPS but there was no listing there. (This is the second PO not found the resident POIs since we left home. We'll be doing something about that.) Mark had put the address in when we were going to pick up our mail there but deleted it when those plans changed. We did three of the four streets in La Belle before we stopped to ask. It was on the fourth street :-/

Getting to Monument Lake was a straight forward shot south on FL 29 to US 41 then east. The road is very rural, except for the small villages, with lots of farms and farm related industries all along. We were particularly concerned when we saw the migrant workers gathering in the fields. It's probably going to be a rough year for them with so much frost kill here in Florida. We didn't see the alligators in the canals along the road that we usually see (because of the cold January?) but there were plenty of birds - mostly anhingas, white herons, egrets and vultures - and this year loads of wood storks. Interesting. There were the usual scattering of "Panther Crossing" sighs as we passed through the Florida Panther Wildlife Refuge but we saw no panthers. We never have.

Monument Lake campground is almost empty. A couple of units sit on each end of the lake and a couple along the side. We had hoped we'd be able to get one of the two sites at the south end of the lake were we would have a good view of the lake and afternoon shade but both were occupied. We took this site planning to move when one of them opened up but after being here for a while we've decided we like it here.

It got up over 85° this afternoon, quite a change from the 48° when we took our showers this morning, and our friendly neighborhood alligator decided to come out for a leisurely swim around the lake about 4:00.

Q07730 Monument Lake CG, Big Cypress National Preserve, FL #5 dry $8.00 B-