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The dinosaur. We left the hotel and went to go see the football stadium for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers really wanting to see the pirate ship we knew was inside. Did we get to see any of it? Well, after driving around the stadium multiple times, we never found any access to even a parking lot to get us anywhere closer than the roads and only managed to catch a glimpse of the tops of the masts on the ship from one angle. Man, we wanted to see that pirate ship in person. That was a disappointment.
With not anything else around the area that we didn’t visit last night, we set Google Maps and started heading north. Some unusual things we passed along the way were the city of Land O’Lakes, a gas station with “out of gas” on its digital sign out front, and a place called “House of Wisdom Teeth”. Unfortunately, we also passed EMTs working on a person lying in the rode who was in a car accident. That’s when the silliness ceased and the prayers for them commenced.
Later, we did encounter another funny sight when we passed an auto center that
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The three sisters at the Three Sister's Springs was shaped like a giant dinosaur. It even had the service bays inside the dinosaur. It looked like we were in Bedrock and Fred Flintstone or Barney Rubble might come walking out any minute.
Leaving there, we all needed to visit the little girl’s room and the van needed gas, so we began our mission to find a nice place to get gas and make a pit stop. First place we stopped was strike one (good gas prices, but the place looked terrible – not stopping to pee there). Second place we stopped became strike two (the place looked good, but unfortunately, they didn’t have a bathroom). Oh, wait!!! There was an exciting opportunity right across the road. Did we want to look at car engines out in the hot sun? Nooooo!!!! Believe it or not, there was a car show going on in that 95-degree heat and all the cars had their hoods propped up so we could see all their engines, and they weren’t even old cars. We restrained all our urges to go and kept on our search. What’s going on? Mile after mile and still no place for gas to be found. Had
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The 3 of us. we had struck out before three strikes? Then, finally about 15 miles down the road, we completed our mission in a place called Weeki Wachee!
Most of our driving today has been on very straight and flat roads with nothing but green trees beside it (aka – the Green Channel). The green channel continued for miles upon miles until we reached our first planned stop at “Three Sisters Springs”. Being three sisters, we had to go there. The springs were called Big Sister Spring, Pretty Sister Spring, Little Sister Spring. The lady at the check in said we’d have to decide who’s which spring and, in the end, Susan was “Big Sister”, Claire was “Pretty Sister” and Pam was “Little Sister” due to order of birth. From the pictures on their website, we expected it to be in a cool, tropical environment as we walked around the calm springs. Well, instead we walked a good way in the hot sun to get to the springs and then most of that boardwalk was also in the sun, but the springs were filled with gorgeous, clear, aquamarine water surrounded by tropical plant life. In addition, we saw something strange
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where did these people come from growing in the springs – people!!! Yes, there were snorkelers, kayakers, and scuba divers all in the springs. Where did these people come from??? The website was deceiving, but in that heat, we sure wish we could’ve joined them. A guide for the springs said manatee season just ended and so they open up the springs for the locals who come from the nearby river.
Apparently, there is no place to picnic in NW Florida. Mind you, we just wanted to stop and picnic at a picnic table in the shade, yet we drove for miles and miles and couldn’t find any place that fit the bill. We tried over and over, with no luck. This time we did strike out and we finally ended up eating in the van as we continued our drive. Florida needs to get its act together.
After our mobile lunch, we came upon some random parking places with 2-hr limits along the highway. What??? There was nothing around but the highway and this line of parking places. We were puzzled. Then, a small town appeared and still there was nothing that would need those parking places and they
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The water and kayaks sure look inviting. were a mile away. We still don’t know why they were there???
Then we found the Suwannee River and of course we had to sing the song with the lyrics, “Way down upon the Suwannee River, far, far away”. There was a picnic table there, but alas it was too much too late. However, we could pull off and stop at the Yellow Jacket RV Resort – we all thought that would be a great idea since Susan is allergic to bees. Why would you have an RV resort anywhere near yellow jackets???
This whole area was very progressive (ha ha); they had old, faded billboards that looked like they had been up from the 60s. Back to the green channel for another long stretch befor arriving in Tallahassee.
In Tallahassee, we saw the Capitol Building with it’s red and white candy-striped awnings, several other silly things, and for Sally’s sake, we swallowed our pride and briefly visited Florida State University’s campus and football stadium so we could make some pictures for her. You’re welcome, Sally.
After checking in our hotel, we searched for a great place to
eat. There were several good choices, but we chose what we thought was the best one. As we left to go the restaurant, Claire put it in Google Maps, and we discovered it was literally right behind the hotel!!! All we had to do was walk through part of the hotel parking lot and we were there. We couldn’t have planned it any better if we had tried and the food was delicious. We struck it rich tonight!
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