Homosassa Park and Grumpy Gators

Mary and Ruth stayed the night and we had a grand time catching up on stories.  We still all talk too much about illness, but that is just what we do as old people.

Here we are at the best restaurant in the world, Van der Vaulk out on the patio area.

Seemed odd without Chuck.  Perhaps next year he will be down here.
We all had some of the seafood special. The women all had salmon.   I had flounder stuffed with crab, a bit off diet, especially for the French fries which I managed to get extra crispy.  No house chips available.  The French onion soup was good.
We had a great waitress, dark haired, friendly and cute.  Melly, the owners daughter was there as well. She is always so friendly with us.

As we ate, the sunset.  It was not dramatic color, but fine ambiance just the same.  Along side us were about a dozen Netherlands folk speaking their language.  As the sunset the old lamps came on and they started up some of the firepits.  I do like this place.

On the way out our waitress asked if we wanted a "kiss on the way out" referring with a twinkle in her eye and voice to a bowl of Hershey's kisses. 
Such a cute flirtation!

I behaved myself.

Back home we sat out by the pool decorated with little lights from the projector we bought at Christmas.  We could see Cassiopeia  and a few airplanes overhead.  It was cool and nice sitting there and talking in the quiet.

Before breakfast we were greeted by the horses and one mule.  Nice.

Breakfast was Elizabeth's tasty omelet, some bacon, a bit of almond flour bread fried in olive oil to counteract some of the dryness of bread that without gluten won't rise.

We visited the Homosassa Park.

It was a bit too hot, and it looked from the cars to be crowded, but for some reason the way Elizabeth walks it, we don't feel pressured by crowds.

Manatee were nearly nonexistent. The gulf must have warmed up.  

Fish were also very scarce.  One school of small mango snappers, a few snook, and one good gar.  Even the bridge had just a few jumping mullet.

There were plenty of boats in the springhead, but most were just swimming.

There was a night heron in the park that was not in a cage.  I wondered if it found its way out of the one section.  It rested right on a post along the walkway.  I loved it.

They were feeding the white pelicans and that was cool.  The feeder selectively fed pelicans in a way that tossed a fish right to them and did not let the thieving wild turkey vultures get a taste.  So they did not need to scare the wild birds with the cannon shots before they fed.

At various locations around the park they are experimenting with these square off areas where certain water cleansing  plants are grown.  The roots go deep, and the idea is that nitrates and other pollutants are filtered by the greenery.  I did not get a photo.

This does not show the velvet colors of the pelicans on the island.

Of course, the flamingos were full of energy and had plenty to say as they zig zagged around and bobbed those long necks.

Two whooping cranes were there, but would not pose for a photo, but just tucked those heads in white feathers.

The deer were pretty active and I enjoyed seeing them.  

They moved the spoonbills from their dedicated habitat to the enclosed bird area with other species.

It was fine to see them clearly without any fences and up close.  Other birds seemed scarce in that pen.

Spoonbill and wood stork

In this area was one bird on eggs, but I could not really make out what it was.  Perhaps a sort of heron.

Here is Lucifer in all his glory

Lu has a new sign, announcing that he is suffering from old age diseases and being constantly treated.  I read that means he is dying.  He is the oldest Hippo in North America.  We will be sad to see him go.

I liked seeing the tortoise digging a hole in the corner of the cage although I knew it was probably futile.  He would not be able to dig very deep in that spot.  One small owl was in one of the tortoise holes.  The rest seemed empty.

Afterwards we went to Grumpy Gators.  I was getting pretty tired.  We were too early for what we came for, the prime rib.  I ordered a hamburger medium rare and it came rare raw.  I stopped eating and took it home for supper. I was not that hungry and did not want to send it back.
Later, Once I'd cooked away the raw back at my house, and added some wine sautéed greens as a topping.  it was tasty.
I have not gotten food poisoning 

The wine was the worst red I've had in Florida.  I added Truvia.

The outdoor fire left ashes in our hair from where they were burning old cardboard boxes, but it ended before it could flavor the food.

The look of the back outdoors is pretty rough,  sort of like eating in a junk yard.
They did have horseshoes, but we did not play.  Chuck needed to be here.

And we watched them make the prime rib on a grill right next to our table.  

There was a dog, a poodle retriever cross.  Nice enough.  I'm happy to eat without dogs, but this was a friendly fellow and very pretty.

There was piped music, a radio station of Western music that I liked, except for the loud commercials.

Not my favorite place and I understood why the Gators there might get Grumpy, had there been any.  I got a bit Grumpy myself,  but it was fine to be out in the breezes, and the company was just grand.

We came home, watched a bit of television and just crashed.  We were very tired.