Rains

Wednesday May 17 and Thursday May 18, 2012
Lithia Springs Site 40, Lithia, Florida

 

Finally it rains.

I wake up to rain on the roof Wednesday morning. It sounds like a good hard rain but I know from experience that the RV magnifies the sound of rain quite a bit so I’ll need to go outside to really assess the situation.

 

I love rain on the roof but I love early mornings on the river bank too.  True to form, my mind is working on how to have both.  So I get the TIBU and put it to a new use as a rain umbrella.  The rain is light.  The perfect kind to soak into the ground.  I enjoy watching the drops hit the water and make overlapping circles.  Doesn’t take much to entertain me.  :-)  

 

 

 

 

When David wakes up, he takes these pictures of me from dinette window.  The rain comes and goes all day long and then picks up in earnest about 7:00 in the evening and pounds down all night long.  We think we might watch a Red Box DVD I picked up entitled W.E. written and directed by Madonna about a modern day young woman named Wallis after Wallis Simpson who is obsessed with the life of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor when Christies auctions off many of their household possessions.  But the rain on the roof is so loud, we can’t even hear each other without screaming.  So that idea is scrapped.  But this rain is so needed, it’s been so long since there has been any real rain.  It is great sleeping music so we read some and go to bed early.  I’m anxious to see how our jungle looks tomorrow morning with this infusion of water.

 

I’m up and out early on Thursday to see how things look. 

 

Everything is SO green.  The resurrection ferns growing on the live oak that shades our campsite are totally awake and alive.  But try as I might I am unable to take a good picture of them over my head.   The sun foils every attempt.  So it’s either too bright or later in the day, too dark in the shade.

 

 

I start to go down to the river bank to see how much the river has risen. 

But when I get to the fence, I stop abruptly when I notice someone has arrived before me.   Can you see him on  a low waterside branch just to the left of where I was sitting yesterday??

 

 

This is a resident red shouldered hawk whose kee-aah kee-aah kee-aah I hear all around the park.  I’ve seen him flying up and down the river, over at the spring and to and from various trees in the camp sites.  But this is the best view I’ve had and for the longest time.  I stand frozen watching him watch the river and then fly across to the other side and land in a tree with his back to the water.  In the lower right of the picture below you can see the resurrection ferns on the tree branch.  They have been brown and dead looking for months.  Today they are green and shining as the hawk looks over his shoulder.

 

The river doesn’t actually look like it has risen any so I decide to walk over to the spring and see what has happened there. 

 

Site 40 is the last site in the campground and there is a trail that comes from it to the boat dock.

 

 

 

Unfortunately the trail isn’t marked at the boat dock end saying this does not go to the general campground area so we get folks thinking they are going on a hike along the river but end up in short order at our fire ring. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s a pretty trail along the water.  Though short, it feels like walking through the jungle.  Seeing the river beside me as I walk along, makes me think of Casablanca.  I keep an eye out as I go looking to see if Rick and Ilsa are coming up the Alafia.

 

 

 

 

The spring is crystal clear and inviting.

 

I wade into the spring.  Its water is a cool 72 degrees. Lots of fish around my toes.  They look almost clear too.

 

 

 

But the water level doesn’t seem to be much higher here at the spring than at the river.  I guess it takes more than one over night pounding rain to make a difference in the water levels. 

 

When I walk down the spring run I find a visitor I haven’t seen here before.

 

The spoon bill is pink but not the bright red of breeding plumage.
Still he’s striking and that is definitely some bill.

 

 

Naturally I take zillions of pictures of the visitor and stay forever.  However I know the rules, don’t post TOO many pictures.  And especially not of the same thing. But it’s sure hard to choose.

Who knows how long I might have stayed to watch him if he hadn’t he flown off over the spring and toward the river.

 

What makes him fly off is the official ATV being driven by the spring flow monitors who zoom from the main spring, down along the spring run and over to the 2nd totally natural spring.   Not sure if their arrival has anything to do with the rain or if they just monitor the flow of the springs on a regular basis.  But they are the only lucky ones who ever get to go over into this beautiful spring any more.

 

  By now it is past lunch time and I am hungry so I take the jungle path back to Winnona.   What a great morning!

 

David is taking it easy, paying close attention to how he feels.

His back is not bothering him as much so we are cautiously optimistic but he still has some insomnia and the post dex fatigue has returned early it seems.

He doesn’t do much these two days.  He works on some minor repairs which he enjoys.  Things that don’t require a lot of energy.  He fixes both breakfast and dinner.  I offer to do the dishes but he’d rather do them and have me read aloud from Peter Matthiessen's Shadow Country.  This link is a bare bones wiki discussion of this award winning book.  The book is anything but dull and is beautifully written.  During many weeks of dinner dishes, we’ve done nearly 600 of 900 pages of this story about the history of south Florida and E.J. Watson.  The only days we don’t read are those when he is just too tired to cook or clean up.

 

 

After lunch it is time to try out my new screened room. 

David offers to help me in this set up effort but I decline although the label on the screen case clearly says in all capital letters at the bottom of this photo…..

 

However, the reason I bought this one was the manufacturer Coleman said “easy 5 minute set up”.  So it is time to try it out and find out whether I can do this by myself.  That has now become a necessary criteria for anything purchased.   If I can’t and they are right about this BOLD STATEMENT, then the room will have to go back 

 

Here are the results. 

TA DA!!! 

I guess we’ll keep it at least long enough to test drive it with mosquitoes.  But no need to encourage them to show up any time soon.

 

My only regret is that I don’t look more smug in this picture.