Car show

There was a car show on Sunday at the Homestead Bayfront Park down the road from us. Millie and I have been looking forward to going since we saw it advertised several weeks ago. The waterfront park is neighbored on both sides by Biscayne Bay National park but is owned and operated by Dade County. It has a small marina, large boat ramp, and a swimming beach on Biscayne Bay.

1 1/2 mile backup to enter the park

waiting to enter the park

Canal Street is a long straight road that accesses both the county and national parks, it is the only access and egress from both parks. Long before we reached the entrance, traffic backed up on the two lane road. I measured it on a map later and estimate the backup was 1 ½ miles long. Even after we reached the toll booth and paid to go in the park we were still stuck in the line of cars. The parking lot was full and they let cars enter as others left. One car out and one car in, as you can imagine it took a while to get to the bay front area where the car show was. 

a miniature corvette

a nice 57 chevy

Camero parked by the bay

T bucket priced at $16K

Hydraulic Mexican jumping cars

Classic cars and hot rods are cool, but not cool enough for me to come back here to see them. When we left the line of cars waiting to enter was just as long as when we arrived some four hours ago.

They started bringing in equipment on Saturday

Back at the campground construction has commenced in the field behind us. We still don't know what they are building, I'm going to walk across and ask someone before we leave for the season. So far all they are doing is scraping off the topsoil, if you can call it that. Under the thin layer of dirt is a porous plateau of karst limestone. It is under the entire state, but most areas have more soil over it. 

Scraping the soil from the limestone base

It's making a lot of dust, I was planning on washing the motorhome this week, I'm glad I haven't done that yet. We'll miss the convenience of parking our jeep behind the motorhome, almost everyone on our street parked back here.

Half way through the winter

Millie doing some hand stitching

We are in residency mode, Millie is working on a sewing project for her daughter and I have been milling about, not doing much of anything. I didn't think I really had anything blog worthy to write about. As usual, once I start, I blurt out a lot, but like I said none of it is very exciting. 

Church rummage sales, the Hispanic market and the Salvation army thrift stores are some of our haunts when we want to get out of the RV for a while. That, and going out to eat, which explains why after six weeks of going to the gym everyday, I still weight the same. We've been to; Cracker Barrel, which only makes me homesick for Bakers Restaurant Chicken and Dumplings, Bonefish Grill, still very nice but getting expensive for my retired budget, The mall food court Japanese, not bad, a local grill called Offerdahl's which was good, El Toro Taco which is our go-too Mexican eatery here in south Florida (Thanks John Fraser for that tip) and Alabama Jacks which has it's own story later in this posting.

Larry at Alabama Jack's

We took several bags of DVD's, audio books and printed books to the Salvation Army Store and then I bought 3 DVD's before we left. We could probably make a few bucks selling things like that during one of the campground yard sales, but we feel good about donating them and we don't have to waste any of our time trying to sell them. We've watched one of the DVD's we bought, it is a comedy called Saving Grace, very clean, very cute.

We stopped at a Habitat for Humanity store right after they had received a lot of products from ACE Hardware. They had lots of electrical parts and they were really inexpensive, I really had to hold myself back from purchasing a bunch of it. First, I don't have room to store it and 2^nd, I'm retired. I did buy an assortment of things I felt I may use.

We went to a new-to-us theater which is 12 miles up the turnpike at the Southland Mall. Nice mall with few if any, empty stores, we ate at the food court here. The Regal movie theater was clean and had nice comfortable seating. It will be our south Florida movie theater of choice from now on. The show we saw was called “Lion”. It is the true story of a 5 year old boy from rural India who becomes lost while out at night with his brother. He falls asleep on a train and is transported 1000 miles to Calcutta. He survives on the street for two months before he is taken to an orphanage. He is adopted by a couple from Australia. That is not the end of the story, go see it, we both recommend it.

IMHO Sunny Pawar as the young SaRoo stole the show

We got a note from the campground yesterday telling everyone on the perimeter road we can no longer park in the field behind our our RV's. I asked them this morning what is the problem and was informed construction was to commence back there soon. Nobody seems to know exactly what they are building, I heard two buildings in the center of the field and parking around them. I guess when we come back next year we'll have a new view out the back. Who knows, maybe we'll get a shopping center with a Lil Caesar's Pizza or a Wendy's.

Alabama Jacks

Last Sunday we went to Alabama Jacks down in Key Largo for lunch. It's a busy place located on a canal by the bridge toll booth on Card Sound Road. Card Sound is the old road to the keys, it is a less used local road now-a-days.

Waiting for a table

Jacks is a popular place, the clientele a mix of Harley bikers, snowbirds, tourists on vacation, as well as a few locals. It's open air dining under a long shed roof, it's definitely not high end, more of a ramshackle place that has been here a long time.

Alabama Jacks

It's only open from noon to six pm which seems odd for a restaurant or a bar, but it's the Keys and they hear a different drummer down there. The Keys attitude probably also explains the chaotic way they run the place. There is no seating host, the busboy does that along with his other duties, the tourists wait in line to be seated, and the locals just walk in and wander around looking for a table.

If that's not crazy enough, it doesn't appear that the wait staff have an assigned section, you just have to catch one as they rush by. They put a table number on your order and someone else delivers your meal. You may not see your waiter again until you track them down for your bill. They have a bar and live entertainment. If you're looking to hang out and drink beer this may be your “Margaritaville!”

PS: The fried pickle chips were great!

Fried Pickles

I've had another mail odyssey. I ordered some New Zealand Manuka Honey from Amazon. I goofed up and sent it to my home in Myrtle Beach. No problem I thought, I'll just have my friend take delivery, we do this all the time at the condo for our neighbors. The mail handler, who was not our regular guy refused to give it to him, (We don't know why) I scheduled re-delivery, it never showed up at the condo, I checked the package tracking app, my parcel was now in Virginia, next stop who knows where. I sent another message to USPS, telling them to either sent it back to Myrtle Beach and deliver it to my neighbor or send it to my mail forwarding service in Florida. No reply from postal service and tracking said it was on its way to destination. The big question was, exactly where was the destination they were sending it to?

The next morning it was in Jacksonville Florida and I was reasonably sure it was going to my forwarding service. I called them and gave them a heads up that it was coming and the next day someone I trusted had possession of my package. I had them send it to me at the campground, via UPS this time. It arrived here in south Florida in a couple days. Guess what happened next, Amazon send the wrong product. Their customer service rep refunded my money right away, happy ending right? Wrong, they were supposed to email me a return shipping label, it's been four days and I'm still waiting for it.

Southern Comfort Campground Jammers

The snowbird musicians in the campground had a jam session last week. They have one every two weeks but this was the first time Millie and I didn't have something else planned. We're so busy, don't you know! They hold it in one of the empty sites rather than the activity center because of a no alcohol rule there. I guess the musicians and some of the audience needed a bracer to get thru the performance. Our neighbor Marcel is one of the group and is the lead singer. English is a second language for this French Canadian and he does a remarkable job with the lyrics.

Our neighbor Marcel

That's all I can remember, stay warm! Next posting will be after the car show this weekend.

Friday night at the drags

Z-28 vs Stingray

Friday Feb 3 2017

Millie and I went to the drag races on Friday night. The Homestead NASCAR track down the street from us has a locals night on the first Friday of every month. Promoted as Fast Lane Friday you can race anything as long as it is legally tagged for the street. 

 Homestead Speedway

 

The ¼ mile track is laid out on pit road of the big NASCAR oval, spectators have very good seats above the garages. All the grandstand seating is closed for the drag races.

The burn out smoke was from the little Mustang II, not the newer Mustang

 

For five hours, from 7pm till midnight participants can race as much as they like. However, later in the evening the line of racers grew longer and longer, so early birds got more runs in.

Nicely restored Z-28 Camero vs a hopped up Dodge Dart

We saw everything you could imagine racing Soccer mom's in SUV's, lots of those little cars with the beehive mufflers, more Mustangs than anything else, as well as numerous Camero's and Chargers. Foreign cars were represented by Porsche, Mercedes Benz's, even a Mini Cooper and an Infinity.

Mini Cooper, check out the (fake) heat signature radiating from the grill

My two personal favorites were an authentic (not a reproduction) Shelby Cobra and a 1930's Ford hot rod. Both were in beautiful condition, if either were mine, I don't think I would have the heart to abuse them on a drag strip.

Shelby Cobra vs Ford "Hot Rod"

 

One of the highlights was a 1940's ford coupe raced by an 84 year old grandfather. He always ran solo, never racing another car. The coupe was pretty fast and several times lifted the front wheels off the ground while accelerating.

Owned and driven by an 84 yr old grandfather

The sleeper of the evening was a Jeep Grand Cherokee. First racing a Mustang and next a Charger, he soundly defeated both. On his third race against a sports car, (I'm not sure what brand it was) it looked like it was going to be a repeat performance. The Jeep accelerated away by two or three lengths when something happened. He missed a shift or the motor stumbled, whatever it was it gave the sports car enough time to overtake the Jeep. He didn't have enough track left to regain the lead.

Grand Cherokee vs Mustang

 

Grand Cherokee vs Dodge Charger

Grand Cherokee vs ?

The stands were packed with spectators, Millie and I were in the minority on several counts. The mostly young Hispanic crowd, although enthusiastic was well mannered. Behind us was a group of (not Hispanic) men who's pre race banter got old after a while, as they solicited bets for each match up. They moved on after they ran out of dollars or whatever they were drinking in solo cups.

Porsche vs Cobra

Our date night at the drags was fun, it brought back memories of our youth. We stayed for four hours, only leaving early to beat the large crowd out of the parking lot.

Biscayne Bay National Park

Biscayne Bay National Park

Thursday Feb 2 2017

Just a few miles east of our campground is Biscayne Bay National Park. The park encompasses 172,971 acres, with 95% of it being underwater. Hhuumm, that congers up some images. Who came up with such a precise figure? I can see the surveyors now, Frick says “its actually 172,970 and 1/2 acres,” Frack barks back, “we get paid by the acre, round it up to 971!”

Millie at the visitors center

Anyhow, the park covers a vast area, it ranges from just south of Miami to Key Largo and extends out into the Atlantic about ten miles. The string of islands at its eastern edge are the northern most portion of the Florida Keys. A good bar room bet would be to the name of the northernmost of the Florida keys. Most would answer Key Largo, the correct answer is Elliott Key. 

tour boat to Boca Chita Key

On the parks western border Biscayne Bay melds into the mainland of Florida through 4825 acres of mangrove forests. This tidal mix of trees, shrubs and water are also part of the National Park. I read an interesting story about the one small beach in the mangroves. Back in the days of segregation, it was a “blacks only” beach. It existed as such until the 1960's. It is now the visitors center for the park and the departure point for our boat trip to Boca Chita Key.

Tourist looking for dolphins

The concessionaire who takes tourists out to the keys uses a large powered catamaran to traverse the shallow depths. The bay has an average depth of 10 feet with many dangerously shallow areas. On the way out the captain finds the resident pod of Dolphins and circles around them so the tourists can see and photograph them. The dolphins don't seem to mind and even ride the wake the tightly turning boat creates. I think there is a double standard going on here, if this was not a park service tour the boat would be confiscated and the caption manacled and displayed before the media for harassing the wildlife!

Wreck in Biscayne Bay

We also floated over the wreck of a sunken shrimp boat. Through the clear water we could clearly see several varieties of fish swimming about the old steel hulled boat. The captain said it was ten feet underwater. 

fake lighouse

Our destination was Boca Chita Key. The harbor and surrounding ruins were built when the property was privately owned. It is now maintained for boaters access to this portion of the park. The lighthouse was never functional and was built as a display when the area was a playground for the rich, circa 1930-s to 1940's.

Boca Chita harbor

I was surprised that the seaward side of the key did not have any surf, there must be a submerged reef offshore somewhere, but I couldn't see waves breaking anywhere on the horizon.

view from the lighthouse

More bar room trivia:

If you look at a map you will notice that Boca Chita Key and several other small islands are north of Elliott Key and I had said Elliot Key was the northernmost of the Florida Keys. Boca and the others are not true keys, instead being transitional islands.

This may lead you to query, what is the difference between a key and an island. A key is formed when an underwater reef grows to the surface of the water. An island can be formed in several ways, like a key it could have started as an underwater reef. Before it breached the surface wind and waves deposited sand on top of it, creating a transitional island. An island can also be created by sand deposited on the ocean floor, these become barrier islands, lots of these on the eastern coast of the USA. Lastly an island can be pushed to the surface through geographic forces like volcanoes (Hawaii) or shifting tectonic plates (the white cliffs of Dover in England).

There you have it, all you ever wanted to know about islands. Hope you win lots of bar bets. Millie and I enjoyed our day trip to Biscayne Bay National Park, next attraction for us is drag races at the Homestead NASCAR track on Friday night.

Miami skyline in the background

Millie and Larry after seeing their shadow on groundhog day and realizing they have to endure six more weeks of this weather!