Highlands Hammock State Park

Today started with a pancake all-you-could eat breakfast at 8:00am, followed by a scavenger hunt from 9:15am to 11:30am. At 1:30pm we drove to Highlands Hammock State Park for a 2:30pm tram ride through the park. The tram is great because you get to see things where where the general public is forbidden, and only they tram and park rangers are allowed to go. After the tram ride, we got to walk the Alexander Blair Big Oak Trail and see the Big Oak tree.

I dare you to come any closer!

Turtles, turtles everywhere!

At more than 1000 years old, this giant Live Oak measures 36 feet around the trunk of the tree.

Florida's Natural & A Boat Ride

We went on our nature hike this morning, and found this gecko with a tasty treat in his mouth.

We have been enjoying the smell of citrus in the air the whole time we’ve been here. When we wake up in the morning or every time we walk out of a building, we smell the oranges.

So today we decided to tour Florida’s Natural headquarters in Lake Wales. Florida's Natural Growers is a cooperative of citrus growers who own their own groves in the heart of central Florida, located along US-27. They are one of the largest organizations of growers and producers, with a membership base of 12 grower associations. The entire cooperative is made up of more than 1,000 grower members who own more than 50,000 acres of citrus groves. We liked sampling all the Florida’s Natural brand juice we could drink.

Abundant sunshine and an 87 degree temperature provided an evening with perfect weather to go for a ride on our friend's boat.

We rode on three huge lakes connected by channels, starting at our RV Resort on the upper right hand part of the lake on the right.

Today Was Fun

What a beautiful morning for a nature walk, and did we get an opportunity to view many interesting things. All these pictures were taken along our Jackson Creek shore line.

Two gators enjoying the warm weather.

Great Blue Heron on a boat.

Little Blue Heron on a drain pipe.

Big turtle on the shore.

The only adventure left for us to check off the list was to spend the day at the beach, and we got to do just that yesterday by driving to Clearwater Beach. We also enjoyed a great lunch with live entertainment outside at the Palm Pavilion Beachside Bar & Grill. On the way home we stopped at the famous Lazydays RV SuperCenter. If you own an RV, stopping at Ladydays is a must. This place is the benchmark of what every RV store should aspire to be.