This post isn’t about biking, but it was a great experience I had because of the bike trip. A good friend from Menomonee Falls East High School, class of 1971, moved to Florida soon after high school & has made his home here. We visited him maybe 20 years ago when we made a family trip down here, but haven’t kept in touch much since then. When I knew where this bike adventure was taking me, I reached out to him & discovered he lives close to where we were having our off day. Here’s a selfie of Tom & I.
Tom & his wife Sandy picked me up from our hotel last night & we had a wonderful evening of dinner, drinks, ping pong & great conversation. Unfortunately I neglected to get a picture with Sandy because she is much more photogenic than us two old guys.
I stayed at their house last night, which is a real upgrade from our typical hotel room, slept in a little this morning, and then Tom took me out on his airboat. Here’s Captain Tom at the helm.
I have never been in an airboat before & it is an experience I recommend you take advantage of if you ever have the opportunity. We were in the Inverness, FL area & if you look at a map, you will see the hundreds of lakes all around. This is different than the sand beaches of the gulf that we have seen so far, but it was very cool to ride through the different cypress groves and natural habitat.
At one point Tom was weaving slowly through some trees headed toward shore, then had the boat pull us right up onto land. He turned the boat around & shut it down. “Let’s have lunch”, he said. The parking area would hold multiple airboats & there was a restaurant right there.
Definitely have to come back down here for an extended visit.
Back on the bike tomorrow for what they say is our hardest day riding for the whole trip. I’m ready for it after a day’s rest.