Panama City Beach, Florida

Wednesday, July 23, 2014


Who in their right mind would drive 475 miles to one of Florida's premier beaches and only stay two days?  The answer is...we would!  This was a last minute trip to see Kristi (daughter) and Sean (Grandson), and we were lucky to get two nights at St Andrews State Park in Panama City Beach Florida with such short notice.

St Andrews is one of Florida's most popular state parks.  The park boasts sugar white sandy beaches on the Gulf of Mexico, sugar white sandy beaches on the Grand Lagoon, camping, swimming, snorkeling, scuba diving, kayaking, canoeing, and you might even get to see a few gators in the swamp!  It is located on the far southern end of Panama City Beach and lies just north of Shell Island.  Shell Island is only accessible by water and has no facilities, but we didn't make the short boat trip this time.

Kristi and Sean

Site 107 was much easier to get into than the site we had the last time we were here in our 5th wheel.  You can view that blog date April 6, 2014 by clicking on 2013 in the left column. Most of the sites are small but private with natural growth on three sides.  This time, we are across the street from the Grand Lagoon.

Here's a couple of shots from near our site looking across the Grand Lagoon.

This was taken from the Gulf Beach looking north towards Panama City Beach.

A storm a few days earlier washed up a bunch of sea weeds on the beach.  In a few days, most of that will be gone.

This is one of several board walks that connect the Gulf Beaches to the Grand Lagoon Beaches.  You can see the Grand Lagoon and a small strip of Shell Island in the background.

The Grand Lagoon Beaches.

This boat is heading out of the Grand Lagoon and into the Gulf through a canal built by the US Army Corp of engineers.

 A 12 foot alligator rules this small lake.  However, he was camera shy today so I wasn't able to get a picture of his smiling face.

No doubt several of his cousins live in this swamp across the street from the lake.

I fully expected some giant swamp creature to pop out while taking this picture.  No such luck today!  Or, perhaps it was my lucky day!

We enjoyed our time with Kristi, Sean, and their friends.  We cooked some burgers for all at our camp site and spent some time together on the beach.  But, now it's time to head home and get ready for our next trip to Florida's gulf coast.  Stay tuned, our next adventure starts in just a few days.

Florida Oceanographic Society on Hutchinson Island, Florida

Monday, July 21, 2014



The Florida Oceanographic Society has a 57 acre marine life center that is dedicated to research and teaching about the water environment that we live in here in Florida.  The center has 4300 species of plants and animals and is located on Hutchinson Island just off the coast of Stuart, Florida. There are many interesting exhibits and aquarium inside, and the game fish, stingrays, and sea turtles are outside.

Here's Kitty and me as we get started on the tour.

Our first stop was at the 10,000 gallon stingray tank where they let you actually feed the stingrays. Kids and adults had a great time feeding and touching the stingrays like this guy in the picture below.  Their barbs have been removed so they can't sting you even if they don't like what you're feeding them! 

I think he's waving at me!

This guy likes to lay on the bottom and people watch!

Smile for the camera!

We headed to the sea turtle exhibit, and passed the game fish lagoon on the way.

I couldn't get any good pictures at the sea turtle display because the sun was reflecting off the water making it difficult to get a good picture.  But, we did get to see a rather large sea turtle enjoying his new home after being rescued from a fishing net.

Well, the sun is getting hotter and our stomachs are telling us it's getting close to lunch time.  We enjoyed the oceanographic center and even us ole timers learned a thing or two while we were there. It's a great place for the whole family with things to see and do for people of all ages.

Did someone say Cracker Barrel?