Duck Hunt

Mattie and Ben's house is pondside and there are lots of Muscovy ducks that swim by, and often come ashore looking for a bite to eat.  They are very tame and, as we found, will eat bread right out of your hand.  They called their friends once food showed up, because the initial two ducks multiplied quickly to eight visitors.

Move-In Cleaning and Repairs

Mattie and Ben settled on their new house on Friday March 14th. The following day we set about cleaning and performing small repairs in preparation for their furniture which would be arriving Monday.  We also bought and assembled a grill and picnic table and had dinner on the screened lanai that evening.

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Cleaning out a completely clogged dryer vent line.

We also cleaned the garage, fixed broken towel bars, installed a new kitchen faucet, got cold water working in the kitchen, fixed a bad toilet flapper valve, programmed the garage keypad, sprayed for bugs and weeds, troubleshot cable TV and Internet, and are in the process of refinishing counter tops.

You play with gators you gonna get bit

We left Ft. Lauderdale and headed to Pembroke Pines to meet up with my sister and brother-in-law.  Ben found the Everglades Holiday Park swamp tour so we decided to check it out.  It was a great time and we got to see a gator show afterwards, home base of the "Gator Boys" from Animal Planet.  The Everglades are spectacular and this was a tour definitely worth every dollar.

The canals in the Everglades are completely man made, and controlled by a system of levees, dams, and pumps.  They range from 2-3 feet deep up to 25 feet deep, and the longest is about 50 miles long. They are teeming with wildlife ranging from alligators, snakes, iguanas, deer, and multiple types of birds.

Sport fishermen passing us in the canals.

 

Many of the gators will come right up to the boat when they hear it coming...depends on their mood.  They are actually quiet docile...unless they misinterpret you as food, or threatening its young.

The airboats are powered by twin Cadillac 500 cubic-inch V8 motors, 1970 vintage, for a total of 730 horsepower.  They hustle the boat along nicely. This was our first time on an airboat, and I see why they called them airboat "pilots"...there is a lot of slipping and skidding with rudder ("drifting" in auto parlance) these craft while operating at speed.

Mikael, was this photo taken in your basement?

Following the Everglades tour, they gave a short alligator show.  These are all gators that were captured in developed areas or had their behavior changed by being fed by humans, so they cannot be released into the wild again.

Check out the Gator Boys wrestling with the alligators. "You play with gators you gonna get bit!"

A little bit of Pittsburgh in Ft. Lauderdale

We left Vero Beach and headed south on A1A.  We stopped in Ft. Lauderdale for some serious  Yummmmmm!!!

This was the view of the ocean from our table.

I got a pizza and George got a Corned Beef and Cheese sandwich.