To Monticello, FL

Submitted by Ben on Mon, 02/14/2005 - 18:42

I packed up in Dan's house this morning and arrived at his coffee shop just after it opened.  Dan's car was parked out front, and the barista confirmed that he was sleeping there.  I checked my e-mail over coffee and then biked to the UU church.

I went to church today looking for Alex, not for freebies, but the members insisted I share their potluck lunch.  One of them offered me a room for the night as well, but I said I was headed out of town immediately.  No one remembered having seen Alex.

I stopped in at a food co-op on my way out of town, following what my map showed as a bike route out of town.  I got out my phone to make some calls and found a message from a cousin-once-removed inviting me to stay at her house north of Tallahassee... had I picked up the message while I was still in town, I would definitely have gone to catch up with her, but I was already about 15 miles east, so we settled for a phone conversation.

Away from the beaches, Florida has actual soil instead of sand, and the bayous look more like the ones in Louisiana and Mississippi: lots of cypress trees standing around in puddles with their knees sticking up.  Cypresses grow their roots in a shallow circle around the trunk, and when they fall over (e.g. in a hurricane) their circle of roots tips up in the air, just exactly like the base of a wine glass.

I stopped for the night at a KOA that turned out to be the most luxurious campground I've seen in months... it has a beautiful, cozy game room, a homey feeling shower house, and complimentary continental breakfast and afternoon tea!  Wild.