From St. Pete‘s we continued creeping north in Florida, waiting for warmer weather before leaving the state all together.
First stop, Sparcia Witherell Family Winter and Vineyards, a Harvest Host. We had no idea until we arrived that the winery was hosting a popular-with-locals folk festival called “Foggy Longbritches”! After handing over the $20 entry fee, the gatekeeper sent us up the hill where multiple RVs were randomly parked like a highway pileup during a blizzard and she told us to pack in tight, as they’d already had one van stuck in the mud this morning from last night’s rain. We weren’t thrilled with the parking situation, especially since more rain was on the way, but we had no plan B.
The good news is that the wine and beer were flowing at the festival, food was available from food trucks, the bands were decent (or maybe that was the wine), and watching the locals was highly entertaining!
We’d nearly forgotten the awkward parking situation until we were back in the RV and realized the cackling group next to us was running loud commercial generator to power lights. This enabled them to continue playing cornhole late into the night / early morning. Between the drunken outbursts, the loud generator, and bags occasionally hitting the back of our RV, it was not the night we’d hoped for…but we did get a kick out of this van that said “Slow car, fast house” and it’s often these travel moments that stick with us most.
A Foggy Longbritches Festival Band.
The following morning we drove to Inverness. We carried the bugs under our eyes down the Cooter Pond Boardwalk Trail. This name made me giggle as my brother has been known to tell you in a fight to throw a “cooter kick”. You can imagine my surprise when the signboard noted “Cooters are often seen basking on logs or floating vegetation, sliding into the water at the first sign of disturbance. Females reach a maximum length of 15 inches; males are somewhat smaller.” Wait. What? It turns out a Cooter is a river turtle, typically with a brown shell and yellow stripes on its head, so this sign wasn’t nearly as disturbing as I’d originally thought!
We saw a few Cooters from the raised boardwalk trail as well as some alligators, which having been in Florida for many weeks now, we weren’t as impressed with.
We also met a couple with a dog, who called their dog harness a sports bra. I’m not sure I will ever think of the harness as anything else now.
Downtown Inverness was very small, but its one sports bar sufficed to watch some football. The town also had a popular, but extremely flat, cycling trail, which we had fun riding the following day.
The Holder Mine Campground nearby had a short trail to a small cave. We rode part way and then hiked the last few hundred yards. All over the area were mid-sized sand mounds that Doug later discovered were made by pocket gophers. We never saw one.
What was more exciting than the cave was the DJ, light show, and birthday party gathering at the campground that evening. Haven’t seen that at any campground.
Campground Birthday Party
The Foggy Longbritches Festival, my Cooter education, and a campground DJ made for an unusual three days of RV travel. I guess it’s true what they say, travel really does expand your horizons.
