Chapter 10: Oscar Scherer State Park—Part 2 (Feb. 15-18)

By Wednesday the weather had become just about perfect. The night temperature was about 60°, great for sleeping with the windows open. Daytime temperatures were in the upper 70s and the skies were clear and sunny. It was nice enough that Marv cooked a great breakfast of pancakes and bacon outdoors (I LOVE the smell of bacon cooking when camping, but it smells pretty bad after a few hours inside the camper) and we enjoyed it outside at our little folding table. Mosquitoes are not the big problem here that they were at Collier-Seminole. A nice Rail-to-Trail called the Legacy Trail runs through the park for about two miles as it connects Sarasota to Venice. By about 11:00 we were peddling south on it, to the historic, restored Train Depot in Venice. We went a little beyond the depot on the Venice Waterway Trail and then returned to have a tour of the Depot. We learned a lot of the history of the area and its original settlers/developers, including Bertha Palmer, widow of the Palmer who built The Palmer House in Chicago. He was older than she by many years and so she was in the prime of her life when he died, leaving her a very wealthy woman. She was a business woman in her own right and went on to make more money. She could see the great potential for this area of Florida and went about procuring land and getting the railroad expanded to service the area thus allowing it to be developed as a resort community. The Depot made a nice break in our bike ride. The Trail also has interpretive markers all along that tell about the history and the natural features, so it was a good learning experience. It is paved the whole way and has short bridges over two “bays” or estuaries and a high, high bridge that goes over the Tamiami Trail (US41) and was the biggest challenge of the day. We got back to the campsite about 2:00 having ridden 13½ miles. The rest of the afternoon was for relaxing and recovering, although Marv also managed to rearrange the back of the truck and the back seat to make room for Louise Sternberg to join us on Thursday. Since we had a late lunch we decided to drive over to watch our first sunset. We ended up going north and dropping south on Casey Key driving past incredible, palatial homes right on the water until we came to Nokomis Beach. We parked and ran over in time for a nice sunset and had the bonus of being where a drumming circle is held, complete with belly dancers, to “drum down” the sun each Wednesday and Saturday. The drums went faster and faster until the sun dropped behind the horizon and then things began to break up and we left. At the campsite we had dinner and then had to wash nearly every dish we own! We did some banking and blogging and then called it a night.

Fresh from her trip to Peru, Louise Sternberg met us at the Thursday morning Blueberry pancake breakfast at Oscar Scherer. She then parked her car at our campsite and we all climbed in the truck to drive to Myakka River State Park, about half an hour away. We started with a couple of five minute introductory videos at the Visitors Center. Afterwards we drove the very scenic park road to the “Bird Walk”, a short boardwalk that goes over the marsh almost to the edge of Upper Lake Myakka. There was a Naturalist with a viewing scope there who helped us see and identify some of the birds. We saw stilts, great blue herons, egrets, ibis, coots, blue winged teals, osprey, bald eagles, white pelicans, and sandhill cranes. We returned to the road and took it to the north gate before turning around and slowly retraced our route. Along the way I realized I had gotten a couple of texts from Rachel & then Janis telling us that Rachel and Michael were at the hospital and that Baby Michael was on his way. On the way back we stopped at the Canopy Walk. Louise stayed in the truck and rested while Marv & I climbed up to the short, swinging, walk at treetop level. At the other end, we climbed up the 74 foot tower to look over the park area. It was a great view from up there! We found a picnic area along a small creek nearby and enjoyed our picnic lunch there before driving to a bridge overlook where we saw two alligators sunning at the edge of the river and two in the water. Although we had only touched on all this park offers, the afternoon was waning so we drove back to get orange ice cream at Louise’s favorite orange stand and then returned to Oscar Scherer. We stopped at the Camper’s Bluegrass “Jam” at the Nature Center to listen to one song and, as we were leaving, I noticed a large gopher tortoise at the end of the field. Marv got some pictures from afar. When we tried to get closer the tortoise scurried into the brush and disappeared. But we were happy to have seen one! Louise left in her car and, after she had gone, I saw on Facebook that Michael Louis Savage Bednarz was born within about an hour of Rachel’s text! I was so happy for the good news, but also sad that Rick wasn’t here to welcome his first grandchild. He would have been so pleased and proud! A bit later we called long ago Edgewood UCC friends, Linda VanderVeen and her husband, Harold DeVor. Her daughter Lisa had seen my sunset picture on Facebook and put us in touch with them. We were surprised and pleased when Linda suggested that we pick up a pizza and come to their house to watch MSU/Wisconsin Basketball. It was so nice to catch up on them since they have moved to Florida full-time and it was even nicer that MSU won the game. What a perfect ending to a very good day!

Friday didn’t go quite as we planned but it was pleasant, too. Marv made bacon and eggs outside while I made toast and a fruit cup. So we had a big, late breakfast and didn’t plan to do much for lunch. We packed up just a light snack and headed over to Louise’s place on Siesta Key. Her plans for the day had fallen through and so we decided to spend the day together. Marv and I walked on the white, powdery sand and looked for shells and read for about an hour. Then Louise drove us around to show us a few of her favorite haunts. We found a new vegetarian+seafood restaurant and ended up taking her out for an early Birthday celebration. The food was very good, cooked by the couple who owns the restaurant, and served by their son. Marv had a portabella mushroom “burger”, Louise had a blackened basa (fish) sandwich on foccacia bread that was really big, and I had a “mezze” plate of baba ganoush, hummus, tabbouleh, olives and pita triangles. Louise and I both ate only half and had another lunch to eat sometime. When we were finished we drove to see Louise’s Florida church, Congregational UCC in Sarasota. On the way she showed us the Amish section of town and we went to Troyer’s Amish Bakery to buy bread and pastries. Seeing an Amish neighborhood in the middle of a modern city is a bit disconcerting and one wonders how they manage to live their faith in such a divergent setting. The Congregational Church was nearby. We went in to see the sanctuary, which is lined with big picture windows, so it is very bright and pleasant. She also showed us the Chapel, one whole wall of which is a stained glass scene of the shore, land, ocean and sky. It is breathtaking!! Louise then drove us back to her place by entering Siesta Key at the north end and going all the way to Turtle Beach at the south end. It was strange to see how coarse the sand was at Turtle Beach, just a mile or so from the sugar sand of Siesta Beach, which was voted the US #1 Beach (signs everywhere told us so!). By then it was time to go back to our camper, where Marv grilled steak and I made a salad and black beans and rice mixture. Before doing the dishes we got a lot of things packed up and ready to leave tomorrow, in case the rain that is forecast comes in overnight. It will be sad to say good-bye to this wonderful Park, but we have lots of other places to see in the next few weeks.