State Park and Sunset Cruise

Once again I was up with roosters. We took our time getting ready and enjoyed another great breakfast by the pool and met up with the gang at 10:00 to walk to Fort Zachary Taylor Historic State Park. On the way we stopped by the US Coast Guard Cutter Ingham (now a museum) for a geocache. Brandon really did want to do one geocache while we were here so joined in the hunt and he was the one who came up with the find. It was a great cache to drop a travel bug I had picked up in Hawaii back in August. I was happy when I checked today to see that the bug has already been picked up.

From here I dragged the group to another cache nearby at the Eco-Discovery Center. Kristin found this one which was just a trackable coin with a log that said to please leave the coin. I never saw a cache quite like that before. The funny thing about these two caches is that we were literally within a hundred feet of both the caches on the bike tour yesterday.

Next up was the State Park. There was a small fee to get in, but the nice attendant charged us the cheaper car rate versus the per person walk-in rate. The savings totaled $.80/person. LoL Kristin and I headed for another cache while Tom and Brandon went on the ranger guided tour of the fort and Leah went to look for birds. Again the GPS had me bouncing but I expanded the search and came up with the find. We headed into the fort and spied the boys across the field. I went to meet back up with them while Kristin went to meet back up with Leah. By the time I met up with the boys they had their fill of the ranger tour and so we headed towards the beach to meet up with Kristin and Leah. At the beach Kristin, Leah, and I walked the very short beach with Kristin and I looking for treasure and Leah looking for birds. On the walk back down the beach Kristin joined Brandon who was sitting on the beach. I spotted Tom sitting at a picnic table in the shade doing what he loves best (watching WordPress training videos). Leah and I continued our walk around the corner. The beach became less beachy, but I was determined to go until I couldn’t go any further. Leah eventually peeled off to go hunt down more birds in the park. The remainder of the beach wasn’t far, but I did find a couple pieces of sea glass and a nice side chunk of a Coke bottle. The glass wasn’t super smooth but it was still a cool find!

As I was heading back up to meet with the rest of the group I got a text from Kristin saying they were going to Uber back and asked if we want to join them. Leah said no thanks, as did I. I did track them down however to grab my purse before they took off. So Tom, Brandon and Kristin headed back to the hotel while I met up with Leah to join her birding. We found a few and I was able to use that expensive Picture Bird app I had accidentally bought in Panama for a couple. When we felt we had covered every trail in the park we decided it was time to go. I took Leah on a couple of more geocaches and laughed that once again as we took almost the same route as we had on the bike tour.

On the walk back we stopped in a souvenir shop for Leah to make her final decision on a Christmas ornament (both her and I were having a hard time finding the exact “right” one. There were plenty to choose from and I ended up purchasing mine on the way to the park after an extensive search over the last couple of days). We also stopped at Kermits so I could buy another piece of Key Lime Pie. I took it back to the Inn so that I could share it with Tom later. When we got back I found Tom napping so I took my computer out to our patio so I could read my book.

At 3:00 Tom and I met up with Brandon and Kristin to head to our snorkeling sunset excursion. We got all checked in and waited to board the catamaran. After we had been waiting for 15 minutes or so, a representative from the company came out and announced that the excursion had been cancelled due to conditions. At first I thought she may be joking as it didn’t seem like bad conditions, but we soon realized that it was no joke. We waited in line with everyone else to see what our options were. Since we were leaving the next day, re-booking for another time wasn’t an option. Thankfully there was a sunset cruise leaving in an hour that we could join. That excursion typically costs $10 more, but since the company is the one that cancelled we didn’t have to pay the difference. The meeting location for that cruise was a 15 minute walk so we got moving. Turns out we had plenty of time because we stood around for what felt like forever before we got to board the catamaran. Thankfully they were taking 2 catamaran’s out because there was a ton of people waiting. There was a group that seemed super loud and annoying so we made sure to watch them board first and then strategically waited for the second catamaran to open up. Such a good choice!

Although it was somewhat cloudy and not the most perfect conditions for an amazing sunset, it was still great none-the-less. The cruise came with unlimited margaritas or beer, appetizers and live music. I was actually impressed with the appetizers of a veggie tray, crackers, hummus, shrimp, tortilla roll-up sandwiches, etc. There was plenty to go around and they certainly didn’t run out even though we went back for multiple servings!! We were super happy with the excursion and admitted that if we had snorkeled first we probably would have been chilled the rest of the boat ride so we’re glad we didn’t end up snorkeling.

After the excursion we bar hopped our way back down Duval. We had a good time at Sloppy Joes talking to the people around us at the bar. At Willie T’s we shared a plate of chicken nachos before Brandon and Kristin headed back to the hotel. Tom and I weren’t quite done with the evening and went to a couple more bars before we headed back at 11:00.

Stats of the Day

Steps: 24,230
Geocaches: 5
Pieces of Sea Glass: 9