Hungry Squrrel...

Return to Ginger Ale Springs...

I wrote about Ginger Ale Springs here previously. It is a small natural spring in Longwood, Florida that was possibly used in a Ginger Ale bottling plant, hence the name. Very few people seem to know about it even though it is just a few meters from the road.

Recently I returned to Ginger Ale Springs to see if anything changed from my last visit. Stuff did change. Much of the foliage between the spring and the road has been trimmed back. There were no longer any ginger plants along the path leading up to the spring either. Much of the random junk that surrounded the spring pool also disappeared. The Virgin Mary and the Barbie Dolls in the trees are all gone.

It seems like all of this has been replaced though with a new collection of junk around the spring. I spotted a decorated CD, an angel up in a palm tree, and flower pots...



The flower pot is sort of perplexing, trying to grow domesticated plants in a jungle-like environment. Whoever puts all of this junk around the spring must be tenacious to have replaced the old collection of junk with a new collection rather quickly.

As for the spring itself, not much has changed. It's still flowing strong. The guppys are still there. The water still smells. All is good...




I also came across this response to the original video that I posted on Youtube of Ginger Ale Springs that somebody made. By the look of it and the clear view of cars passing by, this was filmed after the trees around the spring were cleaned up and trimmed...

Storm Bats...

Several bats were flying around yesterday evening as a big storm was approaching. I'm not sure what type of bats they were. I don't really know how to identify bats by their silhouettes as they swoop by eating mosquitoes...

Lunar Eclipse: February 20, 2008

On February 20, 2008, in Florida as well as many other parts of the world there was a total lunar eclipse. The eclipse started at 8:43 pm and was initially covered by clouds where I was watching. By the time the moon was totally covered by the shadow of the earth at 10:01 pm, the sky was clear providing an excellent view. The moon turned a nice red color in the shadow, and soon enough the earth's shadow began to recede. A little after midnight, the full moon was free from shadow and back to it's normal self!

Here are some pictures I took of the eclipse:

I took some video of the eclipse by leaving my video camera on a tripod with it's full exposure open and auto-focus turned off. I took two segments of footage, one between 9:45 and 10:15 when the moon was approaching it's full eclipse and another segment between 11:45 and 12:15 as the moon returned to normal.

It's amazing how fast the earth and the moon move in relation to one another when you are trying to track the moon with a stationary object. Every time you see the moon drift off of the picture in the videos is not due to the camera moving. The videos were sped up to 3 times their original speed.

Feb 20, 2008- 9:45pm-10:15pm


Feb 20, 2008- 11:45pm-12:15pm


The next one comes in 2010!