Howell Creek is a Central Florida waterway that starts in Lake Maitland in Winter Park and runs into Lake Jessup in Winter Springs. It mainly runs through suburban neighborhoods, but there is a lovely natural area surrounding Howell Creek as it approaches lake Jessup. This can be seen along the Cross Seminole Trail, namely from the Howell Creek Trestle. This old railroad bridge provides nice views of the creek.
This blog was almost abandoned, but I'm resurrecting it for now! In over two decades of living in Florida and countless visits to St. Augustine, starting with school field trips and then trips on my own, I had never been to the St. Augustine Lighthouse. Visible from downtown, the St. Augustine Light is located on Anastasia Island and was built in 1874.
Train spotting is fun. Decided to get out my camera when I saw this Amtrak approaching Candyland Park in Longwood. Pretty soon we will be seeing commuter trains running along these same tracks!
A few months ago I visited the Coral Castle while down in South Florida. It's a really interesting place where a large structure was constructed using locally quarried rock, supposedly by a single man. The short version of the story goes that a man named Edward Leedskalnin was set to get married. He ended up being ditched, and moved to Florida to build a stone tribute to win back his long lost love.
Multiply that admission price by 100 to get closer to the current admission.
The most recognizable scene from Coral Castle are these giant carvings of various astronomical bodies (or astrological, depending on what the tour guide says).
Edward Leedskalnin must have had a thing for astronomy with his moons and planets. He also built what is now being called a telescope. If I remember correctly, it points to Polaris.
And a working sundial. It was just after 3 when I took the picture.
The original name of the Coral Castle was Rock Gate Park. This is the namesake rock gate. The large rock was originally so perfectly balanced on it's pivot that it could easily be spun. Eventually it stopped working and the group of civil engineers that came to fix the gate were 'baffled' at it's workings and weren't able to get it to it's previous condition.
There was a well which also served as a refrigerator.
An oven out of car parts.
I drove out to Port Canaveral to watch the Delta IV rocket launch on November 21, 2010. With the weather, I really didn't think it was going to go, but it did indeed launch. The rocket wasn't in view for long before disappearing into clouds, but it was still very nice. It really is thrilling to watch these incredible feats of engineering fly, especially as close as I was (7 miles). I also think I found a new favorite spot to watch the launches!
Space Shuttle Discovery launched at 6:21am on April 5, 2010. It was definitely one of the coolest launches I've ever seen in a while. The shuttle formed a noctilucent cloud in it's contrail, then about 3.5 minutes in, it did this cool thing where what could be described as a wake or an aura formed around the shuttle as it started to dip below the horizon. At about 5 minutes, the sound waves finally hit and a faint rumbling could be heard...
Only three more launches of this awesomeness!
On February 11, 2010, the Solar Dynamics Observatory launched on an Atlas V Rocket. I attepted to watch the launch from my front yard, but there were too many clouds between where I was and the coast to get a good view. I was able to see the rocket for about five seconds through a hole in the clouds, but that was about it.
Being closer to the launch apparently provided an awesome show. Turn the video to 720p and turn on full screen. Wait until about two minutes in when the rocket is about to pass through the sun dog, and then the rocket goes supersonic while passing through the ice particles in the air. I've never seen anything quite like this!
One night while driving through Lakeland, I came across this great spinning neon sign, if you want to even call it a sign. Perhaps spinning neon object would be more appropriate. It was in a car dealer parking lot and was very mesmerizing to watch. The next time I was driving at night through Lakeland, I was disappointed to see they didn't have the spinning illuminated starburst on a pole turned on...
I had forgotten how much fun ice skating is! I find all of the outdoor ice skating rinks that pop up every winter all over Central Florida to be kind of funny. It's typically too warm for the ice to stay properly frozen, so there ends up being a puddle of water on half the rink. For example, this was the case at the rink set up at the University of Central Florida seen in the video below:
I went for a ride on the cable cars at the Daytona Beach Pier. It's an expensive ride for what it is, and it's a bit scary, especially when you look at all of the rusted metal bits on the ride from all of the exposure to the salty air. I enjoyed my ride though:
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