I had a handful of productive days meandering around Florida this past week.  It included some nice recycled gas stations, a wildlife-filled paddle on the Hillsborough River, a couple days with relatives, and an afternoon visiting with former high school classmates.

It was all accompanied by some very nice tunes from the playlist I’ve uploaded to my new music toy.  Yes, I am moving from CDs to an electronic music library.

First the florists.  There were two of them, Sara’s Flowers in Bartow and the Bonita Flower Shop in Dade City, both in well-kept classic designs.  A third recycled station rounded out the trip.  It was the Fashion Shop in Webster.  From the looks of the add-on drive through bank window on the right side, this is at least the second reuse for this nice former gas station.  You can see all my photos of recycled gas stations here.

My paddle on the Hillsborough was a bit spur of the moment and well worth it.  A friend down here from Connecticut went along.  We put in at the Morris Road Bridge in Thonotosassa and paddled upstream 4.5 miles to Sargeant Park.  It took us three hours for the upstream paddle and two for the return. It was a nice, leisurely paddle. We saw tons of alligators and so many birds that I was at the end of my bird-recognition knowledge.  The scenery was great; huge cypress trees with their magnificent knees and live oaks with their Spanish moss and air plants.

A note for the future:  It’s nine miles from Sargeant Park to the Trout Creek launch and doing a shuttle for the whole run would make a nice morning or afternoon paddle.

I also intended to paddle a small section of the Withlacoochie River up in Dade City on this trip, but the conditions at the launch I picked, on Route 575, were pretty lousy so I passed on it.  I need to research that one a bit more.

Photos are below.  Click on one for the slide show.  I’ve included some of John’s as well.

This trip also included a stop in North Fort Myers.  My cousin Peggy and husband winter there and they were being visited by son Brad and his family from Boston.  My brother Roger and wife filled out the crowd.  It was a nice, relaxed visit with folks I don’t get to see very often.

On the last day I stopped for an afternoon in The Villages for a mini high school reunion.  My high school class (1962) has been holding reunions back in Illinois regularly since graduation, thanks to the fine work of a core group of classmates.  I made it to the fifth and the fiftieth.  In recent years there have also been smaller gatherings in Florida amongst those of us who live/visit here.  I’ve enjoyed renewing those contacts.  We all grew up to be pretty decent folks!

And finally, my new music toy.  I’ve had to change my music formats because a lot of new cars these days don’t have CD players.  I’m getting to the point of wanting/needing a new one, having put my normal ten years and 250,000 miles on the present one.

My daughter recently bought a new car and it didn’t come with a CD player.  Oops.  I wouldn’t have road trip music without a CD player.  What to do for the future?

My decades-old and largely unused ipod couldn’t be resuscitated and I don’t want to use my phone for music.  So I started poking around and found that ipod-like devices are cheap and plentiful, so for $35 I got a nice one that’s Bluetooth capable.

Then came the fun part:  Poking around for all the music I wanted on my playlist.  I have about 24 hours’ worth  loaded up.  It includes the best from all the CDs of course and way more.  I made the list public on Spotify if you’re interested.  It’s called Road Music.   There are several with that name so look for the one By Ron.

Happy listening!