Snakes, Cards and Super Bowl Party!

Weekends have been rainy here lately but we’ve kept ourselves busy. Sunday we took a laundry and shopping day. We got an early start on the laundry in the event someone else had the same idea. I try to help with the laundry but usually make more work than necessary or fold “the wrong way” but, I try.  The laundry building we use has an exercise room and lounge area you can utilize while you wait.

After laundry, we ate an early lunch and drove down to PCB (Panama City Beach) to do some shopping. There’s no shortage of department stores, specialty shops, restaurants so, whatever you need, you’ll find it. On our way, we stopped by the South Walton Sports Complex to check

out the pickleball courts. The facility caters to all types of outdoor sports and has four pickleball courts. They’re very nice with lighting for evening play. Open play is from 7-11 and 5-9 otherwise, you have to reserve a court. The courts are about 20 minutes away, the closest we could find and, considering we’re novices, we’d like to have them all to ourselves so we can practice. Pickleball is a serious sport for many and you’ll see a majority our age and higher enjoying the sport. It’s attractive to us because the court is smaller than a tennis court which translates into less running around. The ball is more like wiffle ball which also slows down the action, a little. Some folks are quite competitive and aggressive which is a little intimidating for us. We don’t want to get out there and keep hitting the ball into their court, they might ban us from the sport. 😉  Ideally, we’d like to visit when it’s quiet and learn to master the game in our own time.

We went on two hikes this week. One didn’t pan out. We use the AllTrails app and have had good success with it. You can find hikes wherever your located. It includes a description, directions to the trailhead, reviews and photos to help us decide which hike we want to take. We selected the Florida Trail: Nokuse and Pine Log to Eglin, it’s 19 miles long but we know we’ll only go as far as we feel up to, then head back. Mag and I both have the App installed on our phones and for some strange reason, directions to the trailhead on hers is pointing us to the far end near Eglin 20 miles away and mine is pointing us to the trailhead 10 miles away. We elected for the far end of the trail and it didn’t quite work out as planned. We exited off route 10 and backtracked a couple miles then, crossed over railroad tracks which led us to the trailhead. The GPS map is instructing us to take a left down what appears to be a newly grated dirt/sandy road and we can actually see a giant roller machine, in addition to, a dump truck with lots of wheels like you’d see at a mining facility; it was giant! We pass by the left turn because we’re thinking, this can’t be right but, after driving a little further we turn around. Back at the turn there are two flagmen. Why two we don’t know but we ask first if there is a trail down there and second, can we drive down there. The younger responds, “There might be a trail down there,” and “yeah, you can drive on it.” We head down, passing the roller machine cautiously and get to where the trailhead should be but it’s just more of the same. Nature was calling so, since we were the only two knuckleheads driving out here except for the work vehicles, we get out for a minute then decided to head back toward Freeport.

We don’t know much about Eglin Airforce Base but I think it’s where they do a lot of testing of aircraft and ordinance because, at times, you can hear explosions which, believe it our not, rattle our trailer pretty good. It’s a real wakeup call to what it feels like in the midst of battle. There weren’t any explosions during our time up there but last year when we first experienced the concussive blast, it was quite alarming.

A second hike was very nice.  There were many trails inside the Panama City Beach Conservation Park and you can pick one, or a combination of trails, to suit your desire.  We picked a combination of trails; the Osprey and Longleaf trails we found in the AllTrails App which is 6.8 miles long.  The orange trail which travels the outer perimeter of the park is a total of 9.5 miles according to the park map.  We’re planning on coming back to do the outer perimeter one day but we’ll need to get a earlier start.   It was a very nice park, the trials were very well marked, it was very clean, with trails wide enough to easily accommodate both hikers and bikers.  On the initial section of the Osprey trail, we noticed these curious boxes mounted on posts every 100 yards, or so.  We never found out what they were but guessed they were for birds to nest in but, if anyone knows, please share your comments at the end of this post.  

As we hike we try to take in the beauty and we don’t always see what’s right in front of us.  About a mile in, Mag spots a red painted rock sitting atop of a sign post.  I’m oblivious to why it’s there but Mag knows and picks up the rock, examines it, turns it over to find a note with instructions.  After one finds one of these colorful rocks, you are supposed to post at a FB group, tag @ the painter, note where you found it then, place it in a new spot for someone else to find.

Around the 2 mile mark, we nearly step on a snake!  Yikes!  Mag gets in close for a photo and the little creature takes notice.  While she is looking through the lens finder so to speak, I can see the baby snake raise it’s tale and shake it.  I warn her to be careful but I also think the little thing isn’t much of a threat and probably couldn’t break the skin it’s so small.  If it had a rattle, it didn’t emit any warning sound we could detect and we’re not sure what type of snake it was or even if it was venomous.  Denise (Mag sister) thought it could be a Pigmy rattlesnake.  If anyone else can ID this juvenile snake, help us with a comment below.  Some other wildlife that enjoys the park are, of course birds and alligators, in addition to, black bears, wild boar, deer, bobcat, Florida cottonmouth (venomous), turkey, turtles and more.  We didn’t see any other wildlife during our hike but we look forward to heading back to investigate further.

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