Orlando area

We've been in the Orlando area for almost two weeks now and haven't done a whole lot other then biking around.  We're right near the West Orange Bicycle Trail so we've been getting in 10-18 miles a day, The trail takes you right through Winter Garden so we've spent quite a bit of time around there, they seem to have something going every weekend.

Today it was tobogganing, yes with real snow, they closed of one of the downtown streets and made a ramp then covered it with a big snow making machine.

 

Not the biggest in the world but the kids loved it.  It was in the mid 70's today.

In the middle of the bike trail they put up the Christmas tree, during the rest of the year there is a beautiful fountain located here.

The other end of the trail in downtown.

And out on the bike trail right near a high school Cathy spotted this.

About ten feet above the path.

While driving around Orlando we managed to find my Grandparents house, they moved down here in the 40's.

This is of my 4 brothers, taken a few years before I was born.  Not a lot of difference in the house

And then we stumbled on this, except we didn't find any Palm's buried here.

Landmark Park, Dothan Alabama

About three miles from the gardens is the Dothan  Landmark Park

The Agriculture Museum part is closed due to lack of funding but the other building were open to explore.  We spent about an hour here, there is a nature center in the woods and about a mile of trails.

Petting zoo area

Bees on the sugar cane press

School group all dress in period costume, working

Just an old wagon, I liked the faded coloring

Front doors of the church

General store

Dothan Botanical Gardens

Since I'm trying to get back into the blog mode I figured I might as well add a few other things we did on the way south this year.

Dothan Alabama Botanical Gardens

It was after Halloween but then still had all the scary decoration up through out the garden, these were put up by various businesses and groups from the area.  Here are some of the better ones.

Phantom

Warhol

This was back in the woods and made us step it up a bit

Neil Armstrong

What Happens to a Michigan Fan
in ALABAMA

Picasso

Scary Guy

Over by the Wedding Chapel area the have a gate covered with locks.

 Some of the Locks on the gate

  

Almost forgot that this was a garden so here's a few pictures.

A Lot of Catching Up

After a summer in Michigan we're ready to get back on the move. We got a late start,Sept 3^rd, since we were busy attending volleyball and football games. We would have liked to stay for the full seasons but it was just getting to cold. We spent the first couple of weeks hitting some of our old haunts and doing a few of our favorite things, a week in Crossville,TN , a few days in Chattanooga and Huntsville,ALA.

We spent one nice sunny day walking around the Huntsville Botanical Garden, the flowers were beautiful and the gardens was decorated for Halloween, a few pictures below.

flower Pot House

Then we planned on about an hour visit to the Huntsville Veterans Museum, well we planned an hour because it was on the small side but we ended up spending close to 3 ½ hours there. My main reason for wanting to go there was that I noticed on their web page that they had on display the very first Ford prototype Jeep, serial number 00001. This was the handmade model that they sent to the army to test, there were a few made but this is the only one remaining, for some reason they were able to buy it from the Henry Ford Museum. This would have never happened if Henry the 1^st was still around. But as it turned out the highlight was that we met a man who worked with Von Braun, right from the start right up to the moon missions AND BEYOND. We spent more then an hour talking with him and hearing his stories about the different behind the scene things that happened in the space program.

Bob cat

And then down to Montgomery, ALA for a week. Our first stop was at the Montgomery Zoo, we were probably 2 of 100 people there today so it was like having it all to our self's. They have made a few changes, so good, so not so good, they have put in a Sky way, which is a ski lift that gives you a ride across the park for a birds eye view, but to put that in they had to change the Australian exhibit which ruined the exhibit.

Slave Quarters (pretty fancy)

Brick Foundation from Original
Civil War Prison

One day we drove over to Cahawba which was the first capitol of Alabama, all the remains are some ruins and foundations, it's now a state park and they are working on buying back the property and restoring some of the buildings. We took the bike and spent about an hour and a half riding around the park to the various sites and then an hour in the visitors center talking about the history of the town with the ranger.

Just a little ways down the road

Another day was spent at the Lowndes County Interpretive Center, which is a National Park site. It covers the history of the Selma to Montgomery March in March of 1965. This made me start thinking about how little I knew about this back in 1965 when I was a teenager, back then the local TV stations only devoted 30 minutes in the evening to national news. If this happen today with all the cable news networks it would be 24/7 with worldwide coverage. If you're in the area this is an interesting 1-2 hour stop.

A week in the Foley ALA area riding a bunch of bike trails and enjoying the weather. Then across the panhandle and south to Wildwood where we are now. Monday we move over to the Orlando area for a month and hopefully will get back in the Blogging habit again.