Green Springs Park Bike Ride

It was a little overcast to day but it was warm and there is a chance of rain tomorrow (Saturday) so we loaded the tandem on the back of the car and headed of to Green Springs Park, over by the Historical town of Enterprise,Fla. Green Springs Park is a little hard to find since it's not on the maps, or at least the ones I have so here's the GPS data 28.86306N / 81.24881W, this is to the parking lot.

The park is very nice it has a couple picnic areas, kids play area an entrance bike path to a section of the East Central Regional Rail Trail, right now there is only about 3 miles or so paved and completed but when they finish and tie everything together it will be close to 50 miles.

Reflections in the spring, you can see why they named it Green Springs.

One of the Boardwalks

Area still under construction

We started out going right when we hit the trail and after about a mile it hit a main street that had the path along side it, too much traffic noise so we turned around and headed the other direction. After about 3 miles we had to go around a small barricade, the path was paved but the wood fence was still under construction, after another mile is turned to very hard packed dirt, another mile and we hit the construction crew pouring concert for the driveways that crossed the path and we were forced onto the street about 50 feet from the path. There was no traffic and we were just getting warmed up so we continued on down the road, we came to a fork in the road and we took it, a little later we came to another fork and took that one too. Well one thing led to another and we just kept wandering around taking what ever road or street looked interesting until we finally decided that we were totally LOST. There are a zillion little lakes in this area so none of the road go straight for more then half a mile and 99% are dead ends, the good news is that I had a small hand held GPS in the handle bar bag tracking our distance and the bike route. Twenty minutes of playing with that I pretty much figured out where we were and roughly how to get back to the car. I had noticed that the longer we wandered around lost the deeper and growlier Cathy's voice became, once I told her I knew the way back and it was just a few miles, her happy go lucky voice returned and I was able to stop worrying about my unprotected back. Twenty minutes and two wrong turns later we were back at Green Springs Park, as we approached the car I sped up went past the car and asked her if she was ready for LAP TWO, that's when I felt a hard smack right between the shoulder blades of my unprotected back. A quick check of the odometer showed that our 3 to 6 mile ride turned into 19 miles.

GREEN=Paved      YELLOW=Paved under construction      RED=Packed dirt

Now believe me, if any of this was my fault I would gladly take the blame, but I'm having a hard time convincing Cathy that all the blame falls on her shoulders. I'm going to need a little help her from Odel over at Semi-True Tales on this one (Ex Fighter Pilot), I need him to explain to her that the pilot rides up front and the navigator rides in the rear seat, so when we get lost it's the fault of the rear seat. I'm glad you guys are back on the road, I missed your writings.

Cathy's not really as small as she looks here, it's a Tandem bike and the front half is a 21 inch frame and the rear half is a 17 inch frame, plus the camera angle, but if the picture was bigger you would see that she's not peddling, at least that's what everybody we pass always tells me.

That's it for today but I sure hope Cathy has learned from her mistakes and does a better job on tomorrows adventure.

A Little bit of THIS and a whole lotta THAT

Just some stuff we found this week messing around.

Cumberland Island National Seashore Museum.

This large block of oak was found at the bottom of a well, they were placed there so when the bucket was lowered into the well it sat on the block of wood and didn't stir up any sand or sediment.

This is what's left of a statute that was at the Carnegie mansion on the island, the picture is what it looked like when it was in the garden.

 This display of uniforms is to let you know about their part in the war of 1812, we always heard that the last battle was the Battle of New Orleans, fought after the treaty was signed.  well even after that the British attacked the Battery Point Peter at the mouth of the St Mary's River.  Since they out numbered the garrison 1500 to 80 it wasn't much of a battle, but it was the last fighting of the War of 1812.









St Mary's River Front

 The Nation Park ferry that takes you to the Island, you need to make reservations during the busy season.  If you're lucky you'll have to stop and wait in the river while a Trident Submarine enters the port.  Really something to see,they're escorted by gun boats, helo's and have a SEAL team on deck.

Show how windy it was this day and I like this picture.

Fountain in Riverside Park.

National Park Headquarters, nice pace to work.

Map of Cumberland Island.  If you go to the island take a backpack with plenty of water and food, get the early ferry and plan on spending the day.  But don't miss the last ferry or they leave you there for the night and you're on your own.

The tide is out so these are stuck in the mud.

a semi tall ship at the end of the harbor but you can't get out to it.






SUGAR WORKS RUINS
                                                  

Click to enlarge and read.

Just down the road and across the street from the main gate to the submarine base.

Part of the Sugar works ruins.

more ruins

and even more, this was a very large operation.

Close up of the Tabby wall, a mixture of sand ,lime and sea shells, the walls are about 18 inches thick.

This trees old enough and looks like it might have been an Indian trail marker tree.









WOODBINE AREA

We parked at the Satillia Riverfront Park and took the boardwalk, about 1/2 mile over to the Bird Sanctuary.

The board walk takes you under the Hwy 17 bridge and connects with part of the Georgia Coast Rails to Trails bike path.

Walking along the path and spotted this grave, it had a stone but we we're wondering why it was here all by it self.

and then we found out the rest of the story.
Click to enlarge and find out for yourself.

Here's a picture of Cathy and I, might use it for our Christmas card since it's a reflection in a Christmas bulb.

Continuing down the bike path.

Ended up in a little city park, already for the Holidays.

More ruins, the ruins of Woodbine Theater, not as old as the Sugar Works.

Under the Hwy 17 bridge on the boardwalk.














SIGNS WE FOUND

So it's OK to Treaspass before the sun goes down.

The building was collapsed but what a great sign.

At least they're honest about it.

And that's it for St Mary's.

Jacksonville - Sally Corp

We finally said good-bye to Savannah and drove down to Woodbine/St Mary's, about 7 miles north of the Florida state line, we're staying at the Walk-About RV Park. This park changed owners about a year ago and is now owned by a nice young couple from Australia and their 4 kids. They have made a lot of improvements and are a real pleasure to deal with.

Today we drove down to Jacksonville, our first stop as always when we're here was Penzey's Spice shop  to replenish our spice rack, if you've never been to a Penzeys then you don't know what you're missing.

After getting our spice fix we drove downtown to the Sally Corp.. They make animated robots and such for amusement parks, private corporations and any one else that wants one. We had called ahead and they said that they could squeeze us in with the noon tour, you must make reservations for a tour, we ended up being with a small (20 4^th grade kids) school tour. At first we thought that it was going to be geared towards the kids but it was very interesting for the adults also.

This company has been here for 30 years and has their robots all around the world. Our guide explained that it got it's start when three students at Wake Forest had a project which required them to give a talk on stage in front of an auditorium full of people. They were all very shy and none of them wanted to give the talk, so they bought a mannequin, ripped the head of and put a few motors in the head that would make the mouth move when ever they pushed a button. Then they had a lady friend record their speech for them. When it was time to give their talk they placed the head on the podium, turned on the tape and started pushing the button to make the mouth move with the speech. They all passed and that was the start of Sally Corporations, why Sally well that was the name of the mannequin and she's still employed there.

This was a fun tour and lasted about an hour and we were amazed at the great questions some of the fourth graders asked.

The first stop showed some of the different characters they have made.

The tour guide putting on a mask of LBJ, if you've been to the LBJ Presidential Library in Austin, this is the mold that they used to make the robot there.

Mark Twain

A sample they used to show the different movements.

They  just finished this one and it's going to a Temple in India.  It was made from the photos and measurements of the real person.

They use human hair on the robots and each one is placed in individuality, it can take this girl up to 20 hours to set all the hair  in this beard.

T-Rex breaking out of his crate.

At the end they have an animated shooting gallery for the kids to try their shooting skills at.