April 1-5, 2014

Little Manatee River State Park

Wimauma, FL

Unless something really exciting or noteworthy happens I am only going to post once or twice a week while we are working at Little Manatee River SP. 

Tuesday-The ranger we are going to be working with is on vacation and not expected back at work until Wednesday so we had another free day.    One of our fellow volunteers told Monte he will probably be doing some painting so we took a ride to a nearby Goodwill to look for work pants for Monte.  For less than $12 he bought two pairs of pants. 

Neither one of us was very hungry for dinner so we settled on French onion soup with tons of melted cheese. 

After dinner we rode our bikes down a path that brought us to Dude Lake.

  Cool-we found another place where we will be able to kayak.

Wednesday-We set our alarm for 7:30 because we weren’t sure what time we would be starting work.  I assumed we would be spending most of the day at the Ranger Station filling out paperwork and doing other orientation procedures.  When no one contacted us by 9:30 we took a ride up to the station with our paperwork.   The volunteer coordinator, Joey, was there but he said he had so many things to do after being on vacation for a week that he wouldn’t have time for our orientation today.  

So we had another day off.  Monte did some chores including taking the gray boy off the rear ladder and stowing it under the rig. 

I tried sitting outside reading for a while but the heat got to me so I retreated inside, put on the air conditioner and took a short nap.

Today marks one year since we lost our beloved cat. 

It was our second night at a beautiful boon docking site in Sedona.  

Pumpkin, ever curious, was always ready to run outside if the opportunity presented itself.  

That particular night he managed to get out when either Monte or I opened the door and we didn’t even realize he was gone for a couple of hours.  

By that time it was dark.  Each day we spent a couple of hours walking the desert calling his name.  

After a week we had to accept that Pumpkin was lost to us and we moved on.   We still miss him terribly.

Thursday-Our first official day or work.  We attended at meeting at 9:30 to discuss an upcoming event to be held at the park.  Monte and I was given the task of creating signs for the event.

We were provided with large stencils that would have been too big for the signs.

  Monte suggested I use my Cricket to create the stencils.  

While I cut the stencils, him and another volunteer, John, spray painted the signs. 

We put in almost 7 hours and where still not done with all the signs when we called it quits for the day. 

While Monte put the ribs on the grill, I prepared a salad and some sides. 

Friday-We put in another long day making signs. 

 

Saturday-Joey, the volunteer coordinator, was working the entrance booth all day and had told us to stop in any time to complete our paperwork.   

Chris, one of the other rangers

 We drove to Camping World’s new location in Dover.   A couple of months ago we had purchased a sun screen that attaches to our awning.   When we went to set it up upon our arrival at Little Manatee River SP we discovered it was too short so we exchanged it for a longer one. 

We also checked out chairs but I didn’t find one I liked.

The only other thing we bought at Camping World was a pause water adapter for our Oxygenics shower head.   

 RV ART along the side of the road.

Because we were fairly close to Hillsborough River State Park we decided to take a drive through to see if it would be someplace we might want to volunteer at. 

On the way home we stopped at the recently opened Wendy’s in Sun City Center.  

It only took Monte a few seconds to install the pause water adapter.

Together we installed our new sun screen. 

What a difference.

Having the shade is going to enable us to sit outside even during the sunniest part of the day.  

We feel very comfortable here at Little Manatee River State Park and are sure we are going to enjoy our two month tenure.