DAY 107 : October 22/22 Saturday. Manatee Springs --> Fanning State Park Park --> Newport, FL

Morning from beautiful Manatee Springs State Park! Chilly this morning and kiddos slept in till 8am and came and snuggled. We even put the furnace on! I got up and made coffee and cocoas and we tried to make some plans for the next couple days in our effort to get to Pensacola to see the Blue Angels air team perform during a practice run on the 25th at 10am. 

Man our kids need a shower and hairwash! Their hair looks like they have been sleeping in the bushes with all the swimming they do. Wild childs. I felt ambitious and cooked up some crepes... they got gobbled down with lemon/sugar and with nutella. 

We biked back over to the springs again with the option to have another swim if we so desired. When we arrived at the park, there was a community set up for the day with a "Bark-O-Ween" event. The State Park and Friends of Manatee were putting on a fun dog halloween costume contest, and had an adoption event from the local "WAG" animal shelter from Williston. We met some very sweet bully mix dogs there up for adoption. Simon was our favourite. We stuck around to pet the dogs and check out their funny costumes. One big pitbull named Bella was very proud of her spider costume and loved pets. Her little sister, Maisie, was a pup and wearing a shark costume. She was full of beans and very cute. 

Meems stayed to watch more of the dog stuff with Jonathan keeping her company. Ollie and I walked down the boardwalk again to see if the manatees were still there. They were, but quite a bit further out this time. When we got back, the dog costume competition was still going on... very drawn out small community style. There was a cute little shy black dog painted up like a skeleton, and a teensy chihuahua that had a mexican poncho and sombrero on. She looked terrified of everything. Her brother, Bear, was the opposite. He was dressed as a cowboy with little booties and loved everyone and everything. 

Finally left the campground around 1:15pm. We had intel from one of the rangers at the dog party that a manatee was seen up in the springs at Fanning State Park not far from here up the Suwannee River. Drove the back roads past lots of lower income looking bungalows with more Trump signs and a flock of wild turkeys. We also passed an interesting looking group of locals beside a car on the corner of the road, with one guy filling the gas tank from the jerry can, with a lit cigarette dangling from his lips. Yikes!

Side note: this book is one we picked up at the Chapters in Kanata, ON. "USA State by State"... it's been a great one for anyone interested. Has neat things to do in each state, very simplified and has mini itineraries you could follow (not family oriented, but some good stuff). 

At 3:20pm we were pulling up at Fanning State Park... paid the $7 entry/park fee and found a place to park. Jonathan was tired of waiting for the kids goofing around and walked ahead to check out the springs. He hustled back telling us to get our swim stuff on... there was a manatee in the springs right where you swim! We got our swim stuff on and hustled over to the springs... past the gator warning signs (oh boy). This was a slightly different set up with a dock to walk down onto and a swim area on either side. There was a "deck boat" pulled right into the springs, which seemed wrong! and a sweet lone manatee swimming slowly around it. We were worried about the captain's apparent lack of concern about it with his motor running, he docked and put a power pole down and turned the engine off. Jay and Ollie and Amelia got their snorkel gear on (jsy in goggles) and got into the water first while I took some pics. Then when I got in, Jonathan ran up to the rig and got our MEC waterproof bag for his phone so he could take some underwater footage. I can't seem to upload the video here, but will try. it was SOOOOOO amazing to swim near that manatee. It was sweet and curious and not at all afraid of us. We kept our distance but it was still very close! A highlight of our trip for sure. xo

--> lots of manatee photos below... couldn't thin them out much. too exciting, haha. 

I guess we spent about an hour there admiring and marvelling at this large creature. Needing some food, we searched up pizza places and settled on Papa Luigi's pizza west down the Hwy 98 in Old Town, Dixie County. Big empty parking lot with an abandoned grocery store and a lone ice machine box, a little strip mall the short length of the parking lot with a cafe and Papa Luigi's. We met the infamous Papa Luigi himself. What a character. His helper was a young blonde guy who looked like someone out of a movie... with an Italian/Brooklyn accent to match. Luigi asked the kids if Jonathan was their "cousin Vinnie" and they were the "two youts"... Very funny. Kids obviously didn't get the reference. We got the lowdown on Luigi's business... he sounds like a very community minded guy, lots of character and opinions. We sat in the parking lot just outside the pizza place on the banquet chairs they Luigi and his helper had been sitting on when we pulled up. We brought over two lawn chairs and enjoyed our Italian pizza and watched as regulars came on through to pick up their orders.  

We said our goodbyes to Luigi around 4:40pm and drove a couple hours to reach Newport Campground in Wakulla... a funny little campsite on the side of (literally) Hwy 98. It had 15 sites and the website said $15 for an unserviced site. Perfect for just staying for the night. When we pulled it, we drove and looked at the sites then found what appeared to be the Camp Host... a tall unshaven middle aged dude with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He approached the driver's side window and despite being quite rough around the edges, he was friendly enough and directed us to a site right beside his. His place was well spread out with a fire going and large animal 3D targets and all kinds of stuff laying around. Upon our hesitancy, he said we were welcome to drive and around the sites and choose whatever we wanted (the $15 sites were right by the road). We chose one that he recommended second, tucked a bit further back from his site and away from the road. It had water and electrical and he said we were welcome to use the outlet and it would be $20 (I think usually it was $25?). We parked, paid him cash and walked to check out the small boardwalk into the woods across to the river. The campground was across the road from St. Mark's Lighthouse apparently, but too far to walk/bike. 

We all had showers -- sadly disappointing! Meems rated them 2/5. Weird set up, main room to showers off the bathroom that had a bench, but then the shower stalls had wooden doors but the hooks were about 6ft up from the ground and no shower curtains to keep the water from flowing out. No where to put your stuff. We have become connoisseurs of campground showers and this one was not good! I could hear Jonathan talking to Ollie on the other side of the walls. And could hear the camp host talking to them about one of the showers not working properly. Then I heard him say something to the ladies in the washroom and one of them thought it was my husband looking for me. Weird. Overall a strange place to stay. 

Full from our pizza feast, kids had a bit of yogurt before bed. Meems was working on yet another board game... I think she has made about 6 or more so far. They are well done!!