Never Fear (State Park) Junior Rangers are Here

Friday, March 4th – Jonathan Dickinson State Park to Myakka River State Park, Jupiter to Sarasota, Florida – Day 25

 Another travel day. We woke up and took our time getting out. Gen worked out and showered. I went for a run along some great sandy trails through the park. I was very envious of some bikers I saw during my run. There were fantastic trails everywhere that featured ramps and banked curves. It looked like it would be amazing to come with a mountain bike. Another trip for another time – once John can ride without training wheels. 

 We drove four miles further into the park to the nature centre. The kids needed to get their State Park junior ranger badges. Aisling had worked so hard to finish her booklet of activities to get her junior ranger badge. We had to work fairly extensively with Charlotte and John to complete enough activities to merit their badges as well. At the end, each child was sworn in as a (state park) Junior Ranger. The nature centre was great with a few snakes and turtles on hand and skeleton remains of turtles and alligators. 

 We took a lunch of tuna sandwiches (we need to up our lunch game from sandwiches) on the front lawn of the nature centre. There was a guided tour at 2pm so we decided to wait for it. Charlotte and John played around with the footy with me. Our nature walk was technically a river walk and was guided by a very knowledgeable volunteer. The girls got scavenger hunt forms where they identified and checked off plant life. We walked along a river packed with mangroves and learned about how the salt water has pushed further up the river on account of the Jupiter harbour widening many years ago. As the salt water moves up the river, the cypress trees die off (a fresh water species) and the mangrove trees take over. Mangroves are pretty awesome. Their roots have a filter that removes the salt from the water. During the hike, John wanted to be carried followed by Charlotte wanting to be carried. Fortunate for me, the brush was low which gave me an excuse to kick them off. 

 After a very good hike, we jumped into the vehicle and took off from the east coast to head to the west coast. A few hours later we were into Myakka River State Park. Note: our trip did feature a quick stop at a play structure while Gen shopped for produce at a market.