Visit to Pioneer Florida Museum and Village

I can’t explain why it took so long for us to visit this museum in Dade City, FL. We saw it from the road many times while driving to another destination. We attend many other events celebrating the rural way of life of Florida, but somehow missed this one. During a recent conversation, a friend mentioned visiting Dade City, and we decided to take advantage of the continuing beautiful winter weather here to take a day trip. While researching what we might do, I found the Pioneer Florida Museum and we decided to make that our first stop.

The grounds open at 10 a.m., and we were the first in the door. The building we entered contains many exhibits of early Florida life such as a music room, where the family would gather to entertain each other before television or the Internet, kitchen utensils from the days when most of the food production occurred in the home and not in a factory or restaurant, and hundreds of old tools.

We left that building and admired the recreated train station, and of course pulled the cord to sound the train whistle. The Lacoochee School House build in 1926 and moved to the museum grounds shows the one room school house with the small wooden desks that have holes for the ink well. We moved on to the church, then one of the oldest wood houses still standing in Pasco, the barn with all kinds of old carriages, farm implements and tractors.

We enjoyed the visit so much we returned a week later with family who were in town, and they enjoyed it too. Admission is a reasonable $8 for adults, $6 for seniors, and $4 for students.

February Photography Hike at Brooker Creek Preserve

Our photography hikes the last Saturday of each month at Brooker Creek Preserve in Tarpon Springs, FL continue again starting February 25, 2017 at 8:30 a.m.

The class presented instead of a hike last month proved very popular. The stomach bug going around kept me away, so Karl taught it himself. In addition to the usual composition techniques and examples, Karl spend time in the class on the basics of SLR cameras.

On a recent hike we noticed that an Anhinga started hanging around the branch over the creek again, the Black-crowned Night Herons seem to have moved back in and are seen occasionally in the same area, and the flowers are coming back.

We hope to see you there.

Exhibit: The Way We Worked

We never heard of the Smithsonian’s Museum on Main Street until 2014. This program serves small communities with traveling exhibits and educational programs. We happened to visit Cedar Key in October, 2014 and saw fliers for an exhibit called “The Way We Worked”. The compact exhibit, featuring photography from the National Archives and Records Administration of working Americans through 150 years, takes only about 30 – 45 minutes to peruse. Concise wording explains each section, and guides the viewer through the history of working men and women in this country. The local venue also does its own exhibit of the way they worked in their area. In Cedar Key, we saw a wonderful representation and explanation of the clam farming for which they are justly famous. It impressed us so much we advised a number of people we know to check it out if it arrived in their area.

Now, over two years later, we discovered that the exhibit is still touring. Last week we visited the Pioneer Florida Museum and Village, and went through the exhibit again. We enjoyed it just as much as the first time, and noticed things we hadn’t before. This time I was struck by the number of the jobs which over the years which have been automated out of existence, the photograph of a telephone switching board with dozens of operators, for example. I also noticed more closely the sign below:

I liked the recognition of all the unpaid work people do. Surveys conclude that having a job is the number one social value in our American culture. Many years ago while attending meetings in a European country, a colleague from that country commented that Americans always focus on a person’s work when they meet him. “What do you do?” still tends to be one of the initial questions we ask when first meeting someone. As a culture, our work continues to be part of how we define and present ourselves. Whether that job is a vocation, avocation, paid or unpaid, it matters to the person and to those who benefit by the work. I suspect a lot of what we enjoyed when touring the Pioneer Florida Museum was the result of volunteer work.

This time we learned about jobs from the past here in Pasco County, FL. Citrus farming plays a big role in our past, as does fishing in the coastal area.

If you get the opportunity to see this exhibit, I highly recommend it.

Manatees at Linda Pedersen Park

Though nearly 9 a.m., Karl and I had the park to ourselves. The forecast predicted that the morning coolness would give way to temperatures into the 70s, but it hadn’t started yet. The cool crispness of the air made the colors pop as the sun continued its rise.

Karl started to see some activity from the manatees resting on bottom of the creek, just in the edge of the swimming area, and called me over. We stood and watched them for some time. They started swimming, surfacing for air, and tumbling over one another. I saw a smaller, younger one surface once or twice, but not high enough for a good shot. Or maybe I just enjoyed watching so much I didn’t have the camera ready.

Our love of nature and hiking led us to becoming master naturalists, and to focusing our initial foray into the photography business primarily on nature subjects. Even though the business expanded beyond nature, we still spend a lot of our time in the natural areas of Florida and other places we travel.

 

Manatees and Reflections at Linda Pedersen Park

A cool, clear morning with plenty of early sun led us to a drive further north. The string of cooler mornings made us wonder if there were manatees in the shallower waters of Jenkins Creek. Several years ago we stopped at Linda Pedersen Park while birding, and discovered several manatees relaxing in the water in the swimming area. This Hernando County Park along with Jenkins Creek Park across the road create a wonderful nature outing, and destination for manatees seeking the warmer water they need this time of year.

At first the mist riding on top of the water and the unbelievable reflections of the shore in the water attracted my eye and camera. I waited some time for a manatee to surface among the reflections, picturing the resulting photograph in my mind. The manatees clearly thought differently.

As the light changed I realized I lost the shot I envisioned, so I walked back toward the parking lot on the boardwalk along the beach. The reflections here didn’t have the clear conciseness of my other location, but a lone manatee did surface for a breath of air so I got a shot, not what I pictured but interesting just the same.

Karl called me a bit further along, and there we could see several manatees lounging under the water. We both waited for them to get a little more active, and enjoyed the show. More photographs of that on Thursday.

Robins...Again! Eco Walk Crystal River

After our experience with all the American Robins at Werner Boyce Salt Springs Park, we visited Eco Walk at Crystal River. Once again, as we walked the trails American Robins dominated the species as we followed the calls and sightings in the first part of the trail. I spent some time at one of the ponds, watching them race back and forth, and then stop and drink.

One Robin flies in as the others are in various stages of having a drink of water

While we always see large flocks of Robins overhead this time of year, this year they stayed at many of the places we hike so we experienced them up close. As we continued on the trail, things quieted. Then we started hearing and seeing birds again, this time clearly warblers. After some watching with the binoculars we saw Tufted Titmouse and other smaller birds, but predominately Yellow-rumped Warbler. By this time the light went from early morning golden toward mid-morning bright, so we wrapped up the hike and found lunch at a local restaurant.

OK shot, but light too bright to see the color details of the bird. More artistic than wildlife photo, as I liked the juxtaposition of the bird with the branches of similar shades against a clear sky.