Several Firsts Today!

After packing our lunch and making a cooked breakfast, Ken loaded the truck for our kayaking trip.  Before we left we did take a walk to get a start on our steps.  We followed Chuck and Melissa and drove for about 50 minutes to Silver River State Park.  From there we launched our kayak and they launched their new port a boat with oars and a trolling motor.  What a beautiful area to paddle.  This was the 1st time we were on the Silver River plus we paddled with alligators and saw lots of wild monkeys.  What a day!  The water was so clear and there were so many water lilies.  Unfortunately they were not open - it would have been so beautiful!  We paddled about 3 miles up stream and then stopped at a cove area to eat our lunch.

Chuck and Melissa in their new port a boat.  The verdict is
still out on whether they are totally happy with it.  They have
to work hard to get it to go if only paddling.

Relatively small alligator!

Beautiful male wood duck!

A much larger alligator!

A tri-colored heron!

Another fairly large alligator!

Having lunch in a quiet little cove area!

Lots of turtles getting sun and resting on the logs!

Floating back was so relaxing and that is when we saw many more monkeys than on the paddle upstream.  There were dozens and dozens of monkeys playing, jumping from palm leaf to palm leaf (very noisy) and even climbing high up into the trees and diving into the water.  It was unbelievable.  On the way up I asked the group if they thought monkeys could swim.  None of us were sure, but that was quickly answered on the way.  Some people say the monkeys came when they were filming Tarzen movies in this area years ago.  Another theory is that a man brought the monkeys to an island nearby thinking they couldn't swim - wrong!!!!  Who knows how they really got here?  We also saw many turtles and about 4 alligators.  Ken and I always said we would be afraid to paddle our inflatable kayak in water with alligators, but it wasn't a big deal.  Of course, we didn't see many along the edge.  That might have made a difference!

Here are lots of monkey pictures for you to enjoy!  You can't begin to imagine how many Ken got rid of to narrow it down to these "few"!  Ken thought is was nice we had a chance to visit my relatives!!!  What a guy!!!  It really was an incredible sight!!

The canal back to the launching area was lined with
water lilies!  Wish they would have been blooming!

Chuck disassembling his new boat!

Back to Willie by 5.  The 4 of us played 2 games of shuffleboard with each team winning a game.  Then we enjoyed supper together in Willie.  Planned to get together to play cards after we cleaned up and Ken and I completed our 10,000 steps.  When we returned from our walk it was almost 9, so we decided to call it a day!  We will continue the game playing tomorrow.

It was a very nice sunny, mild day with temperatures in the mid 70's.  Great day for kayaking!