NBNC>Florida: March 2-5, 2014

March 4 2014-Mardi Gras Tuesday

This morning we leave Florida City when it is 81 and blue, blue skies on our way to central Florida’s Rainbow Resort. This will be our third year at Rainbow, where we enjoy the orange-groved area, and especially our time with Avis and Jim Brown. 

On our way northbound on Krome Ave we will be crossing over several main intersections that travel east-west (or west-east, depending on whether you will be seeing a sunrise or sunset) including Tamiani Trail (Rte 41) and Alligator Alley (rte 75). How sad to see the refuse and litter strewn along the highway as we cross the intersection of Tamiani and Krome.  Everything from sofas no longer suitable for sitting, to refrigerators unable to cool your beer and tires de-treaded.  I doubt these several miles of rubbish fell off the proverbial cabbage truck; appears more that this garbage was pushed off an F150.  As we cruise-control along 27 we are fringing the most eastern boundaries of the Everglades.  Turkey vultures are perched on barren trees waiting for their roadkill buffet.  A perfect perspective of massive power lines stretch out across the sawgrass prairie.

We are curious as to the extensive canal system that runs parallel with the highway and curls its way transversely through the sawgrass. As a result of years of hurricane devastations, floods and drying marsh lands the Army Corps of Engineers began its construction of water management through the Everglades, however, their initial formation caused extensive contamination, unbalanced ecosystems, and re-directing of wetlands for agricultural purposes. And, of course, the lobbyists became involved on the political and economic issues. What was, at one time, a natural course of water flow south to Florida Bay and wildlife habitats, is now regulated and habitats abandoned.

We pass by the southern entrance to Lake Okeechobee which is about 35 miles long and 29 miles wide and averaging twelve foot in depth. The lake’s rim height does not allow us to see the massive body of water, which is the seventh largest freshwater lake in the country and about half the size of Rhode Island.  I wondered about how the lake became a lake. It seems just a few years ago, 6,000 actually, wetlands covered this region and the lake area was a shallow, dry depression. The water table in Florida began to rise (I think this is when Noah was building the A-boat) and there was more rain. After several more thousand years (give or take another few thousand) the lake began to form and the thousands of years of limestone deposits created a natural dike until it overflowed into the Everglades. The catastrophic hurricanes of 1926 and ’28, killing thousands, crossed over the lake creating a storm surge over the dike. Afterward, the Army Corps of Engineers designed the construction of channels, levees and gates.

There is a sugariness in the air. Across the acres of cane stalks we can see plumes of smoke where the canes are being fired up, gathered and dumped in collection bins that will be carted to the nearby Domino processing plants. Very appropriately, the Clewiston school athletic field is named Cane Field.

From sweet fields to sweet calf faces, we pass by the Graham Dairy near Moore Haven. The dairy herd counts near 3,000 head on almost 2, 200 acres and is one of the top dairy producers in the state.

As we nudge along 27 we skirt through small towns and villages, one of them named Venus. As we go by Venus there are two very noticeable features: one is we are glad we didn’t blink; two is the elevation to a minor hill is noted. We are now 112 feet above sea level. The landscape is becoming greener and trees are taller. Orange groves extending miles and miles lend the wonderful, sweet scent of orange blossoms. Three hurricanes in 2004 devasted nearly 40% of the citrus crops across Florida. The growers are still recovering. And now they face another challenge, citrus greening, a bacteria that is spread by a tiny aphid. The fruit of the tree does not ripen and mature to be harvested on these trees that are decades old.

After four hours on the road we arrive in Frostproof, named to entice citrus growers to own land in the area, having never had a frost, only to have had a killing frost a few years later. Settling onto site 400 for the next month we will be visiting old haunts, new haunts and enjoying more of sunny Florida.