Thursday – Okeechobee, Florida
I woke up fine as usual at about 6.30 and got started packing the bike, checked some emails, but as breakfast was at 8, I still had to wait. After that and grabbing extras for lunch, I headed up the road to the most southernmost point of the USA for a photo shoot.
Then I headed off, it was hot and muggy but the traffic was reasonably light but it was early.
I saw this sign board at a business and went back for a photo as I thought it was funny 🙂
After that it was just a few hours of the reverse trip from yesterday, over the bridges and other small islands until I got to Key Largo where I stopped to buy a postcard and send it to some people back home.
When I got to Homestead I checked out some roads at the visitor centre, as I had no wish to go back up the way I had come down. It turns out I should be OK heading north up the middle of the state, and then after that cut back in to the coast. The GPS took me through some back streets until I finally managed to get some fuel and then head north through the farm country.
I was skirting the edge of the Everglades National Park and kept my eye open for alligators, I actually saw a few but they were only small. In fact I saw a bigger one outside the space centre the other day. One thing I did notice though is that a lot of the trees up here were dead looking, although there was a lot of water and a lot of other green growth.
But after about half an hour, the trees started to liven up a bit.
I decided to have a break for lunch near what I thought was an entrance to a racetrack, but when I went to use a tree through the gate, the signs said airport property.
Lots more farmland around here and some nice flowering trees as well.
Now, I was getting close to Okeechobee and the sky started t look threatening, I decided to make for there around the lake and make a decision about stopping then. I was a bit tired and very hot again, so I started to look for the lake, but there was a large bund wall to my left and I could not see it at all, until I went up over the canal crossover, then I saw the water.
I found out later the wall was put up to stop the towns from flooding during hurricanes. The countryside was quite nice around here, there was a lot of turf farms and a lot of palm trees as well.
I got into Okeechobee around 3.30 and it was really looking like a bad storm, so I decided to call it quits and found a motel and went and bought a few beers and holed up in the room while the rain came down. The closest pub was about 6 blocks away so I could not be bothered getting wet, except for a shower 🙂
I updated my blog and contacted a few people at New Smyrna Beach about my tyre and I had also been offered a bed for the night by another chap on the Vstrom forums. So, while catching up and organising tomorrow, the rain kept on coming down, glad I was inside at this time.
Day – 286 miles and 460 km
Trip – 16,183 miles and 26,044 km
Cheers
TravellingStrom
