By glbuzz, on May 16th, 2010
One of my favorite places to visit is the Moosehead Lake area. Why is this area among my favorite places to visit? Well, it is a place where you are almost guaranteed to be able to see my favorite animal, the moose!! My daughter-in-law would disagree with this because we have never been able to find a moose when she is in the vehicle, so her belief is that there are really no moose in Maine. She won’t be in town during Moose Mainea so you will probably fare pretty well if you go searching for a moose in Greenville. Love ya, M, even if you do scare the moose away! 
Each spring, the town of Greenville, which is located at the head of the lake, hosts a month-long celebration in honor of its favorite resident – the moose! The event is being held this year from May 15 through June 12. Events are held during the month, for young and old alike. There will be a kids fun day, craft fair, canoe race, photo contest and more. Click HERE and scroll towards the middle of page for times and dates of events.
Mosey on to Greenville and join in on the festivities. Good times will be had by all.
As you travel down route 15, towards Greenville, keep an eye on the left hand side of the road after you pass the road to Shirley. Just shy of the DOT garage, in the swampy area, you MAY just be lucky enough to see a moose. I took a photo of this one last year in that very spot and as I glance through my moose photo’s, I have photo’s of at least five different moose from five different years right in this very spot. Good luck. Send me a photo of the moose that you find along the way. 
By glbuzz, on May 13th, 2010
 If you do any boating in the Florida area, you are bound to see this sign (or one similar to it). Because until recently, I had never seen a manatee, I decided to do some research to find out more about them and share it with all of you.
The manatee is Florida’s state marine mammal. They are a large aquatic relative of the elephant. Their coloring is a grayish brown and their skin is thick and wrinkle. Often times they have an algae growth on their skin. They glide through the water with their front flippers to help them steer and sometimes theykind of crawl through shallow water. Their powerful flat tails help tp propel them through the water. They have small eyes and no outer ear but researchers think that they see and hear well.
The first thing that you notice when you see one is that they are HUGE!! They can be ten to twelve feet long and they weigh 1500 pounds or more!! They are herbivores meaning that they eat marine and freshwater plants. We got a really good look at just how much they can eat while in Indiantown Marina where they came in to eat the vegetation that is on the edge of the water. It was pretty amzing to see the amount of green stuff that would disappear in a days time. They only have molars, which are used to grind food. When their molars wear down, they fall out and are replaced with new teeth.
They like warm water and take up residence primarily in Florida’s coastal waters in the winter. It is rare for them to be found in water that is cooler than 68º.
Boat strikes are the leading known cause of death. Propellers and hulls inflict serious or mortal wounds. Most manatees have a pattern of scars on their backs or tails after surviving collisions with boats. An example of what this looks like can be seen on the back of this one that I photographed at Gasparilla Marina.
They are known for their gentle, slow-moving nature. They normally rest and feed often. It was a thrill to finally see some of these creatures in the wild. I will close this post with a photo that I found in a magazine so that you can see exactly what one of these look like. They are so ugly- they are cute.  Hopefully, one day you, too, will see one in the wild or in an aquarium. 
By glbuzz, on May 8th, 2010
Just wanted to take a moment to say “Happy Mother’s Day” to all the moms out there. Take some time for yourself and enjoy your day.
By glbuzz, on April 29th, 2010
We left the Port Mayaca lock traveling eastbound. The next “obstacle” was the Mayaca Railroad Bridge which has a 49′ clearance. The Misty Moose, at 19′, didn’t have a problem going right under the bridge with nothing to worry about.
As we traveled just a bit further toward the Indiantown Marina, we came up on this sailboat heading westbound, that was too tall to fit under the bridge. I had read about tipping a sailboat to go under a bridge, but had never seen it until this day. What happens is that the folks on the sailboat hire a man that helps them to “tip” their boat just enough so that it can go under the bridge without them having to unstep the mast.
 The man they hire comes up the river with his motor boat filled with plastic barrels and a water pump. He places the barrels carefully on the rail and then the barrels are filled with water from the river until the sailboat tips over far enough to clear the bridge. The sailboat captain then drives his boat, the barrels, the “barrel man” with his boat under the bridge. When they are on the other side, the barrels are emptied and put back in the motor boat. The sailboat goes on its way and the “barrel man” goes back home until someone else calls him with a need to be tipped. Pretty neat! I have no idea what is charged for this service but it seems to me that it would be an easier way to get under the bridge than to unstep the mast.
We didn’t stay long enough to watch the whole process which left me to wonder if it was scary going under bridge with the boat tipped that way. Hmmmmm…another thing to muse about!
By glbuzz, on April 26th, 2010
 We were able to leave the Roland Martin Marina early on Thursday morning. Although gale force winds had been predicted for that day, we woke to much calmer winds than had been predicted so we decided to cross Lake Okeechobee. It was a bit bumpy in places but the crossing was pretty uneventful.
We locked through the Port Mayaca Lock without a problem. The folks that tend the locks through the St. Lucie canal are awesome and very helpful. They take a stressful situation (for us newbies) and make us look like seasoned boaters. Thanks guys!!
We arrived at Indiantown Marina and were psyched because we were within miles of the Atlantic coast. However…things were about to change (sigh).
We had noticed a bit of an oil slick around the boat when we ran the engine bilge. We thought it was left over from a problem that was supposed to be fixed. It doesn’t take a lot of oil to look really bad when mixed with water. However, since we didn’t want to pollute, we decided to have the head of the service department take a look at things to find out where the oil was coming from and to hopefully fix it so that we could be on our way. Eric Bamburg (a Mainer who lives in Florida now) heads the service department. He checked it out and found oil coming from a breather on the transmission. After checking it out, he thought that maybe it had been overful. The oil was drained, cleaned up and a sea trial was done. Unfortunately, it was still throwing oil.
After cussing and discussing for a couple of days, Steve and I decided to leave the boat in the able hands of the service team at Indiantown. Steve has to have back surgery in May — he should have had it in April but wanted to get the boat moved first. We stayed long enough to make arrangments to leave the Misty Moose “on the hard” AGAIN. She will be tied down with hurricane straps with the rest of the boats that are stored in the yard and Eric and crew will get her fixed up for us. We will spend the summer in Maine, between our home and camp while Steve does physical therapy after his surgery.
Next fall, after hurricane season has passed, we will head back to Florida, put the boat back in the water and head for the Keys to spend some time getting reaquainted with the boat. After that, who know?? We have learned very quickly that you have to be flexible when cruising. It was surprising how many folks told us that they had very similar problems within the first year of purchasing their boat. You can’t believe how many times we heard “welcome to the world of boating”. Quite frankly, I decided that we had better get out of Florida quick because I was going to hit the next person that said that.
We are on the way back home now. We are liesurely driving along the coast and then we will visit my mom in PA before heading for Maine. We don’t want to get home too quickly because we grew really fond of the warm weather. The saga of the Misty Moose will continue but at another time. Hopefully, I will find some fun places to blog about as we travel.
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