Florida - Day 32 - to Lake Griffin

Lake Griffin State Park, Fruitland Park

Friday, 17 February 2023

today's route

Google said it would take less than 2 hours to do today's drive (in reality, it took me 4 hours), so it was going on 10:00 when I left Tomoka State Park.  We stopped in Ormond Beach, the nearest town, for gas at $3.19/gallon.

I passed a historical marker labeled "Old Kings Road" and I was curious enough to look it up.  The inscription is short and says this was a north/south road that ran from St. Augustine, an hour or two north of here, down to New Smyrna not far south.  It was originally an Indian trail, improved by the Spanish, rebuilt as a road by the British (hence the name), and improved by the US Army in 1827.  A sort of Four Flags Over Florida road.

A couple of weeks ago, when I was trying to thread our way through the farmers market/petting zoo traffic at the Bradenton KOA, the radio was playing a Crosby Stills Nash song in memory of David Crosby's death a couple of weeks before.  The song was "Wasted on the Way."  I'd forgotten that song and almost melted when I heard that familiar harmony, and it gave me a new sense of tolerance for the crowd causing me driving problems.  A couple of weeks later and I still can't get that song out of my mind.  And I've found I can't even sing it because I can't pick the melody out of it.  All I can hear is the harmony and, try as I might, I can't sing several parts at once.  It's a wonderful song in its own right and a wonderful piece of nostalgia for those of us who are old enough to remember it from 1982.

A sign told me FL-40 that I was on is Florida's Black Bear Scenic Highway.  I was sorry not to have seen any of them, though I did see a highway sign warning me of bears for the "next 33 miles," which seemed both specific and general (not 30 miles, you understand, but 33 miles).

Coming into the town of Volusia, I passed the Volusia Speedway, per their sign, "World's Fastest Half Mile."  I don't know about that but I can say there was a lot of traffic on this 1-lane-each-side road.  For some reason, this town doesn't even appear on the AAA map - but it's between Barberville and Astor, on the St. John's River.

This area is home to the Ocala National Forest.

At Astor Park, we turned southwest to go around some lakes on a scenic route to the campground.  

Florida has a town called Altoona.

At Umatilla I saw a very large, very tall sign that said "Trump 2020 - Keep America Great!"

We stopped at a Burger King in Eustis.  On the way in, I passed a guy with his 2 dogs sitting in the sun.  He smiled and said hi and didn't try to panhandle in any way.  When I walked back by with my Whopper Jr and separate meat patty, his dogs were interested but polite.  In the past I'd split that patty between Dexter and Gracie, with a little bit for Lily, who doesn't really like it much.  Now, I didn't want to give the kittens much more than a crumb apiece, because of them still being kittens, and I gave Lily her usual couple of tiny bites.  But I didn't want to give Dext the whole rest of that patty, so I gave him his usual half, cut the rest in 2 pieces, and took it back out and asked the guy if I could give it to his dogs.  It made everybody happy, including me.

We drove through Fruitland Park, "The Friendly City," and found tonight's state park pretty much in the city limits.  Sadly, that didn't mean I could pick up an internet signal on my hotspot.  But I did get the tanks dumped.  This was another very small campground,  but it was laid out in a way that allowed a little walking room for Dext and me.  A good thing since I'd planned to stay here 2 nights.