THANKSGIVING 2013

To celebrate our Thanksgiving day this year we had decided to take a road trip in lieu of trying to decide which of our children we should bless with our company. So this morning after breakfast, the morning paper, crossword puzzle and coffee we packed a lunch and away we went. It was about an hours drive to the Devil's Millhopper Geological sight but we added several miles onto the trip up by taking wrong turns...

First, at the urging of my back seat driver and against my better judgment I turned onto the interstate going south, the wrong direction. That added 20 miles onto the trip since the closest exit for turning around was 10 miles the wrong way. But finally we got going the right direction and continued on our merry way. 

Next faux pas I, as the driver, did was to miss our exit. I thought from looking at the map that we needed to go one more exit north but it didn't show there was no exit at that road so we did another 12 miles north and turned around to come back the correct exit, Now we have almost 50 extra miles onto our trip and I have a bladder about to burst. Thankfully there was a McDonald's right in front of me when I got to the end of the exit ramp.  So we did a quick pit stop and continued on to the State park with no other missed turns.

It was all worth it. It is 120 feet deep and 500 feet across with 232 steps down to the bottom where there is a viewing platform. Now 'they' would like us to believe that there was a water table drop that caused the sink hole but I prefer to believe it was caused this way.

 The Legend of Devils' Millhopper 

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful Indian princess who lived in a village near the location of the present day Devils Millhopper. The Devil wanted to marry the Indian princess but she wanted nothing to do with him. So one day he decided to kidnap her. He grabbed her and ran. On hearing this all the Indian braves were deeply saddened and began to chase the Devil and the Indian princess. As the braves began to get closer and closer the Devil created a huge sink hole for the Indians to fall into. When the braves tried to crawl out to ave the princess the Devil turned them to stone. To this day the water weeping from the stones along the slopes are the tears the Indian braves shed for the beautiful Indian princess.

Now isn't that a beautiful legend. Here are some of the many photos I took along the way.

This is the beginning of the walk down.

One of the areas of weeping water

Below is the bottom of the sink hole where they have found sharks teeth and other interesting artifacts. There are so many things to say about this site but mostly it is just a wonderful look into Florida's past which was once a sea leaving behind traces of the life that lived here.

Below are plaques along the board walk

Bob taking a break on the trek up the stairs.










Me after reaching the top again. The weather was perfect for an outdoor activity like this one. Cool and crispy but sunny...

Lunch after the walk to the bottom. 

After leaving the state park we drove home wit no wrong turns and stopped at our son's home and enjoyed dinner with him and his family.