November 02nd, 2021

This past Saturday was Minock Day!  Always the best day!  We decided to meet at the Sunken Gardens in St Petersburg.  Tim and I had been there once before in the summer.  The thing about preserves and nature walks and Botanical Gardens is that even though it's the same place the view is different every time.  Nature is awesome that way.  It was beautiful the first time we went,   beautiful, Hot and Very Very Humid.   It was beautiful again this time 'round and much much cooler and dryer. Ahhhhhh.

The temperature and dew point were so different this time, in fact, that I wasn't quite sure how to dress.  I guess I had forgotten.  When we lived in Colorado, that in between season weather was just a matter of layers.  You know what I mean:  A tee shirt under a long sleeved shirt, under a sweat jacket or quilted vest.  And as the they goes by, if it warms up, you can start peeling off layers and still be suitably covered.  Because of the dry air, it's your core you need to keep warm, arms and legs not so much.   Here, it's not quite the same thing. Even when the air is dryer, there is still humidity and that's the kind of thing that creeps into your bones, all of 'em.  That includes arms and legs.  It's a lot harder to do leg layers.

So I settled on long shorts and a short sleeved shirt (in case it warmed up while we walked) but I brought along my denim jacket.  Within the first half hour of the drive I had put on Tim's emergency fleece jacket that he keeps in the back seat. Oh, not his emergency, no, he keeps it there for me. I snuggled right into that yummy warm jacket and life was good.    And once we arrived, I assumed that I would still be wearing it so I tucked my phone into one pocket and my reading glasses (necessary for taking photographs) into the other.  BUT as soon as we got out of the car I quickly realized that the fleece was going to be too warm.  I put my denim jacket on instead, put my phone in my back pocket and...........completely forgot to get my reading glasses.

Which means that I ended up trying to take photographs without being able to actually see properly.  Sigh.  So while I do have a few photos for you, I ended up deleting most of them. Oh well.  I will show you what I have.  I'll start with the flowers.  Isn't that what first comes to mind when you think of a Botanic Garden?  There were so very many!

It's such a peaceful place.  We walked the winding paths and admired what we saw and caught up with each other's lives.  Some of the trees are towering.  If you want to see the top of the trees, you have to look Very Very up.  I looked so far up a few times that I almost fell over backwards :)   The trees and shrubs of course come in all sizes, shapes and colours.  Here are a few of those:

There were birds of course, there are always birds here, no matter where you go.  Oh and a squirrel too:

When we finally saw most everything there was to see at the Sunken Garden we were getting tummy rumblies and decided that lunch was in order.  We found a nearby place to sit and talk and relax and talk and eat and talk and laugh and talk and talk and talk.  Hey, we had a lot of catching up to do!  We used to see these people almost daily and now, between our various schedules and crazy lives we only manage to get together once every few months. We had a lot to talk about!

So much so that after we ate we pointed ourselves to a cute little lake, a mere block away, for a nice little apres meal walk. And of course we walked and talked and admired the lake, the neighborhood that surrounds it and the beautiful day.  And we still weren't done talking!  Marsha and I did a quick Google Search and she found a place called Boyd Hill Nature Preserve only 13 minutes away.  And off we went.

It was a terrific hiking spot with a great nature center that we fully explored.  To be honest, we only walked a few short trails even though there were some longer ones, but as they day was wearing on, our feet were wearing out!  Got a few photos there:

Once again, Minock Day lived up to it's reputation.  And as always, we look forward to the next time :)