Feb 2009
Florida
We finally got back to the Keys after many years. We were greeted with two inches of rain and 85 mph winds the first night. The strong winds continued for our entire stay, making any water related activities - canoeing, snorkeling, and swimming - impossible. After a few days we left for the Everglades, but we plan to return next December - hopefully with better weather.
The weather slowly improved and warmed up a little. Despite all the canoeing we have done in the past down here, we were still able to find several new rivers and creeks to explore. We discovered a couple of great Rails to Trails paths where we biked, located near State Parks where we camped.
On my birthday (I’m 39 now) we took advantage of Disney’s Birthday Offer and visited Hollywood Studios. I expected it to be like Universal Studios, but actually it was more like the Magic Kingdom. Despite the economy, the place was packed and we were not able to get all the rides in that we wanted to do, even with Fast Pass.
The US mail system is the best and cheapest in the world, despite that-problems can still arise. Before we left, I called 1-800-ASK-USPS and asked for the address of the Post Office in Sebring, FL. I set my mail up to be forwarded there (at the mall PO). When I went to pick it up, they said they didn’t have it. They checked with the downtown Post Office and they didn’t have it either. I called my mail forwarding company and they said it had been delivered and gave me the tracking number. I marched back to the mall Post Office the next day with my tracking number. I found out that my mail had been delivered to the downtown Post Office, but they only found it after I had left the mall PO. They transferred it to the mall PO since that was where I was returning. When it got to the mall PO, someone observed that the zip code was for the downtown PO, so they sent it back there. Fortunately the downtown PO forwarded it again to the mall PO and I picked up my mail!
