Friends and More friends - March 13/14

We met Dick and Marilyn about halfway for lunch today, our last visit til we all get home.  That was nice.  Since we were that far west, we decided to go  north to Winter Garden to do a little biking in a really nice area.  We had a great ride on a really good path, then walked downtown and ran into Jake and Mary Maarse,, who used to go to our church when they lived in the Cobourg area, but moved to Ottawa about 10 years ago.  What a surprise!

As we drove north, we were passing a "pick-your-own" citrus farm, and decided to stop and have a look around.  These are blossoms on a kumquat tree - I know this because there were a few on the tree when we got there....but not when we left.  :-) 

 

 
 
Paul doesn't look too worried considering how close he was to that gator! 

They had a little fenced area with a few animals and birds in it. 

 

 
 
If you look closely, you can see a couple of small bananas forming - just to the left of the hanging purple flower. 

 
We stopped in a park that had a lovely flower garden to walk through. 

 

 

 

 
 
 
Biking with my "friends". 

 
 
Saw a little gator by a pond..... 

.....right where my back tire went flat.  With all the many miles of biking we have done this winter, this is the first problem we have had.  Fortunately, we were only about 1/4 mile from the car, so I walked it back. 

And then we ran into Jake, coming out of the ice cream store we were going into.  Mary was down the street in a fabric store, and we caught up with her later.  Jake was roller blading.  He competes in ice speed skating and also roller blading.  Neither he nor Mary look any different than they did 10 years ago! 

 
Winter Garden has a really lovely downtown area!  The tiny speck of orange to the left in the archway is Jake rolling towards his trailer in the state park.
 
 This is a beautiful old Baptist church we walked past.