floridatraveler

Kids rush to Disney World to meet Mickey Mouse. Teens floak to Universal for Harry Potter and Super-heroes. Now Busch Gardens has a little celebrity power. (Those Madagascar films netted $1.8 billion in revenue.)

Alex the Lion, Marty the Zebra, King Julien the Lemur, and the others will appear in a live musical production starting in May as well as meet and greet the amusement park crowds. Good idea?

During the cold winter months, Florida’s wonderful manatee (sea cow) population head up river to warm springs and go to the warming waters of bay power plants. It is the best time for non-divers to get close to viewing manatees.

BEST VIEWING SPOTS in winter: Blue Springs State Park in Orange City; the Mantee Observation Center on North Indian River Drive in Fort Pierce, Crystal River, Homosassa Springs, and the TECO Mantee Viewing Center in Apollo Beach.

If you want to take some underwater photographs of manatees without getting wet, try the Florida Manatee and Aquatic Center at Tampa’s Lowry Park.

The Florida State Fair just opened in Tampa off US 301 and I-4. The Fair contains the usual anusement rides, livestock competitions, and diverse free entertainment.

Of importance to history buffs, it is the opportunity to see the historic Cracker Country filled with volunteers demonstrating the crafts and skills of Florida’s past. It is a living hiostory lesson for kids of all ages.

This weekend is Tampa’s annual Gasparilla Festival when the infamous Spanish pirate Jose Gaspar arrives to turn the city into a Mardi Gras festival. Historians have found no evidence in the existence of Gaspar nor his harem of kidnapped beauties on Captiva Island.

But there is a real legend behind the region’s love of pirates – he was Juan Gomez, who came to Florida before the Civil War. He claimed he had served on pirate ships, frought in the Seminole War, and was once a wrecker in the Florida Keys.

His stories fascinated the settlers of Lee County, including pioneer Captain W. D. Collier who visited Gomez and his wife in their homestead on Panther Key in the Thousand Islands. Gomez died in 1900, at the claimed age of 119.

People wrote books and articles about his stories. In 1904 when the Tampa business community decided to have a festival, it was logical pirates would be the most popular theme for tourists.

The recent death of college baseball coach and legend Ron Fraser reminded me he was my first interview as the sports editor at U. of Miami. Baseball was not a BIG sport at the U, but Fraser said that would change. He was sure right.

He turned down the job of coaching the “Olympic baseball team of USSR” when he noted the Russian kids were “recruited.” He told me he would rather coach a talentless team of kids who loved baseball than a bunch of packaged super-jocks.

Fraser never had a losing season at Miami. He won two NCAA Championships and got to coach the US Olympic baseball team. He is a member of 10 different Halls of Fame. He showed colleges across the land how to pack the fans into college baseball games. Florida and baseball will miss him.

Some rockclimbing Arizona friends asked me – can you go bouldering in Florida, the flattest state? The answer is YES – in a somewhat odd way.

While most Florida climbers work out at gyms or even try some canal walls, at Blowing Park Preserve near Jupiter, you can go “beach bouldering.” Unique rocky Anastasia limestone foundations jet out above the sandy beach. This is one of the few places in the USA where you can combine surfing and rockclimbing at one destination.

On January 18, 19, and 20, the 22th annual BROOKSVILLE RAID takes place 10 miles west of town at the Sand Hill Boy Scout Camp on Hwy 50. The battle represents a time in July of 1864 when Federal forces marched inland after attacking the key blockade running port at Bayport on the Gulf.

While most historians talk about the event as a skirmish, the people of Hernando County have made the reenactment one of the best in the South – 28 cannons, rows of cavalry, and a cast of hundreds. There are tons of events and the profits go to the wonderful 1854 Heritage Museum in Brooksville.