My job grants me two weeks of Christmas break. This year, one of those weeks was before my eldest’s school break… So I had a week more or less to myself (at least for half the day on most of those days–I keep my youngest with me half days at this point in time).

I had big plans: take a long hike. Walk the Riverwalk in Tampa. Get coffee at some cafes. Eat some baked goods. Wander a bit. Go to the library.

I did all that, bit by bit, starting with Monday (my visit to Werner-Boyce Salt Springs State Park–you may have already read about that here, so I won’t repeat myself.)

Tuesday I had some not-cool tasks to do at home (aka, I had to clean the apartment).

Wednesday I set off to J.B. Starkey Wilderness Park, determined to complete the 7 mile hike I’d seen on allTrails (portions of which I had done in the past). It’d been soooo long since I’d been able to walk more than three or four miles, and it’d been months since I’d visited Starkey. I was excited.

The trail began, as most longer trails at Starkey do, at the horse corral. It was a cloudy morning, but not overly cool. I chugged a water bottle before leaving the car and packed another in my small backpack for the trail (I didn’t end up touching it until the walk was through).

Not much has changed along the segments of the trail I’d taken time and time again, but it was good to take in the familiar pines and palmetto and scrub oak and their dusty, faint coniferous smell. (Not as powerful a scent as the balsam firs in Maine, but still slightly restorative to the soul.) I encountered a couple of folks, most taking their dogs along on their hike, within a few miles from the corral. Once I passed the powerlines that bisect the trail into two approximately equal lengths, though, I was on my own.

Lying along the trail I took are the primitive camping sites 1, 2, and 3 (though they do not fall in that order–as I realized one fateful night). I’ve camped in one of them and attempted to camp in another, BUT–this was when my eldest was about a year or so old–I never made it to site 1. I did not allocate enough time to lug a dog and a toddler (and the latter’s feeding supplies–he was tube-fed at the time), a tent, camping equipment, “real” food, etc. in the wagon we borrowed from my parents. It was wintertime so night came upon us at 6:00-ish, and it grew harder and harder to navigate the sandy paths and hog ruts and oak roots. I knew that my site lay far out, but a couple wrong turns on the path meant it was too far to reach in a reasonable amount of time (and, if memory serves right, my blood sugar was dropping. Joy.). I planned to stop at the nearest site, my actual reservation be damned, but when I reached the third (closest) site, I was dismayed to find it occupied…

So I decided to camp on the trail, out of the way. I recognized the spot I chose when I was hiking, thanks to the big, concrete pipe you can see above. The experience was an all-around disaster. When I stopped, it was too dark to set up cooking equipment quickly, and mosquitoes were out and about, trying to eat up my son. I tried to hide him in the tent but he cried (I am sorry to those souls who were trying to camp at primitive site #3!). I gave up and took a can of food into the tent. My son thought it hilarious that we were inside a big nylon play area and went here, there, and everywhere inside, making it hard to hook him up to his feeding pump. When I did, he cried at the relative leash this put on him. I tried to calm and soothe him with limited success. I ate a bit to avoid dying of hypoglycemia and tried to sing my son to sleep (or at least to gentle rest), but to no avail. He was either laughing or crying, but always louder than I wished, since we weren’t actually in a campsite (for one) and were probably ruining the night of the people nearby (for two).

In fact, the nearby people did come close to investigate why a baby was crying nearby, and then my dog barked at them, and I could have disappeared into the void just from embarrassment alone. The poor people retreated and eventually (at around 9 pm, I believe) I fell asleep and my son did, too.

When we woke at 5:45 ish I found that his tube had disconnected and the tent was full of gross non-allergenic toddler formula. Sigh. I ate another ready-to-eat snack (probably a protein bar), gave my dog some kibble and water, and quickly and quietly packed everything up and away.

Despite the failure of the night before, the walk back to the car was glorious. The early morning mist on the pines was beautiful. I’d like to do it all again, but do it rightly.

(In short–I’d recommend the primitive camping at Starkey to anyone interested in a supposed-to-be private and wild camping experience. Just make sure you give yourself two-and-a-half hours or more to get to your site, just in case.)

Back to my current story: I completed the 7.4 miles in under two and a half hours, as was necessary to get my youngest son from the babysitter on time. I got a few blisters from my efforts thanks to the not-entirely-comfortable Adidas hiking shoes I’ve had for a few years. (Does anyone have any suggestions for VERY comfortable, durable, and lightweight hiking shoes or boots?…)

Which brings us to the next day, when I had a full 6 or so hours to myself. I decided to head towards St. Petersburg, since I had time for the drive.

I wanted some light breakfast, so my first stop was Gulfport. I’d never before been on a weekday, so I can’t say whether it was unseasonably empty or not… But I will say it was hit fairly hard by flooding just a few months ago when Helene shred through the Gulf.

I visited a coffee and wine lounge I’ve been to several times before: Sumitra Espresso Lounge. I always love the shop’s ambiance and haven’t had a bad drink there, either. I’m an abysmal photographer, so you’ll have to take my word for the coziness of its vaguely… Turkic?… Interior, that boasts a lot of gold, rich red and orange hues, and polished, dark wood. Like most coffee shops, bossa nova music plays gently in the background. There was a small collection of eclectic books in the window to peruse while eating and drinking. I’d brought my own book, though, so that’s what I read as I drank my drinking chocolate (which is kind of like a rich, not overly sweet latte, but sans coffee) and ate my white chocolate and cranberry scone.

After sitting for a while, I wanted some vegan American-style food from the nearby Golden Dinosaurs restaurant, but they would not open for another hour… and I had much more to do in the three hours left to me. So I traveled to Central Ave. in downtown St. Petersburg and went on a walk, telling myself I could stop anywhere I liked and get whatever lunch options struck my eye. I knew several vegetarian and vegan options lay on Central, but as I passed by House of Vegano I didn’t feel like sushi and near Love Food Central I realized I didn’t feel like eating a sandwich. I wasn’t feeling any noodles or vegetarian brats, either, so that crossed most of the establishments off my list.

I did, however, stop at a sourdough bakery full of every imaginable sourdough creation (biscuits, pies, brownies, cookies, pancakes, etc. etc.) and get a nice rosemary loaf that actually tasted (and was) artisanal.

And then I got back in my car, keeping to the two-hour limit to free parking, and went to the the Neighborhood Joe cafe and had a quick lunch before making my last stop before getting my children: Sawgrass Lake Park. I was (stupidly) surprised to see that a portion of the park was cordoned off and closed, including their nature center, due to damage from the hurricanes. Still, their boardwalk was open, and in my estimation, that’s the jewel of the park, anyhow.

The boardwalk is about a half-a-mile long. While walking, I could see a bit of the impact the storms had had on the park’s flora. I assume it would have been much worse before the park staff began to cleanup and fix up the park.

While walking, I saw a few juvenile alligators (unpictured) and some fish congregated near their lookout tower, including the always-cool-to-see Florida gar. (Forgive me, and correct me, if I’ve identified it wrong. I know it’s a gar and it seems to match the Florida gar description best, but I am no ichthyologist.)

I bid farewell to fish and reptile and high-tailed it back home to get my kids on time. Night fell, morning came, and the next day I once again had only a few hours to myself. So, I chose to go to Tarpon Springs and browse some shops for almost-last-minute presents, drink some coffee, visit the library, and take a suburban walk I was well-familiar with, but hadn’t undertaken in a year or so.

I started, of course, with coffee. Again, my photograph skills leave a lot to be desired, but trust me when I say that Urban Grounds was a fantastically adorable cafe and my crappy picture from a couch in their loft does no justice whatsoever to that fact.

(The coffee and chocolate mousse I had were very good, too.)

I’d have stayed much longer, pausing to read or write, but I didn’t have much time. It was soon time to take a quick walk to the Tarpon Springs library and revel in their relatively huge and still-admirable collection of books.

All the libraries near me have gutted their book selection, curating it to mostly contemporary selections that are more likely to be checked out and utilized, I suppose, by the masses, and filled their space with meeting areas and classrooms. In a way, that is great, but the devaluation of reading is (to me) a hard pill to swallow. I want the next generation (and the next, and the next) to see that reading is not just pleasurable but life-changing, and without easy access to quality literature, I worry that they may never find that out. (Additionally, I personally find it very hard to find classic literature or truly thought-provoking works from more recent years, which often drives me to Amazon to purchase whatever book I ache to read. )

The library in Tarpon Springs, though, looks and acts like libraries did when I was a child. It smells like books and retains hulking aisles of options. During my walkthrough I found dozens of books I’d either read and loved, or aimed to read, or had never heard of but were written by authors I’d enjoyed in the past. I borrowed several such books after browsing for half-an-hour. My next stop was a boutique home decor store, where I bought several small gifts that were also deposited in my car while I took my long-awaited stroll at Craig Park.

Craig Park is a relatively small park that surrounds the bayou in Tarpon Springs. A claim to fame held by the park (and its bayou) is that it is used by the local Greek Orthodox as the spot of their famous cross dive on Epiphany. (If you do not live near to, or have never heard of, Tarpon Springs, you may not know that it has a very high percentage of Greek residents–in 2000, the highest of any city in the US. It’s filled with Greek restaurants and relics from its heyday as a sponging town.)

This particular walk is by no means the most wild of options, but I’ve always enjoyed it. You can sometimes spot neat fish in the water if the tide is low (I’ve seen a juvenile sting ray skirt past and saw either a baby shark or relatively little catfish, once) and, best of all, can see and hear dolphins or manatees circling the bayou when the weather is cool. In fact, I used to come here at night in the wintertime when I didn’t have children–if it was cold enough to need a jacket, then I’d almost certainly spot one or the other of those large sea mammals. (Apparently, you can try to spot some of these creatures without leaving home through a webcam stream here. )

But even the less-than-wild aspects of the walk are nice: the neighborhood that surrounds Craig Park is picturesque and delightful to look at, too. I love the homes there and even allow myself, just a little, to wish I had the money to own one of the mini-mansions facing the Bayou.

I circled back to my car after thirty minutes or so of meandering. I didn’t spot or hear any aquatic animals and the only land animal I noticed was a curious squirrel, who paused long enough from its tree trunk to listen to me say “hi” before scurrying away to feast on the many fallen acorns from the sprawling oaks that lay between the paved pathways.

That was my Friday; that was my week. It was a big win in my book. I love bringing my kids (and husband) with me on my adventures, and they have all accompanied me to the places I visited alone this week, but I was happy to visit them once again in the near-complete serenity and peace of my own company…

I suppose I think of it as a way to recharge for the occasionally gargantuan task of introducing them to both the human and natural wonders of the world around us!