Mitchell and I had been traveling through Florida, slowly making our way towards Key West. Along the way, we would stop at cute little beach spots. One was Pensacola Beach, where I learned that one of my favorite things is drinking my morning coffee on the beach while watching the ocean.
We wanted to check out Madison Blue Springs, which was on our route. The friends who had told us about the place claimed it to be the most beautiful spring in the US. I arrived at a trailhead entrance in my car before Mitchell, and we planned to park overnight and go the next morning. I noticed an orange cat lying in the grass off in the corner of the parking lot. Of course I had to try to pet him. He stared at me as I slowly walked up, and I found it strange that he didn’t try to run as I approached him. It also seemed like one of his eyes looked funny. Once I got up to him, I realized one of his eyes was completely gone, and he was injured. After petting him for a bit I tried to pick him up. That’s when I found out he wasn’t able to walk. He could move his feet, but couldn’t stand at all. I held him in my lap as I tried to call vets and animal shelters, with no luck. Nobody would take him without me taking financial responsibility for him, which I wasn’t able to do.
Once Mitchell arrived, I brought the kitty, who I had already named Thomas, into Mitchell’s bus. It was going to be cold that night and I figured the least we could do was keep him warm. We made him a little bed in the bathroom area where he slept for six hours before we heard a big thud. To my surprise, he was getting up! He slowly stumbled around the bus sniffing everything. He started purring as he walked around the bus, and then laid in the middle of the floor, still purring. He was just the happiest cat.
I posted on a few Facebook pages seeing if he belonged to anyone, but nobody claimed him. So just like that, we had a one-eyed, fat, orange cat named Thomas traveling with us. We both became very fond of him, and after one small brawl he and Maggie now get along. Thomas loves to just hang out with us. He’s always curious about what we are doing and loves sitting on the dashboard of the bus.
The next day we went to Madison Blue Spring. Thomas stayed back in the air conditioned bus, and Maggie came along with us. When I first saw the springs, it took my breath away. The water was such a beautiful blue color, and it was so clear that you could see every detail of the land below the water.
As we were looking at the water, we noticed little bubbles coming up to the surface, and then seemingly out of nowhere a group of scuba divers appeared, emerging from a cave far below and swimming by us.
We explored the distinctive trees that surrounded the water. They had all sorts of twists and turns in the trunks.
One of the trees was a cypress tree. It had what’s called “cypress knees” growing all around it, where little parts of the tree stretch up from the ground coming from the roots below.
We look Maggie back to a little beach that was deeper in the woods and down some trails. A worker had told us about the beach and said it was okay to let Maggie run free there. We arrived at the beach and the water there was absolutely beautiful too! From everything surrounding it, it looked as though there was a rainbow reflecting off the water. We enjoyed the beach for a bit while Maggie enjoyed running free.
Our next stop was Cocoa Beach. My birthday was coming up and I had hemmed and hawed about where to go and what to do for it. I would be turning 24 for the fourth year in a row. I decided that Cocoa Beach would be the perfect spot. And as a birthday gift from my parents for my birthday we made reservations to go parasailing!
When we arrived at the parasailing place, they loaded us onto a boat with five other people who would be going, and put us all in life jackets and harnesses. When it was our turn, we had to sit with our legs straight out in front of us. When they attached the parachute to us, we slowly started to float up 1000 feet. I was expecting a rush, but we rose slowly, and it was more relaxing than the adrenaline surge I thought would occur.
Once we were up in the air, we had a beautiful view. We could see the beach far off in the distance, and the ocean went on forever. A giant stingray swam in the water below us, my first time seeing one in the wild.
After a while they brought us gently back down. Once we got close to the water they dipped our feet in before bringing us back on the boat. As we neared the dock it was surrounded by pelicans. Someone had brought a bucket of fish and threw it off the edge of the dock. We watched as they all swarmed the fish. One pelican was in such a rush to get to the fish, it flew right into some man’s head.
Once we were back on land, we took the motorcycle to the beach. As soon as we hit the sand, I ran right for the ocean and jumped in the salty water. We hung out on the beach and swam for a bit until the clouds rolled in and it started to down pour. We collected our things and made a run for the pier, where we took cover. Eventually I decided I wanted to play in the rain. I was already wet, so why not? I ran around through the water and splashed about as the rain poured down on me.
We explored the pier and all the little shops on and around it. We stopped by a little stand where a man had fliers, and I asked him what there was to do around here on a budget. He told us about a hotel we could go to where we could listen to a timeshare presentation where we would get fed and paid for attending. He said: “all you have to do is lie and tell them you own a successful restaurant or something so you make money.” I liked the sound of that, so he set it up for us to go the next day.
We ended the day with a gluten free chocolate cake that Mitchell had gotten me. He sang me Happy Birthday before I made a wish and blew out my candles.
The timeshare presentation ended up being a blast. I loved it because we had to make up a completely fake life to tell these people. I enjoyed chatting with the woman about my pretend restaurant and employees. It was like a little game. They fed us lunch, took us on a tour in a golf cart, and at the end we told them we weren't interested. And just like that, they gave us a $100 visa gift card and we were on our way.
Cocoa Beach is close to Cape Canaveral where NASA launches rockets. My dad had told me about one that was happening soon, so we stayed a few extra nights in order to see it. It was occurring at 1 am, and we wandered aimlessly around town with Maggie until it was almost time. Then Mitchell, Maggie, and I all went onto the beach, where many others had gathered to watch as well. When the rocket launched, it was bright as day. It looked like the sun flying through the sky, peeking in and out of the clouds. Suddenly, the delayed sound hit us, rumbling through the sky and vibrating the warm night air around us.
Exploring all the shops and different beaches in Cocoa Beach was fun, but it was hard to find spots to sleep. Every single night the cops knocked on our door and made us move because “there’s no camping inside city limits”. But every single time they were extremely nice and would tell us somewhere we could move within the city where we probably wouldn’t be bothered. We had to talk to the cops on five different occasions in the four nights we were there, but in all honesty, that just added to the fun.
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