Sugarland Tours

The Clewiston Chamber of Commerce offers "Sugarland Tours," an overview of the city history and the agri-business that gave the city's signature phrase "America's Sweetest Town" in a four hour whirlwind tour. It begins at the Clewiston Museum with a fossil talk and a brief history of the town. From there, you load the bus and head out towards Southern Gardens, where orange juice is made.  You see the semi-trucks loaded with oranges and are hoisted up to dump the fruit into the bins that starts the process of making juice and concentrate that you buy from grocery stores.

Next stop, the sugarcane fields. From burning off the cane, to harvesting and loading it into the train cars which roll down the tracks into US Sugar Corporation's sugar processing plant, the tour shows most of the process. Inside the plant you see how the railroad cars are pivoted so that the cut cane falls into the bins to become raw sugar.  Certain materials are added to the product to crystalize the sugar into the white granules that are used in everyday baking and sweetening in many products.

Sandwiched in-between these two tours is a wonderful buffet lunch at the historic Clewiston Inn. (More on that in a later post).

What a fascinating look at two staple food items that we expect to find on the shelves for purchase.  And they are both mainstays in the Hendry County agri-business economy. "Sugarland Tours" operates from late October until March, sugarcane's harvesting season. Log onto http://www.clewistonchamber.com/ for times and costs.  This tour is a must see when visiting the area! 

Big Cypress Christmas

I had the privilege of being able to go to the Big Cypress Seminole Reservation Christmas party this weekend. It started with a parade (notice how the Billie Swamp Buggy is decorated). 

From there, the tribe hosted a big dinner for everyone.  It was held in the rodeo arena complete with decorations and gifts.  The food was great and so was the band.  Several of the Seminole tribe dignitaries spoke, and the various princesses were on hand to add more charm.  I met the Senior Queen of the annual rodeo, a very gracious young lady. Santa even arrived on a " 4 wheeled gator" to give out presents. 

There's a lot to see and some wonderful people on the Seminole reservation. 

Make a visit there soon!! 

Only in Hendry Co.

Christmas is my favorite time of year and I was wondering what people in Hendry Co. do for the season that may be different from whence I came. I found out tonight as I saw these decorations on telephone poles down a street in Clewiston.  (Yes, the picture isn't the best since I don't have an adequate flash.)

 But if you look closely, you'll see a wide-mouth bass flipping around with some garland in his mouth!  Where would this happen? Only on the south shores of Lake O., in Hendry Co.!

Would Merry Fishmas be appropriate to say?? Or Hark the Herald Anglers Sing??   
OK, enough of that. I hope your Christmas is the merriest.

(I thought a daytimeshot would give a better idea of what it looks like).

Airboatin'

I hit the Big O twice this week, this time on an airboat!
It was fantastic seeing all the birds and ducks at mid-morning
and there were a few gators and manatees!!!
(Well, I saw manatee snouts come up for air but there were several traveling through the waters.)

What a rush to see such beautiful wildlife throughout the growth in the lake.
I'd recommend an airboat ride for anyone wanting to see what's in the lake,
besides our finned friends. It takes about an hour from start to finish and is well worth it.

Come on in, the airboatin' is fine!

Big Water, Big Water

It was my first time on Lake Okeechobee (the Lake, the Big O) today, and what a massive body of water it is! It covers 730 square miles (half the size of Rhode Island) and is the 2nd largest freshwater lake in the US! It touches on 5 counties in Florida, Hendry being one of them.  Large mouth bass, crappie and bluegill are the predominant fish in the lake (I saw the deckboy catch a bass right at the push off point).  There were many birds and gators along the edges of the river and the rim canal and seeing the fowl in flight was awesome.

The plant life, birds, fish and weather are all part of God's eco-system that keeps the lake's environment a wonder to behold.  Now all I gotta do it bait a hook and get my "Roland Martin" on.

Big water, big water...I'm coming back!

Devil's Garden Bird Park

Don't let the name fool you, it comes from Florida's history, but Devil's Gardens has a rich ecological feature!  Birds are very prevalent all over the gardens, which has hammocks (diverse hardwood forests), shell mounds, forests and prairies.  I even saw a banyon tree growing within another that resembles an octopus.

Further into the tour, the area opened up to the prairie area.  Here is where I saw many types of birds (so many that I didn't know but am learning about slowly). Whether gathered in a tree or on the wet grassy areas, these birds were incredible to watch.  The snail kite was prevalent, which searched for snails that were scattered all over the area.

 Devil's Gardens offers air boat and swamp buggy tours as well. It should be a great way to get up close and personal with the birds and even a gator or two.  I left the tour with a sense of wonder at all the species of birds and plants in this world, and felt very peaceful with a few hours away from it all in the middle of God's creations.

Captain Francis Hendry House

There are many different styles of architecture within Hendry County. Over in La Belle, there is the Captain Francis Hendry house, located on Fraser Street. Built in 1914, its style is framed vernacular and is one and a half stories.

The house was built for Captain Francis Hendry, the founder of LaBelle and the person for who Hendry County was named when it was formed in 1923. The home is an excellent example of a simple but large vernacular home of its period and is the only surviving structure in Hendry County associated with Captain Francis A. Hendry. Today it is used for private parties and other functions.  The wrap-around front porch is what caught my eye first.

More architecture as I find it.

AIAC, pt. 2

One of the part of the American Indian Arts Celebration I found most interesting was an actual building of a wickiup. Huh, you don't know what a wickiup is?
A wigwam or wickiup is a domed room dwelling used by certain Native American tribes. The term wickiup is generally used to label these kinds of dwellings in American Southwest and West. Wigwam is usually applied to these structures in the American Northeast (source is wikipedia-ironically). It's similar to a teepee which is conical and covered with skins or bark.
It was interesting to see how the family constructed it in the course of a couple of hours.  Also pictured was the "critter show" and a vendor who wove baskets on-site.  Along with the Ah-Tha-Tki-Ti Museum (the Seminole Smithsonian, if you will) and other touristy attractions on the reservation (which I hope to do on another trip), it was quite an educational weekend in south Hendry Co.

American Indian Arts Celebration

In south Hendry Co. is the Big Cypress Seminole Indian Reservation. This weekend was the annual American Indian Arts Celebration, so I thought I'd head down and check it out. Entering the reservation I realized this is a city, complete with schools, hospitals and fire station.  The location of the AIAC was on the grounds of the Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum (featuring the history of the Seminole tribe of Florida and is a Smithsonian Affliiation Program) with vendors, music and food (which really smelled great)!  One facet of the celebration focused on native dances.  Shown below are the arrow dance (which asked protection on warriors going to battle), the earth dance (using rings to symbolize the planets), rainbow dance (after the rains had come) and others.  This was a family who travelled showing their native Apache dances and were quite good.  More in my next entry on this fun day on the reservation.

The guy in red looks like a cow and turkey was chasing him.

Hendry Co. Motorsports Park

In my running around today, I came across the Hendry Co. Motorsports Park. It seems like a good venue, although it wasn't open so I couldn't see the track. What I did see at the entrance however, was a sight that made me laugh. A littlebackground...my Uncle Ralph lives in the Atlanta area and was giving me directions one day. He said "turn left at the big chicken" and go such & such. My kids were tickled at the image of a big chicken strutting around but we eventually saw that it was a large three dimensional chicken that sat on top of a building.  Hendry Co. has its own version I guess, except that it's a big rooster.  So, if you're ever in Clewiston and see a big rooster perched on a pole, turn left.  It'll get you to the Motorsports Park everytime. 

My Spanish is somewhat like Ricky Ricardo's English but I'm assuming the animal sale is a half mile from the track.

La Belle

I needed to travel over to the west part of Hendry Co. today to La Belle, the county seat and ran across a beautiful site on the Caloosahatchee (there's a name for ya) River. No, not the sailboat (is that the equivalent of a Chinese junk?), but the view of the drawbridge, so calm even with the foreboding cloud cover.

Many of its streets are lined with large oak trees which form arches over the roads.
I was told it's known as a sleepy town due to these trees, but there was plenty of activity along the streets.
Another visit to La Belle will be on my calendar in the future!

Do you bird?

I learned a new term today-birding. It has several variations (I bird, he birds, etc) but they all mean the same thing--bird watching.  And there are hundreds to watch in Hendry Co. in and around the waterways.  They even have a Birding Festival in March which attracts many tourists. The above picture is an Anahinga, one of the birds of the Everglades.  Someone had to tell me this since my knowledge of birds revolves around your typical mockingbird, woodpecker and brown thrasher.  But since I'm here I might as well buy a pair of binoculars so I can join the birders (guess that's a word) to gaze upon these unique creatures in God's feathered kingdom.  More later, but I'm looking for a blue heron.....

Clewiston Museum

I had the opportunity to visit the Clewiston Museum today, which shares the building with the Clewiston Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber ladies and Museum curator are nice folks and wow, was I surprised at the exhibits.  Oh sure, I expected to see some of Clewiston's history and sweet sugar (more on that in another post) but the nature exhibits were of mammoth proportion!  Here's a picture of one.  These fossils were discovered in 2000 near La Belle, FL, about 20 miles from Clewiston.  Imagine this beast walking the grounds of south Florida...wonder if the gators were scared of it like we are of them?

Definately worth seeing when you're in Hendry County, and pick up an "I've Been Raising Cane" T-shirt while you're there, too. (Would Eve have worn this after the fall?) LOL

Southern Beau in South Flo, seeing what's happening in Hendry...

New Career, New Place

I've never made a major change in my life on Halloween before, but it happened to fall on this day. So, with Christmas tunes playing on the iPod (yep, I like to start early) I made the long drive down to Hendry Co. Florida, my new home.  I quickly met up with the town's most mature cheerleader, Miss Opal and she began to tell me histories of this and that, as she drove me around the Clewiston neighborhoods.  (For a 90ish year old woman, she can still keep it in the road...thankfully).  Miss Opal is campaign manger for a local commissioner race, and I saw evidence of her hard work in many yards along the way. The most beautiful sight was driving up to the levee of Lake Okeechobee (going forward will be referred to as "the big O").  I could see the south shore of the lake and learned that it spans a good 100 miles or more making it the 2nd largest freshwater lake in the U.S. (that is big) It makes me anxious to get on the water and see how the big O looks up close, but that will be for another day.  I've already bought my new fishing shades, so I'm ready for the adventure to begin.

PS. If you're wondering what's the largest freshwater lake,

it's Lake Michigan, and only the great lake entirely in the U.S.