Highlands Hammock State Park, Sebring, Florida
How hot is it?
It’s so hot, our cold water has to run to get cold and hot water is hot as soon as you turn it on!
How hot is it?
It’s so hot, if you spin slowly in a circle, you feel like a rotisserie chicken!
How hot is it?
It’s so hot, that fire they started 5 days ago is still smoldering.
How hot is it?
It’s so hot, Florida has been experiencing record high temperatures and breaking records for the month of February! We’re into 21 days of consecutive temperatures of 80 degrees or higher in February, breaking the record of 13 days set back in 1932, and a record high for the day of 86 set in 1891! The normal high is 73!
And all of these are true!
We returned to the same church this morning. It was every bit as good as last week!
It began with the couple sitting next to us. They continued to make us feel welcome even after a friend came and joined them. This is the way church is supposed to be!
They’re sending out a team of teenagers to South Korea to spend some time in an orphanage there. The kids were very engaging! Then they presented a ‘going away’ gift to a couple who’d been serving for the past 40 years and are moving away. And they still did all the worship music! And the pastor still delivered his full message. It seems they’re not so focused on the clock here, and no one seems to mind. What a novel idea!
The message this morning was on witnessing again and how Jesus chose ordinary people to be his apostles. He’s still using ordinary people. We’re all capable and not only that, expected, to share the Good News of Jesus.
Matthew Chapter 10 and John Chapter 13 were the focus. The first few verses in Matthew use the words ‘disciples’ and ‘apostles’ and he began with that. A disciple is someone who is learning from their teacher. What have we learned from our Teacher this week? Am I still, no matter my age, open to learn? Or do I think I know it all already? Is the knowledge of what I learn in my head? Or has it moved into my heart as well?
He says an apostle was someone given a message to declare to others, not only learn from Him. He chose those twelve ordinary men. Twelve men prone to failure, all of them. All of them imperfect in different ways. Their lives changed after they received the promised Holy Spirit. Our lives change too, and we are to reflect that change. Especially by our actions. We are called to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves (Matthew 10:16). And we are called to humbleness – meaning nothing in the realm of caring for others is to be beneath us (John 13:16-17). And we are called to love others – … “by this everyone will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35).
After church, we decided to take a walk. Big mistake! It’s almost 90 degrees in the shade! Oh. Wait. There was no shade!
Blaine suggested we try a new area of the Park today, Seven Lakes. We were expecting water. We were expecting beauty. We were expecting . . . . shade.
Hmmm. We saw one lake. We saw water alright, but it was covering the trail and we couldn’t get through. The beauty? That was a little harder to find, but in the midst of personally evaporating, I searched for it and found some! The shade? Nope. Not even cloud cover! I think we had some for a couple of minutes, but that was it. I know when you look at the pictures you’ll think I’m crazy. There are tons of clouds in the pictures. None of them were between us and the sun. . . .
again
When we began this arduous journey, we had a nice wide mowed-grass trail that we thought would circle around the lake.
Once we rounded that bend, there was a little corgi-type dog that stopped dead in its tracks when it saw us. We starred each other down for a minute or so and then turned tail and took off fast as it could go! We never saw it, or its owner again. : )
Before long, we came to a spot where the water from the big(ger) lake was seeping across and into a small pond.
Over there’s where we started
We couldn’t get through, so we went around.
It seemed to be going in the right direction, even though we could no longer see the lake.
I imagine it was not much unlike trudging through a dessert. The sand was deep and loose, but at least there was scrub here. Still, it was blazing hot and I felt like I was slowly cooking. So did Blaine.
“Do you want to turn around?” “No. We might as well keep going. It has to get better.”
It didn’t. And now we’re too far along to turn back.
Snake tracks.
These were all over the road.
Some going right down the middle, some going across.
I began earnestly seeking beautiful things to take pictures of. I knew Blaine was a little irritated because he wanted to keep going and get out of the heat, but I needed reminders that God has made all things beautiful. (Ecc 3:11)
Creative photography!
I went underneath this one!
This is the view from the top.
Pretty sure this is a Gopher Tortoise hole. It seemed too big to be a Pocket Gopher hole.
We determined we were on the opposite side of the lake from where we started.
Ugh! Only halfway back!
This one was all alone and very small. Maybe the size of a quarter?
Stunning beauty!
We thought this tunnel was probably made by the pocket gophers
At least we’re out of the sand now . . .
But it’s still blistering!
Roadblock . . .
Civilization appears!
Could we possibly be saved?!?
About 3.5 miles later, we made it to the road we drove in on, crossed through barbed wire fencing, and headed back to the Jeep with lunch and more water still a half mile away. I was about done in.
Blaine held the top 2 and bottom two together and I crawled – carefully – through and then I did the same for him.
There’s the Jeep!!!!!
But there, on the picnic table, was one of those ‘lizards’ we keep taking pictures of, only this one looked like the Geico gecko! He was on a brown table and stayed bright green and sitting beside me, right up to the time we were ready to leave, and then he turned brown. How nice!
Posing!
Refreshed, we head back home. But not before I took two more pictures. These were near the Jeep.
These red ones weren’t much larger than the head of a quilting pin!
I can’t decide if I like this picture or the purple one best!
I even captured a grasshopper!
I didn’t even know it was there until I looked at the picture later!
So I did find plenty of beautiful things today! I guess I’ll just have to look harder from now on!
That was more than enough for today. Blaine had a race to watch, I read.
It was a NASCAR race in Atlanta. Kevin Harvick won.
That information will be important come tomorrow . . .
We’ll end today with a sunset picture:
TOTAL HIKING MILES: 4
Year To Date: 164
Daily Average: 2.92 (day 56)