Where are the City Parks?

Day 49, May 20, 2011 – Where are the City Parks?

81.2 miles, averaging 15 mph

Route from Fort Wilderness to Daytona Beach RV Resort, Port Orange, FL

Best Moment – So today, I didn’t have a route map and I was quite apprehensive since I was using the AAA state map’s section on Orlando which was difficult to read because of all of the roads printed in a small area.  With the help of the GPS service on the cell phone, I was able to check my progress and make sure I was on the right path.  Isn’t technology amazing? 

Worst Moment – Can’t they synchronize the stoplights for bicycles?  It is a real momentum killer to have to stop and restart every couple of blocks.

The first fifty miles of today’s ride was getting through Orlando and all of the suburbs surrounding the city.  Some of the towns had wide wonderful and smooth bicycle lanes.  Others only had narrow bumpy sidewalks that I’ve resorted to for self-preservation.  It was a lot of stop and go riding – not good for long distances.  (made me wish for the interstates)

As a kid, I remember traveling and always finding a city or county park with picnic tables and restrooms.  Cycling through the suburbia in much of Florida, I’ve not found any of those parks.  Normally, I have to eat lunch in a parking lot – on Wednesday, it was a Winn Dixie, today’s was a credit union. 

After I finally got out of Orlando, there was a lot of ranchland, and more timber with very little that was exciting.  I rode past some beautiful cattle ranches – one of the guys we talked to yesterday at Disneyworld told us that Florida is the leading beef producer – who knew?

Just finished listening to a book about Southwest Airlines, the culture they encouraged, and some of the management philosophies that led to their tremendous success.  I’m reading a book called Thunderstruck, by Erik Larson.  It’s a true story about the invention of the wireless, and how Marconi’s story converged with a killer in England in the early 1900’s.  Larson wrote another fascinating book The Devil in the White City.