June 9, 2010 - Day Thirty-three

We left Orlando to head north to Jacksonville to visit Marianne’s brother Peter, and his wife, Suzanne, and daughter, Stephanie. Their daughter Laura was vacationing in the Bahamas this week, so she was going to miss out on all the fun!

We found their house using our GPS and parked out front, and as soon as we did, their neighbor came over and had to check us out. We knew that Peter and Suzanne were still at work, but Stephanie had headed to the local Wal*Mart to fulfill her shopping fix. We called her on her cell phone and she was home in ten minutes.

The Tills have a great home, and a nice large yard that the dogs immediately took to. They also have two cats, a brother and sister called Mister and Missus. Although Mister is the braver of the two, Missus is the original real scaredy cat. She hid underneath the master bed the entire time we were there, we never caught a glimpse of her. Mister came out of his hiding spot when the dogs were safely outside and he could be the king of his domain again.

The dogs also found a few of the cat’s toys and loved them to pieces, literally. Who knew that our dogs loved catnip so much. The next time I go shopping for pet toys, I’m going to avoid the dog aisle altogether and head straight for the kitty stuff!

Within a short while Suzanne came home, she’s a special education instructor, and this was the last day of kids in the classroom before summer break. She loves her job, so she had mixed emotions: elated that the school year was over, but sad that she’d miss the kids she’d grown so found of for a while.

Later, Peter finally came home and we had to decide what where we wanted to go for dinner. Suzanne had been raving about a Vietnamese restaurant for quite some time, but Stephanie wasn’t too keen on that idea. In the end we elected to go to a “fish camp” about a mile from their home.

Clarks Fish Camp was once a real fish camp on a tributary of the St. John’s River, the large river that flows through Jacksonville and empties into the Atlantic. It’s now an extremely popular restaurant that has a jungle motif and partially overhangs the water. It was so popular that we had to get on waiting list to get a place to sit.

After snapping photos in this very photogenic site, we were seated with stuffed (as in very large stuffed) toys staring down at us from above. Pete and Suzanne said we just had to try the deep fried pickle slices. Now, I’ve never heard of anything like that, but I’m always up for a new taste sensation, so we ordered a large plate to share among the five of us as an appetizer. I have to admit they were very good. I believe they are prepared just like fried zucchini or fried okra, breaded and then deep fat fried and served with a ranch dressing.

This restaurant had an exotic menu, including barbecued alligator ribs. That was a little too much for me, so I just stuck with the deep fried shrimp and Marianne with barbecue pork ribs. The food was very tasty and the ambience was super.

After dinner we returned to their home to pick up the trailer and then take it to another fish camp, Pacetti’s, which really was a fish camp. It’s located about a mile up a tributary of the St. John’s River. Pete rode with me in the truck and girls followed in another car.

I set up the trailer with just a few minutes of available light before night set it. Afterward all we relaxed inside the trailer for a bit. To celebrate the occasion, I decided to bestow the highly coveted honor of “honorary trailer trash” on them. It was an extremely moving ceremony.