Some weeks ago, I visited the town of Celebration in Florida. It's quite a nice and very Disney village. In fact, it's extremely quiet and I believe its first major crime ever was a murder a few months before I visited. I stayed in an hotel called oddly enough, the Celebration Hotel. This was situated on the bank of a large artificial lake
It was a huge lake to walk around. It also had alligators swimming around. There were plenty signs about not feeding alligators. All around the lake was a pretty good wildlife habitat. The bird below was having a great time with its brothers and sisters, chirping away and presumably resting or waiting for prey.
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| Marsh bird in Celebration, Florida |
Not to be outdone, the local flora was quite interesting too. Ignoring the Spanish Moss which seems to grow just about everywhere, there was this gorgeous flower. Oddly enough, this was right beside the hotel, just growing in a flowerbed. I suspect it had been planted on purpose but the vegetation in Florida grows so fiercely due to the warm, moist climate that vegetation can spring up almost overnight. This explains the fact that Disneyland in Florida has teams of gardeners constantly pruning, trimming and planting.
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| Flower in Celebration, Florida |
Outside the hotel where I stayed were two lovingly restored old cars. I'm not sure what either of them were but I gather they were used to ferry extra-special hotel guests around the place. It would have been nice to try driving one but alas, that was not to be.
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| Car at Celebration hotel, Celebration, Florida |
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| Car at Celebration hotel, Celebration, Florida |
The lobby of the hotel was very 1920s and deliberately so. A man sat playing a grand piano while guests sat around on grand looking wicker or leather chairs, reading newspapers and drinking from the bar. A waiter in tails patiently went around serving drinks from a little silver tray while overhead a ceiling fan quietly circulated cool air. The beer was ice-cold. This is not my favorite, being British, but it was quite pleasant. I'd never had beer with a slice of orange served with it before.
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| Alligator in the lake at Celebration, Florida |
As I said earlier, there were alligators in the lake. I only saw one and only saw that when there was a commotion. I was sitting on the verandah near the swimming pool when somebody mentioned that there was an alligator in the lake. Suddenly all the guests on the verandah leapt to their feet and raced in an undignified fashion to the verandah railings then elbowed their way through to take a good look at the alligator. I merely left the verandah and the elbowing crowds to walk around the edge of the lake to take my photograph.
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| Birds at a golf course, Florida |
After the commotion had died down, I wandered toward a golf-course which is where I saw these beauties. Again, I have no idea what they are. Ornithology really isn't my field. I did admire the red crests on the birds heads.
I think my stay in Celebration was the happiest of my visits to Florida. I was not in the middle of any crowds and was pleasantly relaxed. There was a very nice little barber shop near the lake where I had my hair cut and a whole series of rather good restaurants. Disneyland was not far away and of course I did visit Disneyland but to be honest, Disneyland is not really my thing. Yes, it's nice and there's always something to see and do but it's all so incredibly fake. I would rather experience real life and live my life than to visit some expensive fantasy-land. That's pretty much my entire view of amusement parks. The barber shop is below, together with an old-style British phone booth.
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| Sherlocks of Celebration, Florida |
While I was at the Celebration hotel, I sampled some beer that I'd never tried before. That was called "blue moon" and it was extremely nice, especially with the aforementioned slice of orange. The food and drink I have encountered in the US has almost without exception been excellent. The only exception would be some of the food I ate in Disneyland which did make me ill. It wasn't good food, despite the fact that Disney restaurants are devilishly expensive.
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| Celebration hotel, Celebration, Florida |
The water wouldn't stay calm enough to do a really great picture of the hotel, the entire two weeks I was there. It was such a shame. It was also fairly cloudy as there was a wave of tropical storms coming in.
