Fantastic Cedar Key Weekend

Talk about a fun-filled weekend! We started with an adventuresome paddle at Shell Mound. If the Gulf looks flat between the Shell Mound launch ramp and Hog Island, and the wind is blowing about 10 miles an hour, what will the waves be like on the outside of Hog Island?  Adventure! Ride those little waves in your tiny little kayak! Splash on through! Of course I didn't get the camera out until I was back to the calm side, so you'll just have to trust that it was pretty darn fun.

Russ blogged about it on Random Ferments.

Off we go

Pretty little waves

Looks calm enough on this side if the island

Russ and our friend Mark

I love floating up next to the sea grass, but it is still hard to see how it is attached to the bottom.

Slow Food Gainesville came to Cedar Key to learn about the clamming industry and to share a pot luck dinner. Check the Slow Food description HERE.

to the Clam Shack

Learning from Leslie Sturmer

Clam types

Leslie answers our questions

Look at the tiny seed clams

Almost too pretty to eat

The Small Boat Meet was this weekend too. Sometimes Cedar Key looks quiet and boring. Cedar Key deceives.

Party for the Small Boat Lovers at Jeri and Bob's

More partying

Cedar Key Gearing Up for The Winter Season

The Artist Poses with Her Work

Cedar Key is always sleepy in some ways, and almost always hopping in others. At this time of year, many seasonal residents are returning and the social scene gears up.

The Cedar Key Arts Center began its 2010-2011 Season Saturday Night, November 20, with the opening of "Mosaic Magic" by Valerie Bretl. She is a local artist and often uses tiles made by another local artist, Amy Gernhardt, to create her works. Valerie has just had a piece chosen for an international juried show in Austin in a few months. Inspired by the beauty and intimacy of our natural surroundings, she has transformed the ancient art of mosaics with her own contemporary style that flows between the real and the surreal. The exhibit featured 20 new creations. Just because we are on an island in the Gulf, and miles from the nearest chain restaurant or shop not owned by local folks doesn't mean we are short of pretty nifty artists.

After the opening, we wandered over to the Black Dog Wine and Tables with friends to sit on the deck outdoors.  The water slapped against the shore and a nearly full moon lite up the Gulf. Pretty good way to spend a Saturday evening.

This website shows a couple of the art pieces:
http://cedarkeynews.com/All/4865.html

This one is the featured artist:
http://mosaicworksbyvbretl.com/index.html

And this one is the artist whose tiles are sometimes used in the mosaics:
http://www.cedarkeypottery.com/galleries.html

A Cedar Key Evening 11-20-2010

Fall Decorations in Cedar Key

It seems as if we just put up our fall decorations and it is already time to think about when we will be packing them away and getting out our Christmas finery. The term "finery" may be a bit overblown because our recent practice has been to retire some of our less favored ornaments and migrate them to Cedar Key. This seems to us to be a good match because we think cottages and funky decorating seem somehow to go together.

Cedar Key Weekend and Novel Writing in November

Cedar Key was particularly lovely this weekend. The weather was coming down from a high of 87 degrees on Thursday, on its way to a low of 32 degrees tonight. The breezes were strong and balmy. No special events brought crowds to town, so it was just the few lucky wanderers who stumble upon the place when they are on their way someplace else, have a bit of extra time, and a lot of curiosity.

We saw a wood stork on the wooden driveway that stretches from the causeway to the house on the little island just before you get in town. A magnificent bird like that deserves to look regal. It did. The osprey that likes the tree near our house was there when we arrived.

Later we sat on our breezeway. Tortilla chips, salsa and cold beer at hand, we listened to the Florida football game on the radio. We don’t have television there. In fact the radio comes in only with aluminum foil on the antenna, and the antenna touching the screen door…but it worked fine for a game with a score of 56 to 6.

After the game and dinner, we took Jake for a stroll downtown and on Dock Street. We tried to get him to walk in the water at the city park beach, but he wanted to chase feral cats instead. The moon was big and made all the cats glow in the dark, I think.

It was a nice way to top off the week. Russ finished the first draft of his new novel. In the photos, he and Jake-the-Muse are working in his office at the computer. He is participating, again, in the National Novel Writing Month. Participants write a 50,000-word novel in November. He wrote his first one in 2006 and second one last November. It takes about a year after he has the draft to get them polished and published, but November seems to be the most fun part. Although he does get worn out from all that imagining and the other photos, he and Jake are resting in a yoga relaxation pose, trying to get their shoulders loose from all the typing. You can order the novels that are already out by going to his website www.lighthallbooks.com.

A Clam Farming Presentation

Last Sunday, after the Nature Coast Birding and Wildlife Experience, our Gainesville Slow Food Convivium came to Cedar Key for a presentation about clam farming by Leslie Sturmer from the Multi-County Aquaculture Extension Service. As we've mentioned in previous posts, the Slow Food group has visited several local farms, and clam farms fit the pattern in their own way.

When net fishing was banned off Florida's coasts, Cedar Key fishermen began clam farming. Cedar Key is now one of the premier producers of farm-raised clams in the country.

Of course, clam farms aren't quite like vegetable farms. The farmers start with a lunch-bag size sack of thousands of seed clams. They hold them in a nursery table through which they pump a continuous flow of Gulf water until the baby clams are big enough not to slip through the net bag in which they are then staked to the bottom of the Gulf in the underwater farms that the farmers lease from the State.

In a year and a half or so, the very heavy bags are harvested full of grown clams!

Pretty nifty farm visit, which was followed by an spectacular clam feast and Pot Luck dinner at our Cedar Key house. We had about 35 people in our little house, and, as you might imagine with a bunch of folks who believe food should be slow, good, clean, and fair...wonderful pot luck treats.

Cedar Key's Annual Nature Coast Birding and Wildlife Experience

Last weekend was the annual Nature Coast Birding and Wildlife Experience in Cedar Key. On Friday, we participated in the afternoon Native Plant Walk on Atsena Otie, which is the island just off the coast of Cedar Key where the town used to be until the Great Storm of 1899 washed it away and killed almost all the residents. Before the storm, there was a large factory on Atsena Otie where the Eberhard Faber company made slats from the native cedar trees. The pencils were hauled the short distance back to Cedar Key by barge, loaded on trains, and shipped around the country.

After the Great Storm, the factory was never rebuilt, people resettled on the bigger island of Cedar Key, and the major industry was the making of brooms from palms. Actually, Cedar Key was a thriving community until the railroad diverted to Tampa in the late 1920s. Until then, it was a major port for trade with Cuba and Latin America.

In fact, in the 1930s, my Quinn grandparents came here from Rochester and took a ship to Cuba to celebrate their 25th Anniversary. Nine months later, my uncle Mike was born...so the story goes.

Anyway, back to last weekend. The highlight of the hike on Atsena Otie, as usual, was the mosquitoes! We took a boat over and were immediately swarmed when we got ashore. Along the beach, it was only irksome. But inland, it was amazing. Having been there several times before, I wore long pants and long sleeves, and had a hood as well as a hat. I suffered less than the others. The legs of one woman in the group, who was wearing shorts, were covered with little black mosquitoes. Most of our group of about 12 went back by the beach, but those of us who continued had a great walk with Colette Jacono, our guide. Her enthusiasm for the plants practically overcame the annoyance of the mosquitoes ...practically

Friday evening there was a clam feast and a presentation about bird migration. Really nice. Saturday, another Native Plant hike, with few mosquitoes, an equally enthusiastic group of learners, and equally dynamic presentation by Colette. In the evening, Jake's veterinarian, Dawn Miller, brought a dozen or so birds of prey from her sanctuary to show to the 30 or so attendees. And we had another delightful dinner. Very nice, even though there were so many events that we had to skip the bird walks and boating trips, and the kayaking, in favor of plants and feeding the mosquitoes. The photos show Dawn with a hawk and two of the attendees, Peggy and Jennifer, with a small Great-Horned Owl.