adventures in snow white land . . .

robin decided a visit to Gamble Place . . . think Proctor and Gamble . . . would be perfect for today's adventure.  in all of the years i have lived in the area, i had never been there  . . .  even after hearing about Snow White's cottage.

so we hopped in the car and made it down there for the 10:00 tour.  slight problem.  politics.  with no available funding, the retreat is no longer open to the public and falling to ruins.  after chatting with one of the employees and voicing our disappointment, he shuffled his feet a tad and told us that there was no fence on the north side of the locked gate.  hummmm, thought robin and i.  hummmm, indeed.  getting arrested is on my bucket list.  not high, you understand but nevertheless there.  a little trespassing might be just the ticket . . . and off we wandered.   tromping through the woods, over fallen trees and bypassing palmetto scrub until we arrived at the complex. 

first on our list?  snow white's cottage.  Upon James Gamble's death, the spread was left to his daughter Maud and son-in-law, Judge Albert Nippert. Three months after Maud's death in 1937, Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was released.  Judge Nippert was so enamored with the movie, he designed a replica of the movie cottage for the youngsters in the family. 

 and the wishing well:

but since we were obviously trespassing, imagine my shock when i peeked in a window and came face to face with this guy:

who turned out to be a cut out of James Gamble.  Yikes.  See Jeanne jump.

not to be outdone, it was See Robin jump when she ambled into a snake sunning himself on a rock.

and actually, we ran into lots of animals.  this was a very friendly welcome cat:

Archimedes:

one of 35 resident peacocks:

the cockiest of the thirty five:

and a pen full of roosters and hens:

after visiting all of the buildings, we decided it had warmed up sufficiently to go water biking.  yup, you read that right.  robin and climbed on pontoon water bikes and took off down the river. 

we actually did quite well until we saw a huge gator slither down off the bank on which he was sunning and drop down into the water . . . the same water we were navigating upon.  discretion being the better part of valor, we decided to turn around and beat a hasty retreat.  problem?  it is not easy to turn around on pontoons.  you sort of have to do a modified K turn with lots of backing up and going forward.  not the preferred method when trying to leave behind a scaled monster tout de suite.

all and all it was a fabulous adventure.  i hope my butt and knees agree in the morning.  thanks, robin for a great day out of the cave.