Air Boat

The Everglades

Arrived Everglades City. Old Florida. Took the last room in town at the Rod and Gun. Soaking up the local salad bag culture at one of the only restaurants in town. At least 50% of the people around us are French. You can tell because they’re not wearing tie-die or camouflage. Also they speak French.

We saw an 18 foot Burmese python in shark valley today, among dozens of alligators and one rare American crocodile. The python is an introduced species that’s the new top of the food chain in the everglades. Apparently that’s what happens when your bathtub pet gets too big. Or your exotic pet store encounters a hurricane.

It was surrounded by park rangers fingering their holstered tasers and trying to maintain their swagger. “Holy Christ. Call the snake guys.”

This restaurant is in a reclaimed railroad station. The tracks were torn up in the 50s.

Tomorrow we’re kayaking through the mangroves. Love it here.

Miami

Driving in Miami

miami

Centerpiece

I was in charge of the centerpiece for Christmas dinner.

Washington DC

We just flew to DC from Munich. The winds were gusting to 28 knots on landing and it was bumpy. During that communal quiet period on approach the sounds of people vomiting into their laps were audible from all corners of the plane.

We’re staying right next to the White House and went straight over to get a picture. It was ridiculously cold — colder than Munich. But, grace à dieu, no snow. This morning I spent 30 minutes scraping snow and ice off our rental car so we could drive to the airport in Munich. I might be done living in cold places.

Politics aside I always love being in DC. Tomorrow we’re going to visit the Air & Space Museum and the Smithsonian. And then we’ll drive down to Charlottesville to spend Christmas with my family.

On the flight over I finished Wind Sand and Stars which was exceedingly beautiful. It was written by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the author of The Little Prince and an early aviator in the French mail service. What those pilots did was clinically insane: searching for passes through the Andes and crossing vast stretches of the Sahara in tiny single-engine planes with almost no navigation or communication equipment.

If you find it read at least the chapter “Oasis” about meeting two young girls in Paraguay. It is seven pages long and you can read it standing up in the bookstore.