Touring Ocala with Cal and Maggie

Cal and Maggie's flight arrived at Orlando Airport last night and I was there to greet them.  Although there was a detour that took us off of the Florida toll road on the way back, we still made it home safely by 12:30 a.m and I enjoyed catching up with them during the drive.  I gave Maggie a quick tour of the house before they headed to bed and everyone spent a relaxing morning here today catching up on sleep and work.  Cal even had time to take a long walk and start the HBO series, The Jinx, a true crime series that I enjoyed watching with him.

Doug had to work this morning, but was able to take a break for lunch at Tijuana Flats.  They liked the Tex-Mex place as much as we did and everyone loved eating outside in the sunshine.  We dropped Doug back off at work after lunch and I then gave Cal and Maggie a walking tour of The World Equestrian Center.  There was a horse competition in the main arena which was really fun to watch.  

Our next stop on the Ocala tour was Silver Springs State Park.  I had wanted to take Cal on the glass bottom boats since I first rode them two years ago.  I thought that he would really like the movie connection to the springs.  I was happy to find out that I was correct.  He and Maggie thoroughly enjoyed it.  Our guide was perfect as she gave not only the film history of the park, but also named the wildlife on our tour and explained how the springs worked.  We even saw an alligator up close and personal.  After we were done, we visited the Discovery Cove to see the costume worn by the Creature of the Black Lagoon and walked along the boardwalk were we thankfully did not run into any wild monkeys.  

We picked Doug up after Silver Springs and headed home to rest.  After another episode of the Jinx, Cal and Maggie tried out the ping pong table before we took them to dinner at Crazy Cucumber.  The rest of our night was a relaxing one with a round of Racko before everyone headed to bed.  It was such a wonderful day in Ocala and I was incredibly thankful that Cal and Maggie had decided to visit.