Melbourne Beach, Florida

I wrote about our drive down to Melbourne Beach and the broken radiator hose problem took over the blog at the end.  Time to backtrack a little and show some of the views on our way down here.

There are numerous bridges to cross north of Jacksonville and the sailboat in the river below framed the area very well.

 We took I-295 south on the east side of Jacksonville.  There is one very high bridge that allows large ships to pass under it to the docks in the area.  It is very steep and must have a 10 degree rise to it at least.  Combined with the heavy traffic, wind and it made for an interesting drive.

The photo below shows how steep the roadway is.  The view from the bridge was beautiful but I had to keep my eyes on the road.  Gerry took a couple pictures through the dirty windshield.

 It was all downhill at this point and I was glad to see it.  The right lane was closed off and everyone wanted to get around us and were driving aggressively. 

 Our friends Gloria & Doug took us on a sightseeing tour of Melbourne Beach, Cocoa Beach and other towns in the area.  But first we stopped at a nice breakfast stop for some coffee and great food to see us through the day.

 We stopped by the Cocoa Beach pier to check it out.  It is full of touristy shops.  Parking used to be free.  Now it is $10 and the parking lot was almost empty.   I guess during the high season vacationers gladly pay the fee in order to visit the pier.

 Next up was Port Canaveral and there was a cruise ship docked in the area.  It was hard to get a good picture due to all the traffic.  The casino boats are down the road to the right, however they were out to sea with all the gamblers. 

 I found a ready made snack bar to buy and it even had my name on it.  I would imagine it is way out of our price range so I didn't inquire about the place.

 We are parked on the beach and it was a short walk to the water.  It was windy that day so I didn't take advantage of how close it is to the Atlantic Ocean.  The waves were large enough to surf on and a couple people had on wet suits and were out there. 

 This beautiful home was all lit up for Christmas and Gerry managed to get this photo just before sunset.  They had many lights that were going on and off in time with music and it was impossible to capture all the lights. 

I looked into repairing the radiator leak but the only way to fix the problem correctly was necessary to drain out all the old fluid.  The previous owner had put in antifreeze that was wrong and since there were about 7-10 gallons of old fluid in the radiator I couldn't drain it all legally.  So, I called a local diesel repair place nearby and they said it would be Tuesday before they could come to the campground.

That was some of the things we did in the area.  It was windy and rained a little as a cold front moved through but the temps were very pleasant.  Nice to be back in Florida.