Visiting the Peace River and a Major Geocache Fail!

The Peace River Wildlife Center

After we left the Edison estate we had time for one more stop that day.  We decided to go to one of Don and Jackie's favorite places.  The Peace River Wildlife center and Refuge.  We had heard them talk about it before but really didn't know what to expect.

When we got there it was almost 4 (when it closes) but I think we still had about 30 minutes to check out the Wildlife Center. It was a pretty neat place - Marcus Loved it.

Here is a bit about it from their website:

The Peace River Wildlife Center is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the care, preservation and protection of Charlotte County's native wildlife.

THE MISSION of the Peace River Wildlife Center is to treat and rehabilitate injured and orphaned native Florida wildlife (except venomous snakes) and, if possible, to return them to the wild.

If they cannot be returned to their natural habitat due to sustained non life-threatening physical limitations, a permanent home shall be provided by the Center.

We also seek to inform the public about native Florida wildlife and how to co-exist with these beautiful creatures successfully through formal educational outreach activities.

Peace River Wildlife Center Website

As you know from previous posts Marcus LOVES birds to this place blew him away and he kept running back and forth to look at them.   Here are some pics of our visit.

Look at the Bird!

They has one huge are that was full of birds.

Lots of pretty birds.....

I didn't get a good picture but there was a beautiful bald eagle in the refuge.  It has a broken wing so it was designed to be a lifer but it looks like it had it pretty good.  Marcus picked it out right away and say "eagle mommy"-  there is one just like it at the MN Zoo.

Once we finished looking at the birds and refuge closed we decided to check out the park- 

"Ponce De Leon Park"

We took our time and went on a nature walk through the preserve-  Marcus and Grandma Fiedler really enjoyed walking together.

Once the walk was finished we sat by the river and watched a few boats come in.  Marcus saw a Great Blue Heron and decided that he wanted a new pet.  He spent a bit of time very slowly chasing it around in circles.

The good news is that he never caught the bird..... But we did get to watch one eat a fish!

Finally once we were done chasing the bird I decided I wanted to get a geocache and fortunately according to my handy GPS we were very close to one. 

So I set off down the beach-  Luke and Marcus followed behind.  The walk along the beach was beautiful and it was was almost sunset.  For some reason I didn't get a lot of pictures of this - probably because I was focused on finding the cache.....      We got close-  like  10 feet away and even found the tree where it looked like the geocache lived but we also found a problem.  A SNAKE---- it was black and kind of scary looking.... It didn't move and instead just sat at the bottom of the tree.  I don't know a lot about Florida snakes- except for the fact that some are poisonous so I decided that finding this geocache was not worth it.  We turned around and headed back to Don and Jackie on the beach.

 Our adventure for the day was over but we had a lot fun and saw a ton of wildlife.  Since we got in so late the night before I think we were all ready to head back to the house and enjoy a relaxing evening of hanging out, swimming in the pool and Downton Abbey.

Just one last picture of the day.  I just really like this one of Marcus, Mommy, and Grandpa Fiedler.  It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed seeing the water, the birds, and the boats!