A WINTER ESCAPE TO FLORIDA-PART ONE

There are many things to see and do when you are in Titusville. We love to visit Canaveral National Seashore and take long walks on the beach in search of seashells. The beach looks like it probably looked a hundred years ago. Everything is in its natural state--no buildings or anything except beautiful beach and ocean.
On this trip we spent more time at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. We especially enjoyed Black Point Wildlife Drive, a 7 mile one-way drive past areas where sea and shore birds and alligators abound. Scrub Ridge Trail and the Manatee Observation area were also fun. The manatees thought the water was too cold when we were there, and we were never able to spot them.

Quick Tips:

If you are old enough to buy the Golden Age Pass from the National Park System, it will be the best you ever spent. The pass allows you free admission into all of the National Parks in the United States. We visited Canaveral National Seashore every day that we were at Titusville and would have spent for admission fees without the pass.

Best Way To Get Around:

You really need an automobile to really enjoy the Titusville Area. When we visited last year, we toured the Kennedy Space Center, Cocoa Beach, Daytona Beach, and many other areas. All of the nearby sites still require some driving to get there. It would be hard to arrange to see them any other way.

The units are clean, comfortable, but not fancy. We stayed at Vacation Villas last year at this same time and enjoyed it so much that we wanted to come back. The people are friendly, the outside pool is VERY warm, the timeshare is near the Dixie Crossroads Restaurant & Canaveral National Seashore, and is a good place to stay for a week. We bought our week through the Armed Forces Vacation Club and paid $249 for the week.

Last year we called the timeshare office and asked where the locals go to eat seafood. The reply was "Dixie Crossroads Restaurant" and we tried it. From that day on, we made at least one trip per day to the Dixie Crossroads.

We love shrimp and the restaurant offers red, white, rock, & boat shrimp. There are many fresh fish,lobster, and steaks on the menu, too. The food is always prepared as you request and is WONDERFUL.

They have a huge parking lot, but it is usually packed with cars since the food is so good. Depending on the size of the crowd, you may encounter a 10-30 minute wait before your table is ready. The time is well spent with a visit to the butterfly garden or a walk to the bridge over the fish pond. This restaurant is one of the reasons that we chose to spend another week in Titusville.

It would be hard to say enough good things about the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. What a wonderful place to experience the outdoors and nature. There are many places to take long walks and view wildlife, and the Black Point Wildlife Drive is also wonderful. Since the birds and alligators don't feel threatened, visitors have a wonderful opportunity to see them up close and natural.

There is a wonderful visitor's center with great exhibits, a video explaining the work that is done to protect and enhance the wildlife in the area, and also US Wildlife Service Rangers are available to answer any questions you might have. The first time we visited, there were little alligators in one of the aquariums. We learned that they had grown so much that they had to be released into the wild.

What a wonderful place for children as well as adults to visit!! Each time we visit, we seem to see something different and more interesting. We plan to return again next year. Who knows, maybe there will be baby alligators in the aquarium again.

During our stay, we decided to drive over to Cocoa Beach to see if the the ocean and beach were prettier there. We spent a wonderful morning on the beach just across the road from Patrick Air Force Base, which turned out to be a good choice of location. Several young military men were in wet suits getting their exercise by surfing in the Atlantic while we were there. We enjoyed watching the successful (and the unsuccessful!) attempts to ride the waves. The seashelling was not quite as good at that site as we had found at the Canaveral National Seashore, but the surfing entertainment made the drive over worthwhile.

On the way back to Titusville, we stopped at a park near Port Canaveral to watch the fishermen and also to get a better view of the cruiseships and other boats at the Port. There was a lot of activity there and several large ships were being loaded with cargo as we watched. It was pretty exciting to imagine where the ships and their cargo were going and what types of adventures awaited the crews on their journeys.