Gainesville, Florida - the obligatory homeplace journal

I'll be honest with you - Gainesville isn't the best place for parks. However, just outside Gainesville, you have a plethora of choices.

The Florida Natural History Museum, on UF campus, has an extensive butterfly rainforest, and some wonderful other exhibits on local flora and fauna.

The Harn Art museum, also on UF campus, has rotating exhibits ranging from modern art to ancient beadworking.

Fred Bear Museum, a showcase of big game collected from around the world by the late Fred Bear, expert bow hunter and founder of Bear Archery.

The Devil's Milhopper is a local geological sinkhole with steps all the way down, and so filled with greenery it's like descending into a rain forest.

The Ginnie Springs/Poe Springs area has crystal clear springs, and a great park to camp, play, and swim in.

Kanapaha Botanical Gardens is a beautiful setting, both sculptured and wild, nestled around a lake, with lovely flowers of all kinds growing.

Payne's Prairie, just south of Gainesville, is a 21,000 savanna with bison, alligators, and over 250 species of birds. Hiking, horseback riding and canoeing is available.

Kanapaha Veteran's Memorial park is on Tower Road, and offers woods, rolling hills and places for cookouts and sports such as field hockey, soccer.

The main event every year for Gainesville is probably the Gator Growl. I hate to tell you - I'm not a sports fan, so I don't attend this. In fact, I avoid the city for this weekend, and either hole up in my house to avoid the crowding downtown, or take off somewhere else. However, I'm sure there are lots of information sources for this particular event for those that wish it.

Most of my events listed will be culturally oriented, as that is my preference. There are other things going on (especially sports) that I am ignoring :P

Other things that go on in Gainesville:

January/February: Hoggetown Medieval Fair
This is a small medieval festival held on the Alachua County fairgrounds. It has a living chess board performed by the Thieves Guild, birds of prey, animal rides (camels, elephants, etc.), morris dancers, and of course your normal crowd of vendors, performers, and other entertainments. One of the highlights (IMHO) is the band Empty Hats, formerly known as Double Indemnity. They are a very talented group that do Celtic folk music, and do it well. I've heard worse from nationally distributed CDs and such. And don't miss the Queen's Apples - sliced sour apples covered in homemade butter caramel, whipped cream and a cherry on top ;)


February: Westside Fine Arts at Tioga Town Centre
This debuted last year and was a great hit. Local artists and vendors got together in a newly built open air shopping center in Tioga, which is about 10 minutes from Gainesville, heading west. This is a new, upscale neighborhood with some very nice places around.

March: Santa Fe Spring Arts Show
This is put on by our local college, Santa Fe College, and has some wonderful artists from all over the country, as well as a section of community artists.

April: High Springs Pioneer Days
Head back to the old west and see some gunfighting, as well as shop among local vendors and information booths.

Summer: Not a lot of outdoor events happen during the summers in Florida, as it's simply too hot to deal with. However, downtown square holds summer concerts every Saturday evening for free, all are welcome.

October: Thornebrook Village Arts Festival
This is a high quality arts festival set up in the rambling open air mall of Thornebrook Village.

October: Butterfly Festival
This is great fun for the kids - it is held at the Florida Natural History Museum on UF campus, and during the days butterflies are set free every couple of hours. There are concerts, vendors, and activities for all.

November: Gainesville Fine Arts Festival
This art show was rated 23 in the country this year, though it's been in the top 200 for many years now. It takes over several streets along the downtown area, and has many fine artists from all over.

December: O'Connell Center Holiday Craft festival
This is a wonderful place to come for holiday shopping - local crafters gather at the O'dome, on UF campus, to sell their wares on Thanksgiving weekend.

Gainesville isn't one of the places people normally visit in Florida. Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, Orlando and Naples usually figure high on the list, but unless you are a college football fame, Gainesville gets passed by.

It is true that a large part of Gainesville's existence is the University of Florida. It is our largest employer, and owns more of the city land than anyone else (including the city, I believe). It has been here for more than 100 years, and gains fame on and off for football. The fact that our county tends to vote democratic, surrounded by a sea of republican counties, is also due to the student population , I believe.

However, there is more to this city of 100,000 than just the college life. We have our own set of springs to swim in at nearby High Springs, we have wonderful restaurants, some beautiful parks and a great little downtown theater. There are art shows and a medieval festival, parades and other events.

Pomodoro's is run by Paulie, a local restauranteur who owns 3 or 4 other local Italian places of various price levels and themes. This is the family themed one, but not just a pizza joint. The head chef is Marco, born and raised in Naples (Italy, not Florida!), and it shows in the food.

The restaurant itself is fairly standard looking, with booths and tables, as well as a covered outdoor patio area, with side walls for rain if needed. The walls are covered with pleasant murals depicting scenes from Italian villages or seaside spots. Paulie is often on hand to greet the customers in the evenings or at lunch, his accent is still strong.

Then comes the food. While I am no gourmet, my husband has a very picky palate, especially when it comes to Italian food, and we go here several times a month. The pizzas are wonderful, piled high with fresh ingredients. The ribeye is succulent, marinated in a marinara with peppers and onions. The pasta dishes (both Italian and American/Italian) are always plentiful and tasty. They have a fantastic steak salad, great calamari (with tentacles), and their cioppino (shellfish in a tomato based soup) is mouth-watering. I'm hungry just thinking about it!

They have a wine list, but as I am not a wine drinker I can't comment on its quality. However, their sangria is quite tasty, and a bit on the strong side. Once, when we were chatting with Marco about his mother's homemade Limoncello, he went to the liquor store next door and bought a bottle of Nocello for us to try. It's a walnut liqueur, warm and buttery, and after trying it we went and bought a bottle ourselves. Yum!

And then there are the desserts.

Italian wedding cake, chocolate and vanilla cheesecake, tiramisu, cannoli, flan, they are all delicious.

Service is good quality for the most part. The few times we've had a problem, we've spoken to Paulie and he takes care of it.

So come down to Pomodoro's, which is Italian for tomato - 'the apple of love'.

Ichiban's Sushi Restaurant, located near the Milhopper Plaza on NW 43rd Street, expanded a couple years ago to twice it's original size - and with good reason. It's sushi is high quality, reasonably priced, and I've never had bad service there. It gets very crowded fairly early, so come prepared to wait if you are there on a weekend night. Also, the parking situation is awful! There are three restaurants in an area that has MAYBE 30 spots total, so getting there early or late will help in that regard as well.

The conch salad is particularly delicious, with cucumber and spicy mayo dressing. They serve a raspberry sake wine that is wonderful, and I'm not a fan of wine or sake - I like the sweet stuff.

Their sushi bar runs pretty efficiently, and the owner frequently comes by tables or to people waiting to chat with them. The decor is nice and clean, and they now have TVs mounted at various parts for those that want to watch games or news.

They have a dessert roll with banana, kiwi, cream cheese and honey that we always make sure we have room for, and several other interesting and unusual combinations to try.

Durty Nelly's, named after a 1620 pub in Bunratty, Ireland, is still an Americanized version of an Irish pub. It tries, but having been in the real thing, it isn't quite it. It does have some irish music sometimes, but often it is modern American. Now that in itself doesn't keep it from being authentic - most real Irish Pubs (in Ireland) have modern music, and most of it is NOT 'Irish Rover' types of folk music. However, there is a feeling with an Irish local that you just don't get with Durty Nelly's in Gainesville. Actually, I've never really felt it in American pubs, whether they style themselves Irish or British or what have you. They aren't much of a hang out spot after work - more of a pick up place.

DNs isn't as bad as most such 'meat markets', and it is fun to hang out with friends there. But more than once we've been inundated with students from UF coming to party and cruise for dates, something that just doesn't appeal to me any longer (married now).

You can, however, get cider on tap at DNs, which makes it OK in my book :)

OK, it's not technically IN Gainesville, it's just north of it 10 minutes, in the sleepy town of Alachua. If you drive north on 441 from Gainesville, and then turn left on Main Street in Alachua, you will see it on your left.

Conestoga's is owned by a local guy, Rick. It is a wild west theme, rustic and down home. Buckets of peanuts adorn the table, and the burgers are HUGE. I mean huge. I am a big eater, and I can still only eat the Stogie Junior burger, seriously. Their fries are steak fries, their desserts are all delicious, and you get great value for your money. It's not a quiet place - especially on a weekend. However, it's food is great. Even the liver and onions passed muster for my husband, who is picky about such things.

On the way out to pay, you pass through Main Street Sweets, which sells ice cream and penny candies, jelly bellies, and such favorites as wax lips and root beer bottles. Take a trip down memory lane :)