Trip to Florida Part II

The epicness continues. Scroll down if you missed the first part.

The orange farm consisted of hundreds of trees, ten stray dogs, a few pigs and piglets, four abandoned cars, an assortment of chickens, and one boy named Alejandro. All this was surrounded by a barbed wire fence which my friends and I waited outside of.

Alejandro was about 14 and we suspect the only member of the family who spoke English. He opened the gate and let us in. After explaining the squishy small oranges were the best, and giving us two 5 gallon buckets, he stayed close by, no doubt to make sure the strangely excited Pennsylvanians wouldn't find a way to hurt themselves picking fruit. 10 gallons of oranges later we were about ready to leave. We each tipped Alejandro heavily and had him take a few pictures of us. After dragging our trip leader Dan out of negotiations for the sale of a piglet, we began to drive away, exhausted and sticky. The man on the vespa escorted us out of the farmland like some sort of honor guard.

After a short stop by the side of the road to collect palm fronds (Dan's idea), we drove towards the shore. An hour later the sun was shining, it was January and we were eating subs on Daytona Beach among a lot of teenagers that all look like this:

The wind was blowing and it wasn't exactly hot out so I was the only one to actually swim. Spur of the moment trips to Florida, bartering for piglets, and hopping barbed wire fences to collect palm fronds for decoration are all well and good but swim in 60 degree weather? I guess only I'm that crazy.

After taking pictures and collecting enough shells that the people back in Grove City would believe we were actually at the beach, we started to pack up and leave the surf, sand, and aspiring Hollister models. Due to not having slept for about 24 hours, the ride back to PA was rather uneventful. The road from West Virginia to Pennsylvania at 4 in the morning is the most mind-numbingly boring stretch of road in existence. It didn't help that I was the only one awake and thus responsible for all of our safety. That being said I didn't drive off the road once.

We arrived back at college at 6 am. The cold temperature and sleep deprived grogginess made our recent foray into summer seem decidedly dreamlike. Waking up in my bed a few hours later, I wasn't sure that it hadn't been a dream, that is until I noticed I was sleeping among 30-40 oranges.