On Wednesday evening, after falling down, Timothy Ettridge and I
went for a thirty five mile bicycle ride on a loop through the
Van Fleet Trail. I set aside two hours for the ride so that we would be back
before sundown.

We approached the trail from
Bay Lake road to the southwest of Quest Air and headed north on it. About
five miles into it we suddenly passed an eight foot or so alligator sunning
itself next to the trail. We didn't see it in advance and were by it so quickly
we had no time to react until we watched it not moving just behind us. I was not
eager to go back and check it out.

I had told Tim that there was plenty of wildlife along this trail, but I meant
lots of
gopher tortoises. I hadn't seen any alligators on the trail before. The last
time I went biking with alligators was down at
Shark Alley.

Speaking of alligators, we apparently have a new four footer to add to the eight
footer living here in the pond at Quest Air. I've never seen them, but other
pilots say that they can see them when flying over the pond.