We are very proud to announce that the March 2017 issue of Trailer Life Magazine features our article about beautiful Sarasota, Florida, plus a back page column about hiking Bryce Canyon National Park under the stars.
Trailer Life Magazine, March 2017
Text by Emily Fagan, Photos by Emily & Mark Fagan
Sarasota, Florida, is a fabulous place to visit in April, and we enjoyed five wonderful weeks there. For RVers that are heading north these days from the hotter parts of southern Florida, a stopover in Sarasota is a true delight.
Venice Beach just south of Sarasota, Florida.
We have been fortunate to visit tropical beaches all over the world, most recently in Thailand but also in many parts of southern Mexico, Hawaii and the Caribbean. Frankly, not one of them has sand that is quite as pure white and fluffy soft as Siesta Beach in Sarasota. It is the texture of confectioner’s sugar! And the turquoise water is ever so inviting too.
Siesta Beach — Where the sand is like confectioner’s sugar!
But what surprised us was the many other things Sarasota has to offer. A century ago it was just a small fishing village, but the Ringling Brothers decided to settle in the town and make it the home base for their circus, and that changed it forever.
The Ringling – Former home of the founders of the circus
Now, The Ringling is a fabulous museum that offers so much for tourists to see that you can get a three day pass — and you need it if you want to see it all.
Ornamentation galore!
The Ringling estate’s mansion is a phenomenal building that is loaded with decorative arches, fanciful cornices, and an altogether fairy tale type of air.
The Ringling is a “do not miss” Sarasota excursion!
Out front there is a fabulous and enormous rock tile deck that looks out on Sarasota Bay. Standing there I tried to imagine what it was like back in the day when John and Mabel Ringling held parties there. Oh my!
Even the deck is absolutely stunning, with inlaid colorful stone tiles.
The Ringling also has a museum that houses the stunning collection of European art that John Ringling collected. Mondays are “free admission day,” and when we got inside we were blown away by this immense art collection.
The Ringling art museum is free on Mondays and is home to a stunning collection of European masters.
Out back there is a rose garden that was the pride and joy of Mabel Ringling as well as a gargantuan banyan tree.
Out back we found a massive banyan tree shading a very cool bar!
Sarasota is one place where it would take a whole season of outings to run out of things to do. One excursion we really enjoyed was going to Jungle Gardens.
This is a zoo of sorts whose welcoming committee is a flock of pink flamingos who go out of their way to say, “Hello!”
At Jungle Gardens they hire pink flamingos to be the greeters!
They are extremely friendly birds, and even though they had plenty of natural spaces to stand around and do their flamingo thing in the water and under the tropical trees, one flamingo took a particular liking to Mark and rubbed his beak all over him!
True love… for the flamingo at least!
Jungle Gardens also has a wonderful bird show, and we were delighted by the antics of the various parrots. One parrot, a 79 year old cockatoo named Snowflake, was a seasoned professional when it came to performing. He was so old that he had appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show before I was born!
He can still do great tricks, though, and we watched him ride a bike on a tightrope while a buddy macaw perched on a swing and went for a free ride below him.
Snowflake’s still got it at 79 years old!
There are lots of parks in the Sarasota area, and we got a huge kick out of watching native birds fishing, swimming and flying by us in some of these parks.
The native wild birds are a sight to behold in many parks around town.
Sandhill cranes like Sarasota as much as people do, and to our utter delight and complete surprise, a pair of sandhill cranes had a nest with two eggs near a pond at a strip mall.
A sandhilll crane mom checks on her brand new chick.
On the day that they were due to hatch a large group of fascinated birders and photographers gathered near the nest and began to watch the arrival of the baby chicks through huge telephoto lenses and binoculars.
“Yawn…It was a lot of work getting out of that egg!”
This little guy was absolutely adorable.
“Oopsie!”
And the first little one was soon joined by its sibling while the parents pushed the egg shells aside.
“Are you my brother?!”
Sarasota has lots of quirky charm, and there is a mascot that adorns many homes and businesses around town. Nicknamed the Tube Dude, this guy can be seen holding a toothbrush in front of the dentist’s office, wearing a baker’s hat in front of the bakery and sitting in a Kayak at the local surf and kayak shop. What fun!
The Tube Dude at a coffee shop with a water bowl for his dog.
Trailer Life has posted our article on their website and you can read it here:
Sarasota’s Three-Ring Circus – Trailer Life Magazine, March 2017
Flipping to the back of the March issue, there is a photo of a wonderfully starry night taken from the Mossy Cove trail at Bryce Canyon National Park. We spent quite a bit of time at Bryce Canyon last summer, which gave us a chance to get out on the trails in the dark several times.
Hiking Bryce Canyon under the stars is very rewarding.
It is a little eerie hiking in the pitch dark with a flashlight, but we managed not to fall over the edge and we saw some really cool skies.
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Bryce Canyon doesn’t have super dark skies, so there is always a big of a glow on the horizon from nearby towns, but even so, the stars jumped out of the heavens.
We ventured out into Fairytale Canyon
We were there fairly late in the season, in September, so catching the Milky Way was a little tricky as we had to get out into Bryce Canyon’s amphitheater of hoodoos in order to look back up towards the rim to see it. But we caught it sailing across the sky on several occaisions between 3:00 and 5:30 in the morning.
The Milky Way is easiest to see in late spring and early summer.
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Of course, we stayed out so long on these crazy midnight hikes that by the time we got back to our trailer the morning sky was just beginning to lighten into rich shades of blue. And sure enough, there was the Orion constellation hanging over our rig!
Orion sails high above our trailer.
Trailer Life is an excellent magazine, and we were subscribers for years before we became writers and photographers for them. Whether you are a new RVer or have many years under your belt, if you own a towable RV like we do, you might enjoy subscribing for a year. You can subscribe to Trailer Life here:
It’s not expensive, and what I like is that it is professionally edited by terrific editors and it is professionally laid out by a graphic artist which gives it a polish in the print edition that just doesn’t exist online, whether on magazine websites or on folksy blogs like this one.
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Interested in visiting Sarasota? Here are our blog posts from our stay there:
- Jungle Gardens in Sarasota Florida – It’s for the Birds!
- The Tube Dude – Spreading Good Cheer in Sarasota, Florida
- Sarasota, Florida – Life on the Waterfront
- The Ringling – The Art of the Circus in Sarasota, Florida
- Sunny Side Up – Baby Sandhill Cranes Hatch in Sarasota FL
Curious about Bryce Canyon and/or Hiking Under the Stars? Check out these posts:
- Bryce Canyon in Winter – Snow and Lace on the Red Rock Spires!
- Bryce Canyon – Rainbow Point – Bristlecone Pines and Sweeping Vistas
- Bryce Canyon National Park – “Mossy Cave” – Mystery Waterfall!
- Red Canyon Utah and the Bryce Canyon Bike Trail!
- Bryce Canyon Gone Wild – Tempests, Rainbows & Wildlife
- Bryce Canyon National Park – Fairyland Trail – A Beautiful Hike!
- Bryce Canyon – Hiking The Rim & Navajo Loop + A Tourist Time-lapse!
- Bryce Canyon National Park – Inspiration Point – OMG!
- Bryce Canyon, UT – Fairyland of Pink Turrets
Night Skies in Waterton Lakes + All Night Timelapse of the Milky Way – 07/31/16
A Few of the Other Articles We’ve Published in Trailer Life:
Trailer Life Articles by Emily & Mark Fagan
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- Beehive Trail in Arizona – A “Mini Wave” hike by Lake Powell 07/19/24
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- Lake Powell – Heart of Glen Canyon National Recreation Area 05/10/24
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More of our Latest Posts are in the MENU.
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Can’ t wait for my March 2017 issue to arrive…the starry skies pics are frame-worthy 🙂 🙂
We had such fun taking those, even those it was pitch black out on the trails and quite chilly too!!
I loved those photos of the stars and night views….you just can’t imagine the beauty except in person I suspect!
And thank you for waiting on the nice sunny and warm photos of Sarasota until April!
It is always a thrill to see the Milky Way, and getting down into the canyon and finding it when we looked back up towards the rim was exciting! And the funny thing about those gorgeous Sarasota beaches is that they are absolutely fabulous in April, although I’m sure they’re wonderful in January too, especially for folks escaping the snow up north. April is when the photos on this page were taken!!