The Tourists Are Back !

It is as predictable as it is depressing. There is no other way to put it. The tourists are back in south Florida.

A few weeks ago I started seeing an increase in the number of Ontario license plates on the highway (always a sure sign). Then this past week it seemed that most of the license plates were from New Yawk, Joyzee, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana with a few Wisconsinites thrown in for good measure.

Today while out and about I saw my third, fourth and fifth Vermont plate of the fall; no end of New Hampshire plates and a MONTANA for Christ's sake.

They are definitely back. Soon you'll have to wait 3 hours to get a place to sit at a dive like Captain Curt's on Siesta Key or the Beachhouse Restaurant on Anna Maria Island. And that will be before Thanksgiving.

Granted Florida's number one industry is tourism and most every establishment here waits from Easter until Thanksgiving for the "season" to begin. But this is ridiculous having them back so early. I have thought several times this week if the idiot who ran me and my bicycle off the road last Thursday wasn't some blue hair just in from Dayton who was trying to figure out why the highway was going by him as he drove down the street.

And if the influx of tourists wasn't evidence enough, right now at 1:45 a.m. the air temperature is a frigid 74 degrees and its heading down to 71 overnight. That and no humidity (relatively speaking) means that I have all my windows open for the first time since mid-May.

Fall is definitely in the air. I only wish the tourists wouldn't migrate like the songbirds are.