Not too long ago I spied some wild turkeys strolling around the King & Bear front entrance.  It was really early in the morning, the sun was just coming up and I think I said a soft “morning” to those turkeys as if I was nodding at my neighbors leaving for work.  It’s great to be reminded of all the creatures that call our community home.  In fact, a fantastic variety of wildlife thrive here.  Some of our lesser known “neighbors” include bobcats, wild hogs and even black bears. Fox squirrels are one of my favorite.  They are bigger and more exotic looking than the common grey squirrels that dart around our lawns. In fact, they are the largest species of tree squirrels in North America. I snapped this photo of a fox squirrel right here in the King & Bear. 

For me, seeing an otter in the wild, right here in Royal Pines, was an amazing experience. Since I’ve been living in Northeast Florida for most of my life, I was under the impression that I had seen all of the wildlife the area had to offer. So I was understandably surprised one night when I was walking my dog and caught a glimpse of a funny creature waddling across the street. It never crossed my mind it could be an otter until it stepped into the light. It was going from one lake to another. While otters are graceful in the water, they definitely have a clumsy looking hop waddle when they move on land.

I recently had the opportunity to see the new “Hubble” IMAX at World Gold Village as part of our Davidson Realty company outing. “Hubble” is the amazing story of what it takes to maintain the Hubble telescope and the incredible view of the universe that Hubble sends back to Earth.

From the very beginning, the Hubble had technical issues and since it was launched there have been several missions to improve the telescope. This movie mentions the previous missions to give people an idea of what it’s taken to maintain the Hubble, but focuses on the last mission to keep the Hubble in orbit. Large portions of the movie were shot by this Astronaut team. One of my favorite scenes was the shuttle launch, captured in the IMAX format makes you feel like you are sitting in the bleachers of Kennedy Space Center watching it live. The spectacular views of Earth from space are also incredible. It’s amazing to see how difficult the simplest task is for the astronauts working in their space suits; at one point the movie compares the delicate work of fixing the Hubble in a spacesuit to trying to do brain surgery wearing mittens.