I met my little sister Carol Thorspecken-Bishop and her daughter Anna Martindale up at the Maple Street Biscuit Company (978 City Walk Lane Oviedo Florida.) My sister lives in Upstate New York but comes down to Florida periodically since she has a time share. Carol wanted to do a short hike at Little Big Econ. The trail was a short ride from the breakfast restaurant.
The Maple Street Biscuit Company serves biscuits with gravy and scrambled eggs and bacon. I wasn’t on my plant based diet yet but the breakfast was delicious and filling. It offered the perfect carbo loading before hitting the trail.
The trail followed this river and once we found this open vista, I decided to stop to get a sketch. Carol and Anna hiked a bit further. There was a large alligator in the water just a few yards from where I was painting. Two guys took off their shirts and were fishing from the shore up stream. They didn’t catch anything in the time I was working on the sketch and they packed up their rods and moved further upstream.
It is always good to see family, even in the wilds of Florida. Anna had some juicy gossip and I got to catch up with what my north east relatives were up to. I have been painting with gouache again and this scene is an example of how opaque paint could have helped in making the scene more painterly. In France a photographer joked with me saying you can paint any color you want as long as it is green. This scene reminds me of that joke.
Stella showed me some books of the Florida State Parks. I am now thinking it would be nice to go to each park and paint. Those paintings would be oil or gouache. Now that could be a fun series of paintings before the parks are raped and turned into golf courses. I wonder what the biking distance is between each park? I am an old man however and would likely burn gas to get between State Parks.