Ecomotion

I'll start this off by saying that I've always wanted to ride a Segway... I think that there is empirical evidence that you cannot look cool while riding one (we've all seen it - and you will below as well) - but still - the novelty of it really had me intrigued..

First, in San Francisco when the post office was testing them out for mail delivery our mailman would not let me try (citing safety concerns...) and then when Rachel and I checked in to the Frank Gehry hotel in Spain (see post here) we were told that while there we could have free use of two segways that were there as part of a promotion (it turns out that they had been returned to the promotion running group the day before and the desk staff was not aware until I called the next morning to book one... trivia: in Spain it is pronounced 'sedge-way')

So - I was excited when I learned that one of the activities planned during the Christmas/New Year holiday in PVB was an eco-tour - while riding on off road equipped Segways! It was run by a husband and wife team whose wbsite can be seen here - Ecomotion Tours - so all 6 of us comfortably jumped in the car for the quick trip up north towards Amelia Island.

They run you through a safety and handling instruction, and then set you off in an open field to get your segway-legs (and to identify any Darwinian weak links - of which there were none in our group) - a few of us had a tenuous moment or two with our first attempt at it (look closely at Kerry's face and the enjoyment she is getting out of the scene as someone inadvertently tried to run over the instructor):

The tour starts off by an old social and golf club called the Ribault Club and you head out through what used to be a 9 hole Donald Ross course that is now being reclaimed by nature... it has a pretty interesting history - and winds its way out to the water. They have a governor on the machines for the first part - limiting you to about 9 mph, but then let you 'open it up' for the second half of the ride once you are an established segway-er.

the only incident seen (besides the giant spider on me as I learned my lesson for not staying in line while going through the woods) was the spin out and almost loss of a member of our group - just after Kerry in the photos below - after coming up the hill... we were of course blamed as the root cause of the drama.

(look at the grins repeated...)





We then took the ferry across the river for some good local food at Singleton's Seafood Shack - which turned out to be a fried seafood extravaganza - clam strips, local shrimp, stone crab claws, fish, poboys, hushpuppies, collard greens, sweet tea... the real-deal... we all ordered more than was reasonable for any one human being to consume as we sat right on the water watching the shrimp boats come in - the spoils of which can be seen below.


The whole day was great fun.