The house we’re staying in right now is in a housing development in the “Lake Washington” area.  That’s because it’s not that far from Lake Washington, the largest lake in Florida. According to Wikipedia, it’s the major source of fresh water for the Melbourne area.

We’ve been meaning to go check it out ever since we’ve been here, but of course we hadn’t gotten around to it yet.  But, as we move out of the house tomorrow and will be a little further away for the rest of this month, yesterday afternoon we decided that we should  at least take a peak at it.

So we drove over to Lake Washington, which is just down the road. From the small parking lot area you could see a shelter that was on the edge of the lake; in the photo below, the lake is just beyond the trees and shelter structure. If you click on the photo to open it in a larger in a new window, you can see the water of the lake:

Looking toward Lake Washington

We started down the path toward the lake to get a better vantage point. But, we hadn’t gotten very far when we reached a point where there was a nice puddle — and also a caution sign:

Lake Washington Sign

The sign isn’t very legible in my photo, so here’s the text:

Caution
Snakes and alligators
may be present. 
Do not feed the alligators.

Hmm.  Well, then. That’s an unexpected development. Chris and I looked at each other. Wasn’t it was really too hot to be walking around near the lake, anyway? Yes, I think so. Who needs photos of the lake close up, anyway? We went back to the car.

Now, I’m sure there was nothing really to worry about. But as a city-bred Yankee, I don’t know much about alligator behavior. And since it isn’t allowed, I didn’t want to feed the alligators accidentally … if you know what I mean.