Hi again family and friends!  We hope all is well in your worlds!  As we know that several of you are dealing with some very difficult situations, please know that you are in our thoughts and prayers.

So it was time to leave FL and head off to the Southwest.  Our next stop was Ocala, FL, than after a two night stay, off to Chattahoochee, FL, then Lillian, AL.  For our RV friends, the camp we stayed at, Ocala RV Resort, boasted that we were in horse country so we, stupidity, assumed we would see some horse farms.  Wrong!  We were right off the highway.  But, it is a very sweet location with a small pond including ducks, turtles, and fish.  Nice place for families with children.

Of note, when you feed the ducks wait and watch.  Dun-dun, dun-dun, dun-dun, all of a sudden from all areas of the pond tiny heads appear  – turtles.   All are frantically swimming to ME!!!  This was a bit off-putting, sort of like prehistoric dinosaur heads popping up. There were hundreds and I do believe hundreds from all areas of the pond swimming to ME!!!  Surprising, the ducks had no interest.

Pretty cute at first.  Then, a bit creepy, then all was well as they just wanted the duck food and were gentle and a bit standoffish once they arrived.  Kids would love it as they would never feel threatened but very excited.  As an adult without knowledge of the turtles my thoughts were – were they snapping turtles and bite?  Do I have enough food to keep them at bay?

 

Our next stop in Chattahoochee, FL, was recently purchased and in the process of  rennovating the property.  It will be quite different when complete as they will have zip lining at the campsite.  New owner was very friendly and helpful. We were overnighting, just one night.  We head out of FL on Sunday and off we go, Kenny, Uma and I.  We are excited that we are leaving FL and heading west.  We are off to Lillian, AL, our next stop.

If you have been reading our blog, you know that, to date, all has been going smoothly.  Well, as we know, things never continue to go smoothly which is part of our adventure, right? Or misadventure?

Honestly, we weren’t surprised that after driving about 25 miles from Chattahoochchee, we had an alarm sound.  For those that don’t know, if a safety alarm sounds you have a very short time to get 14 tons of motor home off the road before the engine shuts off (less than a minute in our case).

Okay guys, this may seem tame occurring in daytime but it was daytime on a very popular highway with a speed limit of 70 MPH, it was scary.  Each passing car/truck rocked the RV.  Kenny got us off to the side as best he could, set up safety triangles, got on his safety vest and Uma and I took shelter on a hill, on a towel next to fire ant mounds!

If  you are already bored with this post,  for RV folks, please read on for important information that may be useful to you in the future.

We were towed to Walmart – yes, that is correct a Walmart in Marianna, FL. (Sorry Keathley Klan) but we were happy to be in a safe place.  No auto repair shops were open but we were assured that they would tow us to a repair shop early Monday morning.

There are some things that I have to acknowledge during our Sunday day/evening in the Walmart parking lot:

1. We were grateful to Walmart for allowing us to dry camp in their parking lot;
2. A women’s shampoo/haircut/blow dry is $22.00 + tip – yup – I actually did this and got a really good cut!  Of course, it all depends on the stylist you get, right?;  and,
3. It is allowable (legal – who knows?) that you can park a truck in the parking lot and sell puppies and rabbits.

Our first tow to Walmart resulted in a broken fog light; no big deal.  Our tow from Walmart to repair shop resulted in another broken fog light, a crack in the fiberglass front left side and our electric step gone forever.

We know that our adventures will also result in misadventures which we will have to embrace.  Grrrrrrr – so hard to embrace breakdowns.  Okay, so I am really rambling but for RV’ers important lessons can be learned so I will ramble on.

We belong to Good Sam Club Roadside Assistance, et al, and they sent us to a repair shop that they believed would fix our problem. After checking their website, Kenny had serious doubts.  But they towed us to a shop that I won’t disparage.  They tried very hard to help us.

I will try to paint a picture of this for you.  We were in a small FL town about 50 feet from a railroad track where freight trains ran regularly, blaring their horns, rocking our RV, not a problem except for their first run at 3:00 AM.

The repair shop was composed of southern gentlemen, respectful, gracious, and we were introduced to our life line auto mechanics – Danny-Ray, Lightening, and Killer.  Not making this up – all true.  They were great at normal repairs judging by how busy they were,  extremely  good at their craft, and local police had their vehicles serviced there.

Although Danny-Ray tested things on the RV early morning until end of each day, on Wednesday he and his boss threw up their arms and gave up without offering any suggestions on what we should do next.

Okay, we had been calm until then and now we were very concerned.  Kenny had to maneuver through dealing with various contacts,  Spartan (our chassis connection), Cummins and Allison (engine/transmission).  All were amazing and extremely customer focused.  Bottom line, Kenny contacted a mobile unit which arrived Thursday am and we were on our way Thursday afternoon.

Lessons learned RV’ers or future RV’ers:

Insist that the repair shop they are sending you to is a repair location that has the expertise to understand and deal with problems with your particular RV.  If you have concerns, keep all records so that if things go wrong, your expenses will be considered for reimbursement.  Good Sam’s Roadside Assistance has acknowledged our problems and, although, they wouldn’t allow a mobile unit on our first call, they are being supportive of getting our RV back to its original shape.

We arrived safely in Lillian, AL, staying in a quaint, sleepy KOA park advertised as being on the Gulf, with a beach which was a bit misrepresented .  A walk to the beach provided a great pier, if you had an inkling to fish or had a boat to launch but very brackish.  Certainly  not a place to swim.  And the beach, if you could call it a beach, is not a place one would put down a towel and stake a claim.

But, we would stay there again if we were to end up in that neck of the world.  Surprisingly gorgeous beaches within 20 minutes (either FL or AL).  Who would think that the AL coast would have pristine beaches?

The AL coast was perfect – Kenny and I got our Fitbit miles in walking the beach.  It was clear, warm water, not crowded.  RV’ers take note, stopping there is worth your time.

For bikers or hikers, please visit the Gulf Shores State Park.  We had a great bike ride.  For hard core bikers (Shelly and Christie/John and Elizabeth) the trails are probably too easy. For me, perhaps not Kenny, it was such a fun ride.  Gentle, somewhat challenging, but great coasting opportunities and this occurred in both directions.  (Elizabeth and Christie, don’t laugh at me!). Trails are well manicured and well marked so based on maps provided before you start out, you can determine how many miles you wish to travel.

I only saw butterflies and bunnies, but Kenny called me back to see a diamond back rattlesnake that he had seen that I had ridden past.  They are poisonous so Kenny’s motives of having me circle back were questionable.  Note to family and friends:  If I die of weird circumstances, please investigate.

Until next time, we raise our wine glasses and toast to you:

Stop worrying about the potholes in the road and enjoy the journey. – Babs Hoffman

 

 

 

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Hi again friends and family!  We hope all is well in your worlds!

As noted in our last post, Bill & Jackie arrived and the week of their visit went by in a blur with the blending of both relaxing and fun adventures.  It was wonderful to see them again.  We (all) were a bit skeptical regarding our tight quarters but nothing to be concerned about there.  After all, we have shared much smaller space bc (before children) when we camped together in Charlestown, RI, in a tiny Shasta.  Brought back some great memories.

The KOA on Pine Island was pretty empty.  We were told that the Snowbirds usually left by the end of April.  The remaining campers called themselves the Survivors and lived there year round.  Pine Island is their home and they appear to be very happy living there.  It certainly is a great place to be!

The Survivors knew each other too well and their banter and teasing was entertainment in itself.  When in the pool, you can’t help but hear what everyone was saying so you had to get engaged in their silly conversations.  The four of us felt welcomed into their circle of friends.  All came to the pool with their noodles and floated around.  The first time I went there I thought I was interrupting a water aerobics class but they just laughed when I asked that question.  They said if it was, the leader wasn’t moving.

The temperature ran 80 – 90 degrees during our stay so the pool was refreshing and there was a hot tub as well.  We were told by the survivors that when the snowbirds were all there, the camp was hopping with crazy, fun activities but our time was very low key, quiet, and relaxing.  On our particular site, we weren’t allowed to have a camp fire but we were allowed to use the community fire pit by the pool which the four of us enjoyed.

When our friends from Palm Coast, Susan and Mark A., heard that Billy and Jackie were coming they made plans to join us on the weekend.  So, of course, it was time to select some fun activities.

A trip to the KOA laundry provided us with rows of brochures showing us various unique things to do in the area.  On Saturday morning, the six of us headed to Captain Steve’s Swamp Buggy Ride.  (Take a peek on line to see the website: captainstevesswampbuggy.com)  When speaking with him on the telephone, he made me promise that I would bring him a sandwich “and not a wimpy one either – did you see the size of me on our website”.  So, we were a bit surprised that our guide wasn’t Captain Steve but a member of his family, Victor.  Oh well, we ended up with more food for us to eat.

This particular swamp buggy tour is mentioned in Travel National Geographic as a must do.  Big Cypress National Preserve is 730,000 acres of freshwater Big Cypress Swamp and a place where you wouldn’t want to get lost or be in after dark.  Too many critters running around at night.

Our adventure was about a 3.5 hour swamp trip seeing whatever Mother Nature intended for us to see.  The buggy, running on tractor tires, stood about eight feet in the air – it was huge!  It is powered by a 1952 International 4-cyclinder engine.  Kenny was impressed with that although I don’t know what that means.  We loaded our cooler onto the buggy and off we went.  Although we didn’t see any panthers or bears, we saw numerous varieties of birds that I hadn’t seen before.  Susan, knowing all of them, provided us with their names and tidbits of information about each.  We were blessed with spotting three baby (yearling?) deer without their Momma and several alligators ranging from two to eight feet.  The ride brought us by all types of fauna and flora including huge blooming air plants.

And, along the way, Victor provided us entertaining tales of other trips and information on swamp country.   We were in the middle of no where and if the buggy had a breakdown it would be several hours before any help would be able to reach us.  No worries – no breakdowns.

Okay, so we didn’t see any bears or panthers but we did get the opportunity to DRIVE the buggy!!  Of course, all six of us wanted our turns.  And, it wasn’t like we were driving in a straight line on dry land.  We were driving the swamp on fun winding trails!  And before going back to our car, Victor put the peddle to the metal to show what the buggy would do.  Some mud flying – but who cared?  It was great fun to drive the buggy!  Honestly, I thought that was the best part of the trip.  Notice that a picture of Kenny driving is from within the buggy – there was no way any of us were getting out of the buggy to get a better shot.

On Sunday, Mother’s Day, I was a bit nostalgic, thinking about my traditional Mother’s Day which was kayaking down the Farmington River with Zoe, Aaron, Tristan, Dylan and Nikki and Dan.  I was a bit downcast until I spoke with Zoe and Nikki.  Both said the weather was bad, cold and dreary and, if I were home, we would never have gone kayaking in that type of weather.  I was almost happy to hear that.

This Mother’s Day, Bill drove all of us to Santibel and Captiva Island.  We went shelling at Lighthouse Beach.  There were millions (truly millions)  of shells to choose from.  Of interest, in one area, there were hundreds of conch washed up on the beach.  Those that appeared to be alive, we threw back in the ocean but we found out later that it is probably something they have adapted to over the years so they would have survived.  But on that day, I picked up several of those that were all dried up on the beach thinking they were dead.  I may have saved some but I may have been the murderer of others.  I definitely threw more back than I took.  In any case, I have a guilty conscious about that particular activity.

We had a late lunch on Captiva Island at the RC Otter.  We had wanted to go to the Bubble Room since everyone had raved about it but we were too late for lunch and too early for dinner.  RC Otter served up yummy lobster bisque and great Reuben’s.  All-in-all, made for a pleasant and satisfying Mother’s Day.  Of course, hearing from all three daughters madefor the happiest moments of the day.  We hope that all Mothers, of both children and animals, had a great day!

Our final adventure with Bill & Jackie was a trip to Seminole Casino where Bill & Jackie went home ahead of the game and Ken & I broke even.  Of course, Ken & I had to play the Game of Thrones slots.  With special bonus pop-ups, who wouldn’t want to play it?

Sadly, Bill & Jackie left Tuesday morning so it was back to K, D & U.  We are very much looking forward to future visits with the whole gang.

Because I missed kayaking, Ken & I rented a kayak on Wednesday.  We paddled out seeking dolphins and Manatees (which you can usually see in this location) but we didn’t see any.  We thoroughly enjoyed the calm waters as we paddled through the mangroves watching the antics of a variety birds (where is Susan A. when we need her?) that make their home in the area.

We spoke with our youngest daughter, K-T, on Mother’s Day and she asked us if we were ever going to leave FL.  We both laughed at that – we stayed longer than we had intended to, but, why rush through things when we are having so much fun.

But now it is time to head southwest.  We anticipate traveling along the coast of Alabama no later than Saturday, Sunday, Monday or whenever.  Retirement has had us adapt to a rather flexible schedule.

Until next time, we raise our wine glasses and toast to you:

Always do sober what you said you’d do drunk.  That will teach you to keep your mouth shut. –   Ernest Hemingway

K, D, & U