Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Christmas Day

Well, we planned to wake up early to join our Kentucky grandchildren for gift exchange. So, yesterday, my son made sure our technology worked. Everything was checked out and tested. Time was agreed to be 8:00 AM in Kentucky and 6:00 AM in Arizona.

We are having guests join us for turkey this afternoon, so we planned to put the bird in early. Linda had never used to the program on the oven, so she carefully set the buttons.

All is set for a long winter's rest.

Well, the timer on the oven did work. At 5:30 AM the oven must have started. Linda was still sound asleep. Jim was dozing. First the phone rang, about 5:40 AM. Yep, the kids couldn't wait much more. Next, every smoke alarm in the house went off. Of course, it was the oven getting hot. I guess it is the first time it has been used since March or April. Next, the neighbors dogs are barking because our smoke detectors are still alaming. Next, the neighbor's light comes on (Oh what a way to start Christmas Day). Fortunately, no one jumped the gun and called the fire department. Whew! We try to find the fan button on the kitchen fan and eventually found it is one of the 50 buttons on the microvave. Next, we tried to turnt he furnace fan on to stir the air, but you know.... We have a programmable thermostat and you almost have to get the software manual out to change things. Actually, we did get the furnace fan turned on and the smoke detectors quit.

We were pretty alert by now and really enjoyed (virtually) being with the grandkids as they opened gifts.

So the rest of the day....

Coffee at our neighbor's house. They open their garage and house. Serve coffee and people bring things to share. It is as much of a brunch as you want.
More Later....

Sent from Jim's iPad

Thursday, November 28, 2013

Visiting Grandchildren

We spent two weeks off and on in the Houston, Texas area visiting our grandchildren.  Both girls lead quite active lives and keep their parents running. Besides attending the swim meets and musical performances, we helped Lina celebrate her 10th birthday.  During the week of Thanksgiving both were out of school, so we helped shuttle them to their activities and took them shopping for Christmas gifts.  Lina helped Grandma and Grandpa look at new Honda CRVs, an activity she seemed to enjoy.

During the two week stay in Houston, we flew back to Louisville to help our son and his wife when her father passed.  We spent two full days with their family trying to support in some small way.  The family hosted a "Celebration of Life" event with attendance at full capacity.

We made it back to Houston just before the big change in weather.  The big change was not what we wanted.  Jim likes to wear shorts and sandals, not winter parkas.  Within a couple of hours after we were safely back to the RV, the cold wind and the rains began in southeast Texas.  Unfortunately, this weather lasted for five days.  The nights were in the low 30s with the days only 10 degrees warmer.  Texas seemed to be the recipient of two fronts, one from the North and the other from the Pacific coast.  The day before Thanksgiving the weather finally changed for the better.  The sun broke out and the wind and rain finally stopped.

Following an exceptionally wonderful Thanksgiving dinner prepared by our daughter and granddaughter, we left the Houston area at about 3:45 pm bound for our Arizona winter home.  After being gone since late April, both of us are anxious to return.  Provided the weather cooperates, we hope to be back in 4-5 days and begin enjoying the snowbird life with our winter friends.

Saturday, November 16, 2013

Which Way Do We Go?

We had thought we would continue on to Houston to our daughter's house today, but she has called to say she is home from work due to illness.  Our son in Kentucky has also called with more bad news about his father-in-law.  As we pulled out onto I-10 heading west, we decided to stop at the tourist information in Beaumont and make our decision as to which direction we should go.

We arrived in Livingston at our RV lot shortly after noon and enjoyed seeing people on our street and other SKP friends.  It was a beautiful day.  Our decision at this point was to wait to go to Houston until Saturday morning to watch the swim meet; however, later in the afternoon Lina called asking us to come in the evening to play with her.  Grandpa and Lina played Monopoly.  Grandpa won by luckily avoiding Park Place and Boardwalk. 

Saturday, we enjoyed seeing Lina swim and attending Minali's middle school regional orchestra concert.  Sunday was Lina's piano recital.  

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Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Alabama and a change in weather

Monday, we drove with little traffic as it was on Sunday.  We had forgotten it was Veterans Day!  Our goal for Monday was to try and stop at the beach in the Florida Panhandle, but it was too late in the afternoon for us to spend adequate time there.  Instead, we drove further on to Alabama and stopped at the Escapee park to see some Michigan friends.  We enjoyed a short trip to Fairhope

The forecast for the following afternoon was for the cold front to drop south with wind gusts of  20-30 mph.  By 5 pm, the temps had dropped from a pleasant 75 to low 60s; and at bedtime it was only 45 degrees with lots of wind.  For the first time this year, we ran our heat in the evening and the following morning.  The temperature in the morning was 35, and now at 10 pm in Louisiana it is only 39 degrees.  Luckily, the wind died down enough we were able to drive.  We enjoyed entertaining friends in our RV during the cold weather in the evening.  I made chilli to go with the cold weather.

Our granddaughters in Houston have a swim meet this weekend, one has a piano recital and the other has an orchestra concert.  We will definitely be busy with their activities while we visit.

We will be 'home' in Livingston next week and part of the following week while we visit our daughter's family.  It is always good to see our friends in Texas too.  However, I am starting to get homesick for Arizona too.  We have been gone since April and this is the latest it has been when we return.

Sunday, November 10, 2013

Naples, Florida and North

Yesterday, we had a few hours of RV maintenance to do before we could leave today so Jim and I stayed at our upscale motor coach park for the morning.  It was cloudy and even rained for awhile so it made it hard to get going.  My cousin and his wife also enjoyed the 'down' morning. Since the day was generally cloudy, our 2 hours at the beach did not happen.  A change in plans, and we got together after lunch.  The 'boys' took an excursion to Best Buy to look at electronic toys, and the girls took a 1+ hour walk around their new housing development.  Afterward, we had a mid-day meal in downtown Naples at The Dock at Crayton Cove.  We had another wonderful seafood extravaganza followed by an evening sunset walk on the Naples pier to watch sunset with a large number of other people.

This morning, Jim and I awoke at 6:45 am and got things ready for the drive today.  Traffic was light at 8:30 am, and it wasn't until we were south of Tampa that traffic really picked up.  Since it is a holiday tomorrow, there were very few semi-trucks on the road making it less stressful.   We alternated driving 60-75 miles each and had a fairly easy travel day.  Our destination was a small town on US 27 southeast  of Tallahassee, Florida.  The RV park has only been open two seasons.  The people here are very nice and are doing a great job making people enjoy their time here on the Suwannee River.

We'll be setting out tomorrow with the hopes of stopping by the beach in the Destin area for a couple of hours and spending the night in that general area.  We think we can manage this and provided the weather also cooperates with our plans.

Saturday, November 9, 2013

Escorted Tour of Naples, Florida

We set out this morning for Everglades City.  Our intent was to check out the boat tour of the Ten Thousand Islands of the Everglades National Park.  As we arrived at the national park office, we noticed that the water was fairly calm and people were loading for the first tour of the morning.  We rushed into the concessionaire, bought tickets and loaded onto the pontoon.  Our eco-tour included seeing many types of birds, dolphins, and several raccoons living on an island in the distance.  All of us had hoped to see more of the islands so we were a bit disappointed.  But the day was absolutely gorgeous and sunny so it was a great day for a boat ride.

After a small bite to eat at The Oyster House  we headed down to the old town of Naples and a relaxing walk onto the Old Pier to see the brown pelicans, terns, and cormorants fishing.  There were lots of people swimming in the Gulf here and many people also fishing from the pier.  Our guide took us for a drive down along the gulf to see the many million dollar homes.  Then, we headed to a county beach park that is inhabited by gopher tortoises and a cute little raccoon that knows how to get his food out of the waste cans.




















Friday, November 8, 2013

Big Cypress Swamp National Preserve

We said good-bye to the Florida Keys on Wednesday, November 6 in rain showers and 20-30 mph winds.  Our last full day in the Keys was cloudy, windy and intermittent rain--so much so we couldn't spend our final day on Sombrero Beach.  So, we invited two couples to go to Keys Fisheries for dinner.  As is most common, the three RV couples enjoyed one another's company and the wonderful fresh seafood of the Keys!

Our drive northward from the Keys took us to the Everglades.  We had printed a Groupon, and we proceeded to the airboat tour for our introduction to the national park.  Both of us enjoyed the ride and decided to also make a stop at Shark Valley.  Here, we took the last tram ride of the day to see the wildlife as the sun was setting.  Back in the 1980s, we drove our car in this area; but now, you either pay to take the tram, bike, walk or run the 15 mile loop.  We left the National Park as it turned dark and drove an additional 13 miles to the Midway Campground which is located in the Big Cypress National Preserve.  We had done some research and saw that this park offered power and water.  And, the bonus was the clear, dark skies of the Everglades and Big Cypress area.

Thursday, we drove the car to the Oasis Visitor Center of the Big Cypress Preserve to see the movie, learn more about the preserve, and observe from the boardwalk the alligators, great white egrets, great blue herons, the tri-color herons, cormorants and anhingas.  This boardwalk viewpoint is a do not miss.  We enjoyed watching the herons and egrets catching fish and the alligators stalking the birds.

Afterwards, we made a stop at the Clyde Butcher Gallery to see the wonderful collection of black and white photographs on exhibit and for sale.  Clyde Butcher's pictures are similar to those we have seen by Ansel Adams.  He has done not only various national parks, but many scenes from Florida.  We returned to the RV, hitched up the car and continued along Tamiami Trail towards Naples.  Our final stop at the Kirby Storter boardwalk to see the cypress and epiphytes (air plants) growing in the swamps. 

After a quick lunch, we drove an additional 37 miles to the Naples Motorcoach RV Resort on the edge of Naples.  Linda's cousin and his wife live less than 5 miles from here in the winter.  The first couple of hours of our afternoon here, the four of us explored our new home for a couple of hours followed by a short drive to see their home.  After dine at Alice Sweetwaters Bar and Grill, Jim and I returned to the rv park to relax in the hot tub and meet some other people here in the park.  

Monday, November 4, 2013

Wiring Project and Curry Hammock State Park

We are having fairly windy weather. The wind keeps boaters on shore and most of the tours and kayak rentals close down.

So, Jim is undertaking a somewhat complicated wiring project to make hitching and unhitching the tow car a little easier. It is a good thing Jim was half way through the project before our son called last night.

It has been our plan to transfer our 14 year old Camry to our son's family. He seeks cars with 100+K on the clock. Let other people absorb that depreciation (this time it was his parents who absorbed it). Our Camry just went over 100K and now he wants it.

Our son's idea is to fly one way to Lost Wages, Nevada for a western vacation tour, then drive the Camry back to their home.

This means Linda has to shop for a car she wants. It is definitely her turn to choose.

If I had realized the wiring project was such a brain teaser and the custody transfer of the Camry was so imminent, I would have continued with the old hitch up. Well, the engineer in me has to take something that works and see how it works.

"If it ain't broken, take it apart anyway to see how it works!"

The brake controller wire is being used to monitor the tow car braking system and the transmission lube pump is using the backup lights wire on one end of the cable and the Aux connection on the other end. It is all wired and ready to test. Whew!

Before testing, we decided to ride bicycles to Curry Hammock State Park. With the wind, it was easy to get here. Now, we have to go back against the wind.

Curry Hammock is known for a real sand beach. Indeed, it is a very nice white sugar sand. However, just a few feet into the water, the floor turns to weeds and muck.

Tomorrow is our last full day in the Keys. We've already decided to go to Sombrero Beach for the fourth time. It is still the best we have found in the Keys.

Friday, November 1, 2013

Bahia Honda State Park and Looe Key


Friday, November 01, 2013

This morning we awoke to the sound of rain on the RV.  After breakfast, I took the garbage out to the dumpster and discovered the humidity was quite high.  This is the first day in over a week that the wind has died down.  Since Jim was hoping to take the snorkel tour to Looe Key from Bahia Honda State Park, we were glad for the calmness of the ocean and Gulf.

We took our bikes with us to Bahia Honda State Park.  We arrived and checked in for the snorkel trip.  Weather was still calm.  We rode bikes around the State Park and walked up to the Henry Flagler Bridge.  Flagler was a big name in the Keys as he put in a railroad all the way to Key West years before there was a road to drive to Key West.  In the photos, you will notice a gap in the bridge.  The hurricane of 1935 shut down the railroad and it was never rebuilt.  The gap is not from the storm, it is a gap to allow taller ships to sail through. The uniqueness of this bridge is that there is a road for cars atop the railroad portion.

After our picnic lunch, it was time to board the snorkel trip.  The State Park has a very large pontoon boat which serves as the snorkel boat.  The boat goes about 18 to 20 mph and it takes about 35 minutes from the bridge to the reef at Looe Key  The captain says it is 8.35 miles. 

Read more about Looe Key at:  
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Looe_Key

Also, have a look at the under water webcams maintained by TEENS4Oceans at:
www.teens4oceans.org
If you look under webcams, you will find Bahia Honda State Park

We pulled up to the anchor buoy at the reef and almost everyone on board exclaimed how clear the water was and how you can see corals that are 40 feet deep.  I must say, this was the best snorkel I have done except for the snorkel days in the South Pacific.  There were thousands of tropical fish.  Schools and schools.  All sorts of corals.  The only disappointment would be the bleaching of the corals.  The State Park allows 1-1/2 hours in the water and I used every minute of it. I was the second one in the water and the last one out when the whistle was blown.  No one made fun of my shorty fins after the trip.  You see, most people use those huge scuba fins.  They get tired really quickly, and they are awkward.  If you’ve gone to scuba school, you learn to train in scuba fins to get good with them and scuba divers need big fins because they have all that gear.

You will have to wait for photos…  Or maybe I’ll get a few posted here and add some more later. 

Back at the dock at 4:30 pm….   Linda and I had snack, then rode our bikes to the other end of the park.  We really liked the campgrounds and beaches.  You have to book the campgrounds on the first available day which is exactly at 12:01 am 11 months before your reservation request.  All sites are booked within minutes after midnight.  The only other way to get a camping spot is to be lucky to get a cancellation or take on a volunteer position. 

Sunset at 6:41 pm.  We watched another sunset and took more sunset photos.  This time, we have the Flagler Bridge in the scene. 

At the RV Homebase, we fired up the Weber grill and cooked our salmon on a cedar plank.  It was delicious.  

These photos are from the Google camera. Just Google Images Looe Key.









 
 

Thursday, October 31, 2013

Easy Day, Home Depot and Keys Fisheries


Thursday, October 31, 2013

 

Today was spent cleaning the RV inside and Jim spent lots of time getting the pictures you can see from our link organized for ‘his’ video.  A trip to Home Depot for some miscellaneous hardware, along with the evening meal out at Keys Fisheries Market and Marina in Marathon were the highlights of our day.  Another RV friend recommended this place for eating, and the seafood was fabulous.  Jim ordered shrimp, and Linda had the grilled plate, which included shrimp, scallops, mahi mahi, and lobster.  It was all superb.  Besides sitting outside by the Gulf, we also viewed the tarpon swimming near the floor of the restaurant.  This is the only day we haven’t made a trip to the beach, we just used the pool for an hour in the afternoon. Prior to our dinner, we visited Sunset Park Beach to view another sunset.  This beach is not for swimming, but it has really nice sunsets.  I know you may get tired of our sunset pictures, but we have only had two evenings (our first) when there was no sunset.  Watching the sun set every evening is a ritual for even the locals!

 
Links:


Sunset Beach Park

Sent from Jim's iPhone

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Key West (2), Dry Tortugas


Wednesday, October 30, 2013

We are off on another big day.  The main event will be the trip out to the Dry Tortugas.  But the seaplane check in time isn’t until 1:30 pm.  So there is time to do another Key West exploration.

Linda chose to tour the Ernest Hemingway House and Jim chose to walk around to take a few photos and do a geocache.  You will see our photos in a movie by following the link.  I hope you enjoy it.  We really enjoyed the day and Jim enjoyed linking the photos together (next time it won’t take so long).  Watch this (60MB):  Our Day to Dry Tortugas
 
Some more details on the day….

We parked near Duval Street and walked together to the Hemingway House.  At this point, Linda went on the tour and she regrets not taking a photo of the cats.  We have several friends noted for their close relationship with their cats.  A funny sign in a window sometime ago reads, “Dog have owners.  Cats have Staff.”

Duval Street is the rough equivalent to Bourbon Street in New Orleans.  It is the main street where things are happening.  Just about every other place is eat and drink.  It is sort of known to be a loosely regulated area during Fantasy Fest especially later in the evenings.   But the Fest is over now and during the day times (when we are there), it is just a tourist area (100% tourist area) with several cruise boats docked daily. 

Linda enjoyed the tour of the Hemingway House and Jim got the geocache.  It is now time for the lunch that we brought with us and time to go to the airport.  The Seaplane Adventures company makes it very easy.  Check in is simple.  They give you a cooler with your choice of soft drinks and fill it with ice.  You remember the letter code of your cooler.  All the coolers are the same size so the pilot can stack them in the storage compartment.  They have mask, fins and snorkels (included in the price), or you can take your own.  You can take beach bags, but no umbrellas or chairs. 

You can tell from the photos that we really enjoyed this tour.  The flight is superb.  They fly at 500 feet for 35 minutes.  You can see the reefs, tidal inlets, keys and a couple of shipwrecks.  Some flights are lucky enough to see marine life, but we were not lucky.  You arrive at the Garden Key, the pilot drives over to the sandy beach, points the nose out and reverses thrust to back the planes pontoons onto the beach.  In less that 15 seconds, the pilot is out of his door, opens the passenger door and you start to get off.  As we say in the photos, “All Flights Should Be This Much Fun.”  We spent a short time touring Fort Jefferson and spent the remainder of our time here snorkeling and swimming in the pristine waters.  Needless to say, we hated leaving the island (Garden Key).

Links:
Seaplane Adventures
 

Dry Tortugas Video

https://db.tt/NUEorian

Sent from Jim's iPhone

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Anne's Beach


Tuesday, October 29, 2013

 

We had a big day yesterday, so today is shopping and trying another local beach.

 

Shopping included the grocery store and Kmart.  Jim’s snorkel had failed and Kmart had the brand that Jim wanted so that worked fine.  Groceries included a Ribeye steak for the grill this evening.

 

After storing the groceries and lunch at the RV, we headed off for the beach…

 

Anne’s Beach, Lower Matecumbe Key.  Beaches in the Keys are generally very disappointing.  We have been spoiled by beaches at Destin and Pensacola Beach.  Others, like Tampa, Jacksonville, Daytona… are great, too.  The Keys are coral, the whole place is coral.  The sand is pulverized coral.  In some places it sort of feels like coarse sand, but more often than not, the grinder (wave action) has been running non stop for a long time; and, the pulverized coral is so fine that it can and does make quick sand which is unpleasant to wade through.  The coral pebbles and rocks are also very hard on the bare feet. 

 

With that information, Anne’s Beach looks great as you see it from the highway.  Once we parked and tried to find a good place for setting up chairs and umbrellas, we started to become discouraged.  We did find a place and enjoyed watching kite boarders, and we occasionally waded out through the coral rocks and slimy quick sand to relax in the shallow water which was a very pleasant temperature.

 

The best beach on our list so far is Sombrero Beach in Marathon; no muck, no large coral rocks, lots of space to set chairs and umbrellas and gradually sloping to deeper waters. 

 

Back at the RV, we watched sunset (again), then put the ribeye on the grill.  It was delicious.

Monday, October 28, 2013

Key West day one

On Monday, we loaded our bikes and went to Key West. We parked at the State Park.

We rode our bikes to:
* Truman's Little White House,
* Returned to the state park for a picnic lunch,
* Sat on the beach,
* Went snorkeling for a while,
* Rode our bikes to the Mel Fisher Museum,
* Linda went shopping,
* Ate at Wendy's on Duvall Street,
* Did geocaches at the southernmost point of the US and at The State Park,
* Sat on the beach and watched the sunset.

We had a really good day. We both liked the Mel Fisher Museum. On display are part of the silver ingots with the King's hallmarks for assay, weight, source, and taxes. (So the tax was already paid). Also, part of the gold is displayed.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

A Mix of Activities

Last night's World Series Game kept us up too late. 


We did some domestic duties then headed off for Robbie's Marina in Islamorada. ( www.robbies.com )

It is hard to fully explain Robbie's other than you can rent kayaks, jet skis, take fishing charters, feed tarpon, get close to birds, arrange guided Eco tours, have lunch and buy lots of stuff from the little huts. Yes, that's us sitting in the psychedelic beach chairs. I guess we just don't look just right, not relaxed enough.


Signs for sale...
I like "Paradise Ain't Cheap"


We returned to our RV home base, loaded the bicycles and headed for seven mile bridge. 


At Pigeon Key, we found a nice pier. 


We did the geocache and got it. We tried a second geocache and came up with DNF. We asked a geo friend for help and maybe we will try again. 

Back at RV Home Base, we planned our day tomorrow in Key West. We were reading reviews and decided we better make up our minds on the excursion to the Dry Tortugas. We booked the seaplane at 2:00 PM Wednesday.