12/25/2010 (Sat) - Christmas Day

Hello,
I have not dropped off the face of the earth, I've just been busy.  We arrived in Punta Gorda, FL on Tuesday the 21st at which time Jim pulled the 5th wheel in next to the park model.  We had to leave as soon as it was parked because as we turned the corner to get to the park model a friend stuck his head out and said, 'happy hour at four.'  We were parked by 3:45pm and immediately packed our cooler and headed down the street for the happy hour.  Was so nice to see old friends again. 

Once back we took what we absolutely needed for the night out of the 5th wheel and stayed in the park model.  We were just to tired to unload the 5th wheel that night.  It was one long haul coming from Mesa, AZ to Punta Gorda, FL.  I'm thinking it was about 2,300 hundred miles.  Doesn't seem that much saying it but hauling a 37 foot fifth wheel is not the same as driving a car.  The truck did a beautiful job and ran almost better than when it was new. 

So on Wednesday morning we started to unload the 5th wheel.  There is so much more storage room in the 5th wheel.   When we were finished unloading it we had stuff just everywhere in the park model.  We had to pull the 5th wheel out of the spot we had it in.   The park manager was kind enough to let us park it there to unload it.  So by 3:00pm on Wednesday we were hauling it down the street to store it.  It's in a secure storage area for the next four months.  We spent the rest of the day getting things put away or should I say stuffed here and there.  By evening we had had it so we went to visit one of our favorite couples for a bit.  They are what I would refer to as the senior couple in the park and are just a wonderful example of what a loving couple should be like.  Love them.

Thursday Jim and I went to the lumber company to buy some wood because Jim was making a storage compartment under the bed.  Most all 5th wheels have a compartment under the bed that all you have to do is lift the mattress and a piece of plywood and you can get to it.  So that is what Jim built.  He still has to tweak it a bit but it's almost finished.  I want to paint it so will do that hopefully Monday or Tuesday. 

On Friday we did nothing at all.  Took the day off.  We did walk to the clubhouse in the evening for a sing-a-long/cookie event.  It lasted a couple of hours and was nice.  Got to see more people we had not had the opportunity to see before. 

So here it is Christmas Day and we watched my daugher and family open their gifts.  How was that possible when we are in Florida and they are in Michigan.  We skyped them using the computer.  Watching the grand kids open their gifts was almost better than being there.  I can honestly say without a doubt they had one fantastic Christmas.  One of the things my son-in-law did, that I thought was great, was wrap a couple of gifts in a box.  He then put his sons name on the box.  When he opened it the gifts were for his two sisters.  We all burst out laughing.  My granddaugher opened one of her gifts that was in a box and a present was in there for her brother.  Great idea.  My daugher and her husband had this small sand pail filled with ice.  They then gave that pail to my oldest granddaughter (20 years old) and told her that her gift was in the ice and that she had to dig for it.  Know what was in there - Come on - think - If you are thinking hard cold cash you would be right.  She laughted as did all the rest of us.  I'm thinking she thinks her parents are something else.

One of the gifts we gave each of the grand kids was in those small flat rate boxes.  They all got the same thing and had to open it all together.  I had put candy on top of each box and then crunched up one dollar bills and wrapped all of them in tissue paper.  They pulled the tissue paper out and out flew all those crunched up dollar bills.  You should have heard them.  Yup they loved them.  First one to count how much was none other than the 8 year old.  She was a happy little girl.  Dollar bills were falling all over their laps.  Have to think of something different for next year.

We are having a Christmas dinner here in the park at four today so I will end this but I want each of you to know that I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a fantastic New Year. 

12/20/2010 (Mon) - From Duson, LA to Bonifay, FL

Today we started out a bit later than the day before mainly because there was no way I was going to get caught in that frost.  It did not frost last night but one can never be to careful.  We left about 7:45am and had a really nice drive of about 425 miles.  That is more than enough for one day. 

We traveled thru parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.  I-10 goes past all of them.  Do you have any idea how tired I am of being on I-10 well I am totally tired of it.  This road has nothing of interest to look at.  Going thru parts of Louisiana the highway was on stilts as it was all swamp area in that part.  I can only imagine how expensive that part of the road way was as it went on for a long time.

Driving I-10 in LA

Swamp in LA

Oh my there is life!!!

Fall??

A little water here and there

Once thru Louisiana we hit Mississippi and in that section it was nothing but trees. 

Don't ya just love these state signs----not

Scenic spot

Once in Alabama we were sort of close to the water and there was a lot of water and bridges to cross.

Did not know we had to drive thru a tunnel in Mobile, AL but we did.

I just liked these spiky things

Now we are in the panhandle of Florida about 80 miles west of Tallahassee. 

Last state sign for now

Loved the planes on the bridge

Florida Highway Rest Area

Fire in Florida

We are now in a little town called Bonifay and are in the Florida Springs RV Park

I have to tell you the landscape has really changed since we left Arizona.  We left desert land with gorgeous mountains to flat Texas land to swamp land and then onto forest land to the panhandle where I have yet to see a palm tree.  But they are coming soon I know that. 

Tomorrow we will travel I think about 350 miles.....or it could be more.  We'll see as we go along.  We have had really good weather so far and only a couple of road construction interruptions.

12/16/2010 (Thur) - Christmas Gathering

Today we drove to the north side of Phoenix to have a Christmas get together with Jim's daughter. It was wonderful especially because I got the best gift ever. Being a little older, there really isn't much that I want that I haven't already purchased or have been given. So when asked what I wanted, I just said you know what, why not give a gift in my name to an organization that is in need. So Jim's daughter went on line and bought chickens from a place called Heifer International. Yes chickens, and the neat thing about this is that they will be shipped to a depressed village that is in need. The only requirement is that whoever gets the chickens will share their knowledge of how to raise chickens and also give one or two of the chicken's offsprings to another needy person in a village. It's kind of like chickens that keep on giving. I love it. It's the perfect gift.

12/17/2010 - 12/19/2010 - Travel to Florida

12/17/2010 - Friday morning Jim and I were just hanging out when we both decided to pack up and leave for Florida.  We were going to leave on Saturday but we left on Friday.  Which turned out to be a very good thing because....  I don't know if I related all the trouble we've had with the 2005 Ford F350 Truck or not but it was major.  This truck has has issues for years.  Jim has taken it into the Ford Garage in almost every town we have been in.  All he has ever heard is, 'we can't find the problem' or 'well you know the truck is getting older and naturally it will start harder.'  So after fooling around with "The Ford Company" for years the truck finally just stopped all together.  The engine warranty was for 100,000 miles, the truck broke down at 105,000 miles after many many trips into the Ford Garage.  I don't doubt for a minute that all Ford Garage owners were instructed not to find anything wrong with those trucks as there is a blog site for these trucks just filled with people who have the same issues.  Should Ford have honored their warranty, you bet they should have but they won't.  So after the breakdown in South Dakota in September we made it to Mesa, AZ.  As I said before we could never turn the truck off once it was hot as it would not start again.  Jim took the truck in for an oil change and just mentioned that it was having these issues, now at 110,000 miles, and they said sure they can find a high pressure leak.  They found it and fixed it but it came back to us missing like crazy but it would now start when it was hot.  They told Jim the truck needed number 1,3,5, injectors and the EGR cooler and oil cooler was leaking.  The 1,3 and 5 injectors were not missing when we took it in, but they said they did not do anything to it to cause that.  It happened overnight I guess.  We naturally got another opinion and decided to have it repaired as it hardly ran.  No the Ford Garage did not repair it.
So when we left Friday at noon it was with a lot of concern as to the truck running.  We got all of twenty miles away when we heard this very loud kaboom sound.  It sounded like a tire had exploded.  The truck lost all its power and we coasted to the edge of I-10.  Jim called the repair service center and as soon as he told them the problem they said they would be right out.  Long and short of it was one of the high pressure clamps broke.  Thus no power.  Once repaired it was fine. 

But I do have to tell you our trip the first few days have been a bit tense as we were more than a little concerned about the truck.  But it is running very well, actually Jim said it's running better than it has in years.  Lets pray it keeps on running well.  Would we ever buy another Ford of any kind-----never never and I'm telling everyone I know not to buy one either.  The really sad thing is most everyone who needs a big truck like that knows about the Ford truck and won't touch it so the resale is almost nothing on them.  Thank you Ford!!!  I'm working on putting that all behind me but what Ford has done is morally wrong and hard for me.

Mountains

More I-10 Views

I-10 View

Arizona Scene

Scene on I-10 in Arizona

So our first day driving we made it to Lordsburg, NM which was only about 300 miles but remember we were held up with the broken clamp and did not start until noon.  We pulled into this all night truck plaza and decided that we would just sleep in the 5th wheel.  They had a Days Inn right next door but the 5th wheel would do nicely.  Once we were settled in I started to think about my one friend who had their truck stolen as they were close to the Mexican border and we were very close to the border in this truck plaza.  My mind started to thinking about what if they steal the truck not knowing we are in the 5th wheel.  We could be hauled into Mexico and not be able to get out.  I sat up, woke Jim up, and said let's stay at the Days Inn.  When I told him why he just burst out laughing.....but we did stay at the Days Inn. 

Cotton being hauled via truck

Welcome to New Mexico

Welcome to Texas

12/18/2010 - Saturday we left around 6:30am and got as far as Ozona, TX and stayed at the Circle Bar RV Park which was 200 miles west of San Antino, TX.  It seemed nice to just veg for the evening.  We did not do a thing just read and took it easy.

Cattle in holding pens.  For about two miles that's all we could see.  Poor things.

Texas Refinery

12/19/2010 - Sunday we left Ozona, TX about 7:00am and once we got onto I-10 I knew right away we were in trouble because the road was all white and crusty looking.  Jim does not agree with me but I am positive the road was covered in a thin layer of frost that had frozen.  It was shinny and crispy like and I don't care what Jim said it looked slippery.  We drove on this for over an hour before the sun came out and warmed the road up so it melted away.  By now you know I do not like slippery roads.  My teeth even hurt later in the day.  But once it warmed up we made terrific time.  Jim drove thru San Antonio, TX like nothing and I just knew once we got near Houston it would be ugly.  I was totally wrong as Jim drove right through the city and had no trouble at all. We drove in Texas for two days and finally around 3:00pm we drove out of that state.  Yea!! 

Welcome to Louisiana

 By five at night we were all set up in this little RV park called Frog City RV Park in Duson, LA.   There really is nothing exciting to blog about as I-10 is really a boring road to drive on.  Nothing to even take a pic of.

But anyway at least you know we are heading east and hopefully will arrive in Punta Gorda, FL Tuesday or Wednesday.  Tonight we are watching Green Bay play New England.  Good game.

12/13/2010 (Mon) - Departure time is Close

Friday night (12/10) our little group went to see the light display at the Arizona Temple.  The campus covers about one huge city block and almost every inch of it is lit up.  The palm  trees have fans of lights at the tops.  Not one palm tree but all the palm trees and there are many.  The ground has lights everywhere except on the sidewalks.  All the trees have lights, not just a few, but every branch has lots and lots of lights.  Many different varieties of lights too.  The new icicle lights too.  Some that are on the ground look like flowers growing.  It is just amazing to see.  Thousands of people come to see this display as it is really impressive to say the least.  They said it takes an army of volunteers to put all the lights up.  For as many lights that were up it had to take at least two months to finish it all.  Not one bulb is burned out.  It's perfect.  They must have their own power plant as you can see this display from at least a mile away.  Then we come back to our little street......with no lights at all.   sniff sniff.

On Saturday (12/11) Jim and I went to pick up his sport coat.  You know the big huge non-shopper guy.  We arrived at the store and Jim said to me to make sure I remembered which way we have to go once we get off the escalator.  We had to go down the escalator to the men's department.  So here is Jim walking down while the escalator is taking us down.  I'm thinking he was in a rush.  We stood ( I rested) while the salesman got his coat and away we went.  Now I've been told I walk pretty fast but there was no way I could keep up with the non-shopper.  We got to the up escalator and no kidding Jim was walking up while the up escalator was taking us up.  We got on the main floor and Jim hardly missed a beat in his stride as we headed for the door.  I don't think we were in that store more than three minutes.  I don't like to shop for a long time either but I am no where near the non-shopper like he is. 
ps:  The coat does look nice on him...with the shortened sleeves.

We received the neatest early gift from my daughter the other day.  We now each have Christmas lights that plug into our USB port on our computers.  Festive I would say.   We just might be the most festive on the street.

The lights actually light up and they can be wrapped around the computer.  Cute huh..

 I do have to tell you that for just years and years my daughter and I have been 'really really' afraid of snakes.  Really true too.  So a long time ago I started to send those rubber snakes in packages I sent to her (mean aren't I).   She would draw snakes on paper for me and put them in cards.  In the gift with the lights was perhaps 20 of those tiny rubber snakes.  I about screamed when I pulled them out as they looked really alive.  I'll get her for that. 

Can you believe there are 20 snakes there.

Sunday (12/12) brought church and then we met up with 'the group' to play the game farkle.  Farkle is a dice game where the number one is worth a hundred points, the five is worth fifty points, three of a kind are worth points, and so on down the line.  Fun game to play.  We each put a dime in the pot and for each farkle we have (that's when you don't get scoring numbers) we put in a nickle.   There were nine of us tonight and guess who won, not once, but twice......drum roll......that would be me.  See my money. 

Great haul

Tonight (Monday (12/13) we met up with 'our group' again to have our farewell /Christmas dinner.  Pam and Bill are heading out on Wed. for Illinois with Mel and Joanna leaving on Thursday for Canada.  I'll miss them alot.  Great great people.  We each brought something for dinner and we also drew names to buy gifts.  The limit was $5.00 not including tax.  That was one hard job.   What a riot tho.  I rewrote the story, The Night Before Christmas, to include them.  Now that was harder than I thought.  We had reindeer antlers for the reindeer (that would be Jimsher, Pamcer, Melcer, and Joanna-aim.)  Santa hat and paper face was for Santa.  Had a black sack for his goodie bag that was filled with candy for their stockings.  Was just a fun time where we laughed a lot.  But the undercurrent was one of sadness because we all knew we would not be together for quite some time. Going to be hard to leave.  The following pics are from our get together.

Reindeer Pam

Reindeer Joanna

Pam, Joanna, Mary

Reindeer Jim

Reindeer Mel

Santa Bill

Bill, Pam, Mel, Joanna, Jim

Santa, Pamcer, Melcer, Joanna-aim, Jimsher

Once in a great while a person is fortunate enough to meet some really wonderful people and I can honestly say Jim and I have done that.  We know without a doubt we will be friends with these two couples for years to come.  Yes they are going to be hard to leave......

12/10/2010 (Fri) - The Final Stretch

It's really quite difficult to blog when very little is going on, or could that be I am doing very little.  On Thursday we did see the play, Hair.

 

The play was well done but not my style at all. 

I personally liked the Grinch Who Stole Christmas much better.  Both Jim and I have found we like the small intimate theaters for plays.   Last night we went to a dance here at the park.  I am still surprised that with a park that has 748 sites that so few people attend events.  I don't think there was 75 people there.  The music was wonderful and of course the line dancers were in full swing leaving just the center between tables for couple dancers.  This park has some really good dancers, I mean really good. 

We have been busy getting things in order so we are ready to hopefully leave on Dec. 17th.  We've been in this spot for 3 months and we have really spread out.  I've been going thru all the cabinets to make sure everything is as it should be.  When you pull a 5th wheel it is necessary to have things so that they can't fall and break, and so they can't actually bang into each other.  We use a lot of gripper shelf liner.  Keeps things in place. 

My shelves to keep all my tops.  Aren't they all neat and pressed?  Yes they are as I went thru all of them to make sure they were.

Jim's half of the closet.  Yes his are all pressed too, but I'm not showing you my half of the closet. 

Here in the park it is just one row after another of Christmas decorations.  Many people have those Christmas trees that are a round coil that lay flat and with a stand you pull them up and they look like a circular tree.  On any given street I think there are at least twenty of those.  Another thing that is just everywhere are those big red Christmas tree lights.  Only these are like a little fence around peoples front yards.  Each bulb is held up by that white plastic one inch pipe that is about a foot tall with notches cut in the top to hold the light.  One row that I mentioned before had those round ball things on their palm trees, and then on both sides of that street you see a string of lights from one ball to the other.  Toss in those red fence lights, those circular trees and you have one lit up street.  Power bill is going to be high for a lot of folks.  Our street, well.......let's just say we celebrate in a quiet way, a very quiet way.  Almost like no one lives there quiet.

We still need to put the things that need a little safer mode of travel in the back seat of the truck.  We will then have room for the outdoor carpet and the lawn chairs.  Jim has to go thru the front storage area and clean that up so the grill and propane can go in there.  Yes there is a place for everything and let me tell you it has to go in that place.  We arrived with a lot of space in the under part of the 5th wheel, but some how we have collected stuff.  Most likely stuff we really can be without.  We have found that by doing a little each day, it makes it easier than the big push the night before we leave.  When you are rushed you make mistakes.

Jim has been busy planning our route to Florida and we have reserved spots for the days we will be on the road.  Believe it or not we will be on the road six days getting to Florida.  We drive no more than 400 miles a day hauling the 5th wheel.  The total trip I think is around 2,200 miles. 

The puzzles are still being put together. They may look easy but these have been really difficult.  The one with the deer took the longest.

The weather has been really nice of late.  It still gets very cool in the evenings but during the day it is almost perfect.  Only bad thing is that by four it is nearing sunset time and it starts to get cool already.  Have a great day, and those of you in the northern part of the country, stay warm.

12/06/2010 (Mon) - Laughable Shopping

Did you ever hear the expression, 'some rain must fall' well I've had a bit of that this week.  Let's just say I've finally got all the holes covered so no more rain can fall.  Bad week and I won't go into that at all.

Jim, I have learned is somewhat of a puzzle addict.  He loves them, in fact he wanted to actually have a puzzle room in one of his homes.  He wanted to glue the completed puzzles and hang some of them on the walls in that room.  So far I think in the past while he's completed at least eight or nine puzzles.  These puzzles have lots of pieces and are hard to put together.  He just sticks with them until they are completed, whereas I can only sit just so long and then I have to do something else.  I've been trying to take pics of them but have missed most.

Today we went shopping!  I also learned something new about Jim I did not know before.  He is a major not shopper.  He is one of those get in and get out asap guys.  I did manage to get him into the store to buy a new sport coat which almost made me laugh because he tried on two navy blue jackets and took one.  Jim said it looked fine and the saleperson said, "No it does not, it needs the sleeves altered."  We have to pick it up on Friday.  Fits nice and looks nice.  Yes that's my Christmas present for Jim.   I know what my Christmas present is already.  I have not purchased a new winter coat in just ages and that's what I wanted.  Here's the web site for my coat.  http://www.rei.com/product/801365   It is supposed to be light weight and warm.  My children were very happy when I suggested they get it for me as they tell me I am hard to buy for.  We are going to Michigan in January of 2011 so I will not get it until we fly into the airport.  Don't need it in Florida.

Since we are leaving before New Years Eve and we had tickets for that event we gave them away.  Also gave away two free tickets to a Santa Caroling Party as we won't be there for that either.  Actually our whole little group will not be here for those events so we are all giving our tickets away. 

12/01/2010 (Wed) - Christmas is upon us.

Today finally we woke up to a bit warmer climate.  It only got down to 47 last night which is much better than the 38 we've had for the past two days.  It really does warm up nicely during the day but as soon as the sun goes down it really cools down fast.

We have made what we hope are our final arrangements for our departure from SunLife, which will be on the 17th of this month.

We have not been up to much at all except doing puzzles.  I think in the past week we've done five of them but they are the 500 piece ones.  Jim is much better at it than I am, as I can only sit so long before I have to get away from it.  

This is the first one we did. 

 Our neighbors behind us are putting up an Arizona room so every morning by eight the carpenter is there pounding nails, well actually he has a nail gun.   It's been interesting watching it go up.  One man is doing it and I think he must have come from the north.......as he is a really fast worker. 

He has put all this up in about two days.

  We are going to dinner with friends Don and Sarah tonight and then we are playing a game called wizard.  Every Wed. a large group gets together to play it.  It kind of reminds me of Euchre as the high score winners move to another table.  It really is a fun game and one that I had not heard of before.  We hopefully will be buying it before we leave for Florida.

The park here is busy getting everything in the Christmas mode.  One thing that is neat is that each street is decorated by that street residents.  Looks pretty festive.   I think the activity center has four or five trees up already.

One street has these on every lamp post.

One street has these on their lamp posts.

Another street has these not on the lamp posts but on the palm trees.  They also have strings of lights going completely down both sides of the street.  Be like day time when they turn them all on.

Now for our street.  We have nothing because no one is stepping to the plate to suggest something.  I have heard that since most of G row is Rv's they normally don't do this street.  Now how sad is that.  If we were going to be here until after Christmas I would be putting something up that's for sure.  But we are not.

11/26/2010 (FRI) Shopping and More Shopping but...

I am not one of those 'black friday' shoppers.  In fact I have all my holiday shopping completed.  It's been a bit since I've last posted as really we have not been doing much.  Same ole same ole.

Thanksgiving here in the park was really nice.  We had in excess of 200 people attending and it went incredibly well.  They had the tables set up in sections of two eight foot tables end to end.  Then one singe table.  Each grouping was like this.  I was in charge of hosting table two.  By that all I had to do was make sure the table was decorated and the food was uncovered when it came time to eat.  I had friends Pam and Joanna helping me so it was really easy. 

Our Table For 16.

Our table, we were told, was the nicest decorated table of all.  It did look very nice and all those sitting at the table thought it looked nice......or is that because they did not have to help...

Food Table

Each couple had to bring a specified dish that would feed 16 people.  The park furnished the turkeys, gravy, and drinks.  We had dressing, cranberries, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, salad, vegetable, rolls/butter, and desserts.  Food was excellent and not one person went away hungry.

Yummy Food...

The really bad thing (or it could be a good thing) is that you never have any leftovers to munch on later in the day.  But really after eating all we did we certainly did not need leftovers.

Friends Mel and Joanna

Friends Bill and Pam

Thursday was also a very special day for our friend Bill because it was his birthday.  Later in the day we all met here to celebrate his 61st. birthday.  Was just a fun time.

Bill And His New Hat

Happy Birthday Bill!!

Poor Bill had to open some of the most unusual gifts that we had purchased from a garage sale.  Cake was excellent and we all had a great time.  Hurry and turn 62 Bill we want another piece of cake.