VISIT TO KEY LARGO

This was our first visit to Key Largo and we stayed at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park. For more information click on John Pennekamp Website

In the late 1950's, John D. Pennekamp and Dr. Gilbert L. Voss of the Marine Institute of Miami teamed up to lead a fight to protect the reefs from further damage caused by tourists taking reef souvenirs.  His efforts paid off and in 1960 President Eisenhower gained federal control of the reefs and the Key Largo Coral Reef Preserve was established.

We don't stay at state parks often but made an exception for this one to do some snorkeling and we're glad we did

Ready to explore

I'm not the best snorkeler in the world but really enjoyed this experience

Took a boat ride out to the reef

He's ready to take the plunge

What a day of sun and fun.  Loved it.

VISITING DENIS' COUSINS IN FLORIDA

Have you ever seen a Hickory Horned Devil?  We thought it was a centipede but after a little research learned that it's a caterpillar.   Learn more about this strange creature by clicking on this video Video of a Hickory Horned Devil

Hickory Horned Devil

We made several stops along our route to visit Denis' cousins, his dad's sister's children.  He hasn't seen them in years and it was a happy reunion.  Joanne and her family made us feel very welcome while we parked in their driveway.  Joanne made us a nice dinner and the next morning Ron served up bacon and eggs.  Natalie has a beautiful voice and sang Think of Me from The Phantom of the Opera and Kristin showed us her artwork.

Cousin Joanne, husband Ron and twins Kristin and Natalie 

Joanne dressed for 60's day at work - she looked adorable

Richard and Aimara drove a couple of hours to meet up with us in Key Largo and we went to the Shipwreck Bar & Grill for fresh fish. We enjoyed talking and getting to know them, it was fun.
 

Cousin Richard and his wife Aimara (just got married in May) - Brother of Joanne and Carol

Cousin Carol (sister of Joanne)

Denis was thrilled to be able to spend time with his cousins and reminiscing about when they were kids.

This was a view we shared with Richard and Aimara

Thanks for stopping in.  Please take a moment to say hi and leave a comment.

TAKING A BLOGGING SABBATICAL

Denis and I have been blessed with an amazing year and a half of travel.  From the east coast to the west coast, from Alaska to Mexico and many, many places in between.  We've been full-timing since 2007 and move from one place to another every two to three weeks.  We love the RV life-style and pray that God will bless us with many more years of happy trails.

With that said, I'm sad to tell you that I'm going to take some blogging time off.  We have business, personal and family issues to handle over the next few months.  I hope that I don't go into withdrawal because I'm one of those bloggers that feel guilty if I miss a few days.

I love reading all your travel blogs and from time to time I'll take a peek to see what you all are up to and leave a comment or two.   Thank you for sharing your thoughts, travels, good times and bad through your blogs.  I hope you enjoyed traveling along with us and as the terminator says "I'll be back".

Happy trails to all until we meet again

That's all folks!

BYE JAC - HELPFUL TIP

We brought Jaclyn to the airport this morning and she arrived home safely.  It's too bad she didn't have one more day here because today was the day of sunshine that she was looking for.  We enjoyed having her and I think she enjoyed a few days of relaxation.

On a rainy day the indoor flea market was a good idea - "posing" in front of a scenic poster

Today was a perfect day for drying laundry outside and I managed to get four loads done.  Other than doing laundry and a little house cleaning, we enjoyed our gravity chairs, the warmth of the sun and a good book.

A friend gave me a cleaning tip that really works and I thought I'd share it with you.  I used to scrub down the shower walls which is a lot of work and not always effective, not any more.  I bought a spray bottle, mix water with a little Cascade Rinse Aid and spray down the shower with this mixture after each shower.  No more spots, scum or scrubbing.

I try not to use any toxic cleaning or toiletry products - no sulfates, phosphates for me, if I can help it. I find vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, baking powder and elbow grease work just as good if not better than those high priced commercial products.  Do you have a "tip" you'd like to share?

Thanks for stopping in.

JAC IS BACK

Yesterday after going to mass and getting our ashes, we went to picked up Jaclyn.  After four days of basically slave labor and no contact with the horses, Jaclyn decided to bail. I can't believe they were having her wipe down the stall walls with straight bleach without offering her gloves.  She has bleach burns on her hands as a result.  They didn't even provide drinking water for the student workers and the tap water was undrinkable. The room she shared with another student was dirty and smelled of mildew.  Unbelievable!  She worked from 6 in the morning to 6 at night, which she expected but she was promised riding lessons in exchange for her work and that didn't happen.  So she's staying with us until her flight leaves on Saturday morning and we're happy to have her.

It was a sunny day and we all enjoyed a day of reading, talking on the phone and catching some rays.

Doing there thing

Today it's raining and we're all very content to do our thing indoors.  Jaclyn is searching for another co-op job, I'm baking bread and Denis is working on the computer.  Maybe we'll watch a movie later in the day.

What else is there to do on a rainy day?

She seems very happy to not be mucking out the stalls today

The rain doesn't seem to bother this Sandhill Crane outside our window

Talking about movies, what did you all think of the academy award best picture?  We watched 12 Years a Slave the other night and the acting was exceptional but we're just tired of slave stories and the brutality of it all.  I thought Dallas Buyers Club was excellent.

Thanks for stopping in!

$60 TO REMOVE A SCREW

Over the last couple of days, Denis has been trying to remove the gas filter from the coach.  The filter has never been changed. We've been getting a warning light plus sometimes when we're driving the engine slowly shuts down and we have to pull over, wait a few minutes then start the engine.  So I say Denis has been trying to remove it because one of the three screws won't cooperate.  Last night we had a mechanic come over and after a 30-minute struggle he was able to remove the screw and we were $60 poorer.  First thing this morning Denis was able to put in the new filter and, hopefully, this will solve our problem but we won't know for sure until we do some driving.

Saw this baby at I-Hop - Only grandparents would dress their granddaughter like this

We met friends at the Olive Garden in the Villages for lunch.  Most of us ordered the all-you-can-eat soup, salad and bread sticks.  There were no complaints about the food or service and we had a nice time.

The blurry photo is the result of asking someone from the Villages to take our picture, sorry!

If you remember, we picked up my niece on Saturday from the airport.  I guess things are not what she was promised and she's asked us if we'd help her escape. We'll be picking her up tomorrow morning and she'll be staying with us until her flight leaves on Saturday.  Can't wait to hear her story.

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

VISIT WITH MY NIECE

We were at the Orlando Airport this morning at 8:30 to pick up my niece, Jaclyn.  She is a business major in her third year at Northeastern University and had an opportunity to intern at a dressage. I had to Google the word dressage because I'm not a horse person but Jaclyn has been around horses most of her life and she was very excited.  She'll be there for a week while they "interview" her.  If all goes well, she's hoping to spend the summer working there.  We had a big breakfast together at I-Hop before dropping her off and taking a quick tour of the grounds.

Left Hartford with temps of 9 degrees to Orlando with mid-70's

Eating a hearty breakfast because she wasn't sure when her next meal would be

Hard to believe this is my youngest niece

We've been reading http://geosuzie.blogspot.com/ and seeing the mouth watering foods George whips up on his Weber grill and finally decided to buy one.  The first night we cooked a whole chicken with baked potatoes and carrots.  It was so easy and came out perfect except the carrots burned on one side.  We're now a Weber believer.  I wished I remembered to take a photo but we were so anxious to eat, that I forgot.  Next time.

We were fortunate to watch this young lady practicing

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

CANAVERAL NATIONAL SEASHORE

We visited the longest stretch of preserved coastline on the east coast of Florida.  Over 57,000 acres of undeveloped beach with a thousand species of plants and birds.  This was our first visit and we sighted an alligator, otter and lots of birds.  The sun was shining and the temps were in the low 70's .. it was a beautiful day and we enjoyed a two mile nature hike.

Our first visit

Beautiful beaches

Spotted this guy as we were driving through the park

Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge is where we needed to go to have our National Park book stamped and we were happily surprised with what the refuge had to offer.  The visitor's center closed at 4PM and we had just enough time to watch their 20-minute video.  We walked along their boardwalk and that's when we spotted the second alligator sunning himself.

This was a nice 2-mile loop

Enjoying the sunshine

I used my Yelp app to locate a local diner and found one on the river's edge.  I had a grilled grouper sandwich called a Groupen because it was like a Rueben on marble bread, swiss cheese and coleslaw. Denis got the broiled redfish sandwich.

Everything was home made including the coleslaw and potato salad

This is the restaurant that Yelp rated with 4 stars

We made a u-turn at this park when I spotted this cluster of birds

Before leaving the campground this morning I saw mom, dad and baby Sandhill crane

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

RAINY DAY APPS

Florida is getting the rain it needs and I'd much rather be here than in the New England area where they're getting dumped with more snow.  Over the last few days we've had all kinds of weather from muggy, hot sunshine to cool windy, rainy days.  When the sun is out, you'll find us outside in our gravity chairs reading a good book and soaking in some vitamin D or taking a bike ride or walk around the park for a mile or two.

Denis practices Tai Chi come rain or shine

We love our Map Our Walk app which logs our workouts by date, mileage, time, place and calories burned.  It even emails me a weekly report, pretty cool.

Map My Walk log

We like the Out of Milk app which is a perpetual shopping list.  It's neat because once you put a grocery item on the list, you'll never have to put it on the list again.  You just check it off and it goes on a pending list for the next time.  I've broken down my grocery lists into several categories i.e. Costco, groceries, Walmart, clothes, etc.   It's a handy, dandy app that gets lots of use and it syncs with Denis' phone.  

Just check off items until you need them next time

When traveling, we like to use the My Pilot app which gives us a list of nearby Pilot/Flying J's.  It provides the address, highway exit, phone number, cost of gas and much more.   I like to find the ones that have RV fuel lanes and propane.  I think the Flying J pizza slices are pretty, darn good and one slice is big enough for a satisfying, cheap lunch.

Another app that I probably don't use as often as I should is Mind Games.  This is a perfect app for a rainy day and, who knows, maybe it will keep my mind sharp.  The app has memory games in math, objects, words and more.  Try it, I think you'll like it and it's free as long as you don't upgrade to Pro.

Good for the memory

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

WHAT DID WE DO BEFORE PHONE APPS?

This afternoon we drove to Southern Palms in Eustis to visit with Larry and Gail.  Gail was a gracious host when we visited her in Alaska last summer.  We met Larry back on 2006 and have been bumping into him ever since.

We spent some time chatting inside the coach waiting for the electrical storm to pass and then we went for lunch at the Smokehouse Restaurant.  Gail pulled out her phone and found a restaurant coupon app that gave us a free appetizer.  Thank you Gail for a nice lunch and we'll get you next time.

Larry and Gail

I miss my pugs but it's even better to enjoy someone else's dogs - here's Misty

They've heard about geocaching but have never tried it.  So after lunch we pulled out our phones and found a couple of geos nearby.  Larry found the first one and Denis found the next.  Us girls will have to do better next time.

This was a unique location for a mini-geocache - screwed into a telephone pole

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

ENJOYING THE LIFESTYLE

We've been enjoying the park, the sunshine, reading a good book, taking long walks around the park, the flowers in bloom, good food and the wading birds just outside our window.  Here's the photos to prove it.

This was out first chicken dinner after our 6-day cleanse

Anyone know what kind of tree this is?

I thought this was a wood stork but I'm not sure - anyone?

Here's a quick update on my dad's prognosis.  Dad has been moved from assisted living to the nursing home at the soldier's home.  He's in a wheelchair all the time now and needs help moving from it to his bed or a chair.  He needs help with bathing, dressing and they need to bring his meals to him.  He can still be difficult or confrontational but has lost a lot of his fight.  My Aunt Donna went to visit him and was surprised to see how much he's changed in a month's time.  He's lost about 10 pounds and has developed a hand tremor.  I spent a good part of this morning talking with the nurse, social worker and his primary care physician.  We all decided he shouldn't be leaving the the facility to see outside physicians because it's too much for him.  I felt better after talking with everyone and feel he's in good hands.  I look forward to seeing him in April.  He just had his 85th birthday.

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

BACK TO NORMAL EATING - YEAH!

We were very excited to have real food today.  Our 8-day cleanse ended up being a 6-day cleanse ... which wasn't ideal but it was beneficial.  We did three days of just veggies and three days of veggies with rice or quinoa.  Denis says he didn't feel any different one way or the other.  I felt great, slept better and didn't experience the bloating and stomach problems which are regular issues for me.  I went from 32 body fat to 30 and 117 to 113 pounds ... not that I wanted to loss weight but I seemed to lose it in the tummy area, which is good.  Next year I'd like to plan the cleanse when we're at Desert Pools so I could incorporate the mineral springs and sauna.

We both love our Nutribullet and plan on making more tasty smoothies now that we can have fresh fruits.  Denis made us an orange and honey smoothie today - it was great.  Tasted similar to an orange julius but probably a lot healthier.

Our site is facing a pond and we enjoy watching the wading birds while reading and soaking in the sun in our gravity chairs.  This is the life!  We appreciate it even more when we hear from our friends and family up north.

Our view from the coach

The site is huge - that's our coach in the background

Loving it!

Just one of the many wading birds that enjoy the pond

We met new RV friends in Alabama and spent a couple of hours getting to know each other before we headed to Florida.  They've seen us at several other parks but this is the first time we had a chance to spend some time together.

Dale and Julie Edge

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.