Dale and Lisa's Travels

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

From Florida, the Only Warm State in the USA

Thanksgiving Day 2013 was certainly a new experience for us. No turkey to cook, no potatoes to mash, no gravy to stir, no stuffing to stuff, but most important no family to hug. Uggh! We enjoyed the dinner held at the Woods N Water Trails clubhouse and met some new folks. The food was all very good with about 60 people in attendance. We both ate lightly, knowing that this was Turkey Day Phase I. Dale was disappointed that the Lions game wasn't on a TV in the clubhouse, but at least he stayed for the whole meal. One Cheesehead at our table was so distraught over the lack of the game on a TV in the clubhouse that he jumped up as soon as they started calling tables, even though ours hadn't been called. He filled his plate and made a beeline for the door. His wife later explained his need to see the game and apologized for his absence. At 4:00 we went to the home of Kathy Ilkka's mother, Marlene. There were just five of us as Don and the boys were up in Michigan's UP for the annual deer hunting weekend. It was a nice cozy dinner with another round of wonderful food. Marlene, Kathy and Anna welcomed us like family. While there we Face Timed with our Michigan family, so even though hugs weren't possible we were able to see everyone.

Woods N Water Trails RV Resort clubhouse

Getting our instructions prior to loading our plates

All the fixin's waiting to be dished up

The all-important dessert table

Getting ready to say the blessing at Marlene's

Had to include Marlene's Puffy - Tell me he ain't cute!

On Friday we drove our bikes around and down to the waterfront at the resort. As we were making our way out on the dock a rather loud fluttering of wings above startled us. Looking up we could see a large bird leaving its roosting place in the tree we were directly under. He flew to another nearby tree and landed. We were looking at a Bald Eagle not 40 yards away. Lisa got several good shots, but upon getting too close, the Eagle decided to find another place to roost. Lisa was bummed as she missed getting it in flight. She's been back to the dock area a few more times hoping to spy the majestic creature, but to no avail so far. That Friday night we met Marlene, Kathy and Anna in downtown Eustis for the Annual Light Up Eustis festivities. It was quite an affair, the likes of which we've never seen in Michigan with, at least it seemed, no less than a thousand people strolling about. Of course, it might have something to do with 60 degree evenings in Florida at this time of year as opposed to evenings in the 20's in Michigan. The streets were blocked off with stages set up in various locations. Santa and Mrs. Claus arrived in a City of Eustis fire engine.

Woods N Waters canal and boat dock

Bald Eagle at the boat dock

Another view of the majestic eagle

Peddler's Wagon is a cool store in downtown Eustis

Inside Peddler's Wagon

Fountain in Eustis waterfront park

Light Up Eustis crowd and main stage

Santa and Mrs. Claus arriving in a Eustis fire engine

Santa & Mrs. Claus getting ready to visit with good boys & girls

Shot down Magnolia Ave in Eustis

On Saturday evening it was Mount Dora's turn to light it up. The Mount Dora crowd seemed to be two to three times that which we had seen in Eustis. It had a more elaborate stage setup and light display in the park in front of City Hall. They also have a singing Christmas tree and the Mount Dora marina a couple blocks from downtown is not to be missed.

Crowd gathered in front of City Hall for Light Up Mount Dora

Light Up Mount Dora stage

Mount Dora stage after dark

Mount Dora City Hall

Mount Dora lit up

Here's how they do it in Mount Dora

Just a portion of Mount Dora Marina

Other side of the marina taken across the water

On Sunday, December 1st, after church we went to Olivia's in Eustis for lunch. It came highly recommended and did not disappoint. It's not fancy schmancy, but rather quirky cool with an eclectic blend of non-matching furniture and dinnerware. They have a small musician's stage and apparently bring in some decent talent for dinner shows. Oh yeah, and the food was very good. On Tuesday, December 3rd, after Lisa attended the Womens Bible Study we helped decorate the park with other campers. Lisa worked inside the clubhouse and Dale helped with the outside landscape decorations.

Just another picture of the welcoming committee that patrols the grounds daily

Woods N Water Trails all lit up

Apropos decoration for a campground

On Wednesday, we enjoyed a beautiful sunset on Lake Dora by their lighthouse park. While there Dale spied an interesting little 2 person powerboat cruising out on the lake. A truck and trailer eventually drove up, and pulled the little craft out of the lake. It turned out to be a CraigCat which neither of us had ever seen before. It's a tiny catamaran, in this case, powered by a 25 horse outboard capable of pushing the CraigCat to over 25mph. The guys pulling the boat out actually work for a local CraigCat Tour company. They gave Dale a flyer describing the 2 hour tour where you drive your own boat and the guide narrates over the boat's Bluetooth sound system. Our tour is booked for Friday, December 13th. Dale can't wait. Oh, and Lisa is looking forward to it, too.

Lisa waiting patiently for the sunset over Lake Dora

Someone else waiting for the sunset

This guy don't care about no sunset - show me da teeny tiny fish!

Sunset over Lake Dora

Thursday we swam and relaxed by the pool, and Lisa got her new Canon T3i camera! The pictures for the blog should be a touch better going forward. Friday saw us attending another street party in Mount Dora. This time it was the Mount Dora Christmas Walk. Once again streets blocked off, bands playing, choruses singing, people everywhere. We also got to listen to David Willis, an American Idol contestant from February of this year. Originally from the area, he purchased, renovated and reopened a coffee shop in Mount Dora in July this year. He was outside the shop singing and playing guitar with a couple other backup musicians. Needless to say, he was attracting quite a crowd. On Saturday, Dale started the installation of a tire monitoring system for the motorhome and Jeep. This system will alert us of any impending tire failure before it happens and, hopefully, prevent any catastrophic incidents that might turn into a local news story. On Sunday, December 8th, after church we drove out to New Smyrna Beach on the Atlantic coast. We had been told by some other campers in the park that they had driven their Jeep on the beach. That sounded pretty cool, so we headed out only to arrive and find out the beach was closed due to high tide. What's up with that? Slightly disappointed we sat in a city pavilion and ate our Subway sandwiches at least enjoying looking at the water and beach activity including some young surfers testing their skills. About the time we finished eating there came an announcement over the local PA system that access to the beach for vehicle traffic would resume in a few minutes. Yeehaw!! Down went the top on the Jeep and out we went to get in line. Sure enough a beach ranger opened the gate and we were soon tooling along the sand. Silly Dale at first put the Jeep in 4WD just because we haven't used it yet, and he remembered almost getting stuck with his 1979 Mercury Capri on Daytona Beach thirty some years ago. However, the ramp at New Smyrna was very solid and everything, including Corvettes, were making it onto the beach just fine so he pulled it back into 2WD. Maybe we can use the 4WD when we get up to Michigan over the Holidays. We had a great time on the beach! Lisa had insisted on buying Santa hats for the occasion and made Dale keep his on the whole time. Needless to say we attracted some attention and smiles.

Driving on New Smyrna Beach

Hey, is that Santa in a new red sleigh?

Time to head out after a stressful day at the beach

On Monday we golfed at the Mount Dora Golf Club referred to as The Old Course. Since we hadn't golfed in quite a while we didn't keep score. It was better that way. The only score written down that day was Dale's rare birdie on the 14th hole. On Tuesday, December 10th, Dale was finally able to make it to the Men's Bible Study while Lisa once again attended the Women's Bible Study. Dale appreciated finding out that the Men's study was just starting a Ray Van Der Laan series which he had not been through yet. Our Michigan bible study group has done a couple of his studies. If you've not experienced a Ray Van Der Laan faith lesson you should give it a try. He takes you right to the Holy Land for each of the studies. A very good, easy to understand teacher. The Women's study had a very nice potluck luncheon after their study so Dale enjoyed a great leftover dinner that evening. Yum!

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Happy Thanksgiving from Mt. Dora!

Twas the night fore Thanksgiving, when all through the bus,

not one turkey is thawing, cause here it's just us.

Well, that's the extent of my poetry skills. And to think it only took me three hours to come up with that!

The remainder of our time in Williston since our last blog entry was spent getting back on the exercise wagon for Dale, going through our mail which we hadn't had forwarded for three weeks, biking around the campground, grocery shopping, and scanning old photographs into the computer. Exciting stuff! We did end the time in Williston with an evening by the community campfire singing along with a very talented (older) guitarist. The criteria for the song requests was that they had to be at least 35 years old. It was a very nice ending to a relaxing week.

On Sunday, November 17th, we drove 80 or so miles from Williston to Woods N Water Trails RV Park. It can be a little stressful finding parks that are not on nice big main roads. Woods N Water Trails is not on a nice big main road, but we managed to find the park without any missteps. That was the good news. However, once inside the park things got a little tight. Upon pulling into the park on the entry road there was no obvious place to stop and check-in. The entry road was barely as long as our motorhome and Jeep combined before it T-boned at the clubhouse. Dale made a quick assessment as to the best way to proceed to get us out of the way so as to avoid blocking the entrance to the whole park. He picked a route with the thought in mind to go left and then right around the clubhouse and then stop along side it's left side where it appeared there wouldn't be too much traffic. We made the left turn and started to make the subsequent right. Well, this sequence of turns was not designed with a 40 foot motorhome in mind. As the situation got more questionable Dale sent Lisa out to spot for him. At this point we were starting to provide entertainment. We like to do that from time to time as life can be so boring for some of these snowbirds. Finally Lisa threw up a frantic STOP signal. Dale got out and confirmed there was no way we were going to negotiate that turn without adding some new cosmetic features to the Big Brown Bus. We would need to disconnect the Jeep in order to back out. About this time a fellow in a golf cart stopped to check on us. He informed us that he worked at the park and asked what site we morons were headed for. He didn't really say that, but Dale knew he was thinking it. Dale explained that we were to camp near the owner's house (whatever that meant) per conversations he had had with the manager of the park a week earlier. He then gave us the good news that we were not even in the right place. We should have turned a couple hundred yards prior to this entrance. Wonderful, we were providing entertainment and we weren't even supposed to be here. Well, Troy turned out to be a godsend. After disconnecting the Jeep, Lisa and Troy guided Dale back around the corner, and we safely parked the motorhome along the front side of the clubhouse far enough to the side so traffic could pass. The Jeep was parked elsewhere. Troy called and delayed an appointment so he could show us where we were supposed to go. The three of us piled on his two person golf cart and headed back out the entrance. We turned in at the entrance to Baywood Condominiums and eventually ended up going down a driveway. This driveway belonged to the campground owner who lived adjacent to the campground. He brought us to a location with two full hookup sites in what appeared to be the owner's side yard. It was actually very nice with a view to the lake over some lakeside vegetation and a lovely treed yard. It was like a custom private site just for us. We set up camp and then visited Dale's Michigan Tech college roommate, Dr. Don (and Kathy) Ilkka, and his family for dinner that same night of the 17th. On the 18th we drove up to The Villages where we spent February and March of 2012. We enjoyed our time there in 2012 and made some good friends so we want to spend some time there again this winter. So the main purpose for the trip on the 18th was to scope out potential campgrounds for January 2014. We ended up making a reservation at Recreation Plantation just outside The Villages in Lady Lake. Of course we had to end a perfect day in The Villages with a visit to the nightly party and dancing in the streets, this time at Spanish Springs. The only drawback to our site is that it is a grass site with the natural ant hill or two. On Thursday, the 21st, Dale did find out during a day of washing the motorhome with flip flops on that at least some of the ants are of the fire variety. Not bad, but just enough to cause some caution for the rest of our stay. We haven't mentioned it yet, but our intention is to park the BBB in Florida for about a month during the holidays and head back to Michigan to see family and take care of some doctor appointments. The plan had been to park the motorhome at Don's house during our absence. However, upon visiting his farm on the 17th it became clear we needed a plan B. Although Don has plenty of property, the driveway up to his house is bordered by some healthy evergreens which form half of an arboreal tunnel with well under the requisite 13 feet needed to allow the motorhome to pass unscathed. God provided plan B in the form of Kathy's mother. Kathy's parents, Doug and Marlene, used to own a substantial fifth wheel trailer. So Doug installed a limestone pad at the side of their garage complete with 50 amp electrical and water hookups to keep their trailer. Unfortunately, Doug was called to heaven earlier this year and the trailer has gone on to new owners. However, the pad is still there. On Friday, the 22nd, we took a ride over to evaluate the potential parking space. It was ideal. Large, unobstructed driveway. Plenty of room to maneuver the motorhome into place. And somewhat hidden well away from the road on their 6 acre plot. God works in amazing ways. Our parking spot reservations are in place. On Saturday, the 23rd, we took a ride with Don and Kathy up to Juniper Springs Recreation Area to see an excellent example of Florida's natural springs. Fern Hammock was very cool and somewhat reminiscent of the mud pots of Yellowstone. Water was 'boiling' out of the sand at a constant 72 degrees Fahrenheit at the rate of around 6 million gallons per day. Kathy packed a picnic lunch which we ate adjacent to the swimming area at Juniper Springs. Sunday we attended church at Faith Lutheran in Eustis. We met a nice couple from Kalamazoo, MI. We went out to lunch with them and invited them over to see the motorhome afterwards. On Tuesday, we drove down to Winter Haven to check out tire shades to protect the motorhome tires from the sun and to check out a couple campgrounds in Davenport for a month starting in mid-February. We ended up making reservations at Deer Creek Golf RV Resort. Looks very nice with friendly people all over. Thanksgiving Day will be spent in two places: our Woods N Water Trails clubhouse starting at 2:00 and then at Marlene's (Kathy's mother) starting at 4:00. Lisa is relishing the thought of not hosting for the first time in many years, but we will indeed miss spending the day with family for the first time ever.