KW to Sarasota to Cape Canaveral

After a month in Key West at Boyds it was time to move on and wanting to see The Ringling in Sarasota we motored off the Keys and across I-75 to Naples and north to Sarasota.  We plopped down at Sun ‘n Fun on Fruitville Pike, just east of I-75 and about 8 miles from Sarasota but easy travel in any direction.   This is a huge resort, lots of park models and big areas for RV's including big rigs. Plenty of activities and resources including pool, fitness center, etc.  Some people actually spend the entire winter there.   The Ringling museums = circus, art and mansion – are all well worth the time and price.  There is also a classic car museum across the street from The Ringling worth a visit too.

Tuesday, April 8, the rain came down, hard, all day, so it was stay put and it blew over in time to leave Wednesday morning and drive across to Cape Canaveral.  North on I-75 to Tampa, pick up I-4 and go east, past Orlando and Dizzyworld again (ugh!) but after some congestion around the not so magic kingdom, it thinned out and easy sailing on to Port Canaveral and Jetty Park which is part of the Port.  Easy in and parking, nice spot, reasonable and good facilities.  Not a lot of amenities but clean and friendly.

Susie had looked ahead and found out that there was a launch scheduled for Thursday and weather permitting, the countdown had begun.  We spent the entire day at the Kennedy Space Center and the peak was watching the Atlas rocket put a pay load up toward the space station, some kind of spy equipment.  The I-Max movie about building and maintaining the space station was also a highlight.   Recommend that if you haven’t visited and you are ever close by, KSC is really worth the trip and the time.  Be sure to take the tour bus to Saturn V and have enough time for both sites, the visitors’ center and Saturn V.   Tomorrow we leave for Savannah.

Key West

Key West is literally the end of the road south, especially on US 1.  And for those of you who have driven down recently, you noticed that there are constant improvements under way, repaving, widening and reinforcing.  Never mind the laying of a huge pipeline.  Hopefully by next winter, all of that will be completed and depending on the volume of traffic, which can be heavy at times, the trip will be easier, faster and smoother.

We arrived at Boyds Campground on Stock Island a week ago and will be here until April 5.  The campground is well situated, on the water, about 5 miles from Duval Street where there is much tourist activity.  Lots of people bring boats.  The parking spaces are tight and parking a big rig is quite possible but there are fewer spaces available.  Good swimming pool, many campground activities and very friendly and helpful staff.  Lots of folks from up north especially PA, OH and MI.

We attended a special event at the Truman Little White House one evening, a spectacular review of the USO with two entertainers of very high quality.  That historic, presidential retreat offers a lot as does Key West in general in terms of opportunities for artists, and writers, galleries, lectures and outdoor sports and water activities - boating, fishing, snorkeling, diving, etc.

One of our favorites has become the happy hour at Half Shell Raw Bar, on the dock near where the Ft. Myers express ties up. That's a large catamaran hydroplane that makes the trip in 3 hours if any of you are up that way and want to visit Key West without driving down.  We are looking at the possibility of four months down here next winter.  Seems we have become real snowbirds.

Disney, Ft. Wilderness and Miami, FL

To all of you who want to go to Dizzyworld, Ft. Wilderness is a most adequate campground.  Just be sure to get a big enough space and Loops 1400 and 600 seem OK.  Our spot was 621, convenient to bus stop, dog park and plenty big enough.  If you keep closer to the edge on the driver's side backing in, you have a bit of extra pavement on the patio side and the slide-outs still work just fine.  There is no WiFi which is amazing in this day and age but you can get a cable connection via ethernet.  I was there to attend a national conference, need the internet for work so it was a bit frustrating at first, especially since the cable guys had to come out and fix the connections.  I will not comment much on Disney except to say that at lot of their systems seem antiquated, paper records and the like, many employees seem retired and incompetent and the whole place is way too contrived, corporate and controlled for my personal tastes.

We pulled out Sunday morning, zipped on down to Miami via Sun Pass and are currently at Miami Everglades Park on a grassy parking spot in the middle of some very attractive farmland.  There are a number of people who spend the winter here and there are 37 super sites that probably have concrete pads and at least their WiFi works fine. There is a paved hiking, biking, walking trail around the perimeter of the park, and it's quite long, just short of one mile.  The park is 34 acres, 300 parking spots, a very nice swimming pool, etc.   Of course, the weather right now is superb in the 70's and 80's, clear skies and a day of catching up and some shopping lies ahead.  Stay tuned for the next installment from Key West.

MIAMI, OK via AR and TN to ORLANDO, FL

A previous blog got us as far as West Memphis, TN and we traveled from there to Nashville, stopped at a Camping World to get a light wire to the toad corrected.  Called ahead to make sure they could work us into their busy schedule which they did and we then spent the night at the KOA next door.
It was an OK KOA, narrow driveways, but very good restaurant next door between Camping World and the campground, called Cock of the Walk.  Good catfish and other vittles as well.

The next morning we set out, stopping to fuel up at a place in the general direction (south) that we were headed, and the GPS took as right there to a Z-Mart where diesel was $3.53, about the best price we've seen thus far.  Here in Orlando it's right around $4.00! Traveled on south stopping for the night in Forsyth, GA at yet another KOA.  Big Prevost pulled in next to us and they left early the next morning and we followed them out, plopped back onto I-75 and ran into a lot of rain and heavy traffic.  Saw one terrible accident where a car had tried to drive under a tractor-trailer.  The car was a twisted mess and my hunch is that a wet highway was a contributor but big factor was probably driver error on the part of one or the other. 

Arrived Sunday afternoon at Ft. Wilderness in Dizzyworld and entered by a very remote, bad GPS direction through the back lots of Disney.  Took a wrong turn and had to make a U-Turn in a field courtesy of a very helpful and polite security guard.  Checked in, and we are in Loop 600 for this week while I attend a national conference and we get a little more organized.  Good to be in warmer temperatures, nice parking spot and while a little tight, was able to back in with one turn.  Have sat reception for Direct TV and all the other amenities one would expect from a class operation.  Even the Dude is happy.

Stay tuned, enjoy your travels, be safe and be well.

Sunrise over the Mississippi

2/21/14  6:43 AM.  Brilliant, blinding sunrise 108 degrees East from our parking spot in Tom Sawyer's Mississippi River RV Park, at the end of 8th street in West Memphis, Arkansas.  After heavy winds including a tornado warning yesterday, a river being churned up to whitecaps, all is calm this morning.  Tugs and barges continued to ply the river upstream and down yesterday, last night and again today, just a few feet from the west bank in front of us.  If you want a precise location as some seem to enjoy, we are 35.7.50 N and 90.9.41 W for coordinates.

The big plus of this park is the location, proximate to both I-55 snd I-40 as well as about 14 miles from downtown Memphis.  The minus is that if you depend on park amenities, there aren't many but there is a very good WiFi connection on which we depend for good connectivity.  The level concrete pads have good 50 amp electricity, water and sewer hookups.  All in all, a good 3-day stop for us as I had some work about 30 miles north in Wilson, Arkansas where plans are afoot for an RV park there. The town is undergoing a restoration and is especially interesting from a historical perspective as well as a fascinating farm economy and outdoor environment in the Delta.  Here is a recent article to give you some insight:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/20/us/arkansas-towns-new-owner-has-visions-of-its-renaissance.html

Nice to have a leisurely start to a new day, another gift as we prepare to launch toward Orlando where we are due on Monday for a national conference next week.  Mapquest says that it's about 800 miles so it's easy to break that up into two or even three days and we will have to see what there might be to see along the way.  One option would be to drop down into the Florida panhandle earlier and enjoy some scenery along the Gulf.  If anyone has other suggestions or recommendations, please send them along.

MIAMI, OK to WEST MEMPHIS, AR

After a week at Camp Newell, taking delivery on our "new" 2005 Newell which we have dubbed "Big Blue" we set out on Monday, 2/17, around 1:30 PM.  We had originally planned to leave earlier but were having issues (and are still having them) with our Direct TV.  We will either figure it out as to whether it's our newly installed Winegard satellite receiver or Direct TV and maybe just cancel Direct TV which is often a pain in the ass anyway.  We have called Direct TV four times trying to change a physical address and they seem totally incompetent and unable to do it.

The final glitch was as we were hooking up the toad, we discovered that the receptacle for the plug-in wiring for lights from the Newell to our Jeep did not match our cord which we had used on our previous coach.  Ah well, small exchange and as soon as the lunch horn signaled the end of that period, Andrew fixed it and we departed.  As an aside, we drove over to Bentonville on Sunday and visited Crystal Bridges, Alice Walton's museum of American art.  Spectacular!  Both the building and the collection are unparalleled.  Go see it when you have the opportunity.

Monday night we stopped in Mountain Grove, Missouri.  You can skip that one.  The electricity in the Missouri RV Park is unreliable but we met an interesting family who work in construction.  She is a heavy equipment operator (Skylift cranes) and he is a welder, rigger, driller.  They travel full time with two trucks,  a fifth wheel toy hauler and a trailer with equipment.  They made the toy room their daughter's bedroom.  One of their jobs was erecting wind turbines in various places.  Fascinating!

Yesterday we motored on down to West Memphis, Arkansas and after a lousy detour in the adjacent neighborhood due to construction blocking the route, we found Tom Sawyer's Mississippi River RV Park.  We parked immediately in front of the river with a view both up and downstream, just across the river from Memphis, TN.  The immense river barges pass within 50-60 yards of our parking spot. This is a very good place to stop and camp if you are traveling on either I-55 or I-40.  Tuesday night we drove into Memphis for BBQ ribs at Cozy Corner.  Might be a little lacking in atmosphere but terrific menu and very good ribs from friendly folks. The restaurant in Memphis not to miss is The Elegant Farmer.  5 stars for menu, quality and service and not over the top expensive.

I will be working up the road for the next couple of days with a former colleague and good friend in Wilson, AR, and then we head for Orlando for a national meeting. If you're really interested in what's happening in Wilson, including plans for an RV park, have a look at this NY Times article published last month.  

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/20/us/arkansas-towns-new-owner-has-visions-of-its-renaissance.html  

 

SOUTHWEST to SOUTHEAST Feb 9,2014

We are getting ready to launch tomorrow morning from Santa Fe, New Mexico, our home base, on yet another road trip to a few destinations and parts unknown.  I had the opportunity early this morning to read a terrific article by David Abram that appeared originally in the September/October issue of Orion magazine. It was entitled “The Air Aware - Mind and Mood on a Breathing Planet.”  Because of my continuing connections with the cycles and seasons, this kind of rumination stirs something in my own soul.  My first response was this is one more reason I appreciate being able to travel to other places and absorb the changes in the climate and culture.

Our itinerary for this next travel adventure will take us east, through the panhandle of Texas, interesting for the big change as we leave the mountains and desert of the great Southwest.  We have stopped a couple of times at Palo Duro Canyon and if you get bored sometime on Interstate 40 near Amarillo, go there.  It’s worth it.  It’s the second largest canyon in the United States, has some great mountain biking and hiking trails, and you can even rent horses.  The canyon itself is 120 miles long and as wide as 20 miles with a maximum depth of 800 feet.   It’s a camper’s paradise but you can make it a day trip too.

At the end of the first day, the way be clear and no diversions, we should make Oklahoma City and then the next day on to the very northeast corner of Oklahoma where we lived for a few years on Grand Lake.  Our purpose in going there is not to re-visit the lake but to exchange our motor home for another, somewhat larger one since we are living full time in this house on wheels.  That will take a couple of days and a shakedown cruise before we leave the factory where this particular brand is constructed. 

We like the mobility, freedom and independence that comes with this life-style and have enjoyed it off and on for the past 15 years.  We have been all over the United States, parts of Canada and Mexico and were almost three months in Mexico last winter.  Our original plan this year was to be in Mexico again for January and February but because of issues with some extended family members, that trip did not materialize.  And we sold our house in early January and became “homeless” as far as real estate is concerned.

After Oklahoma, it’s a stop in Arkansas for some work there and on to Orlando, Florida, for a national conference meeting at the end of the month.  March will find us in Key West and as we motor our way from Southwest to Southeast one thing is certain.  We will welcome warmer temperatures, tropical winds, the salt air and ocean.  By April or May we will be ready to go back to the high desert and lower humidity of the Southwest but in the meantime we shall absorb a variety of climates and cultures that add to the rich tapestry of our travel experiences.