Month: March 2019

Well over a year ago, Betty & I began plans for the Florida Keys portion of our overlandish odyssey.  We had previously visited the Keys by car, staying in a small motel in Marathon, Florida, roughly half way between Key Largo and

Key West. On that trip we had seen amazing Florida State Parks that backed onto the Atlantic Ocean. Some had campsites that

contained at least one palm, a picnic table, fire pit, and sandy beach. Nirvana! Our goal was to spend two weeks in each park (the maximum allowed), moving up and down the Keys based on availability. This turned out to be wishful thinking!

Reservations for each of the State Parks in the Keys can be made 11 months in advance. I researched the campgrounds and chose preferred sites and dates at each. We were in Quartzsite, Arizona 11 months ago, so I got up before 5 am each morning (yawn) in order to book the sites as they became available at 8 am Florida time. If I clicked on the booking a minute early, the site was available but the message said it was too early to

reserve. If I clicked 1 second past the hour, the site was already booked by someone else. This happened nearly every day for 3 – 4 weeks, until I realized that I would never have the speedy connection required to beat the competition.  From time to time I checked back, and one day I found one night available at Curry Hammock State Park near Marathon: March 1, 2019. So our Keys adventure was built around that one booking.

Betty & I were able to get into Boyd’s Key West Campground for two nights prior to our Curry Hammock stay, and that gave us a chance to cross

the 42 bridges that lead down to the southern tip of Florida to do some touring around Key West first. We have to say the adventure was amazing, whetting our appetite to return again some day.  Following are a few pictures that help tell the story of our joyous journey:

 

Yes, visiting the sunny, steamy Florida Keys, with

temperatures in the high 80’s f. every day (while the weather back in Winnipeg was well below freezing) was wishful thinking. Betty & I hope that all who wistfully read this might have an opportunity to do their own wishful thinking and enjoy this funtastic sunny tiny tip of Florida some day!

Cheers!

Note: for some reason, some of our best pics (taken in portrait) will not rotate & load. If I figure it out, this post will be updated.    We also ate the Key Lime Pie too fast to get pictures, so you’ll just have to use your imagination. lol                      G.R.

 

After exploring the series of small islands that make up the extreme south east corner of the U.S.A., Betty & I have finally turned our home-on-wheels to face the north again. The journey north to Winnipeg is expected to take at least two more months, with the actual date subject to spring forecasts for Manitoba. Call us when the snow is all gone… Lol.

As we bake in southern Florida’s tropical weather, it seems strange to watch the dire predictions and reports of extreme weather in states and provinces to the north.  Next week we will visit Cape Canaveral and learn about space exploration, but already it feels like we are in a different world!

We didn’t make reservations in advance for the Gold Coast portion of Florida, from Miami to West Palm Beach, so

Betty & I have been dividing our time between three campsites this week. Using each as a base camp, we have been driving up and down the coast, mainly on the small coastal road known as A1A.

I use the qualifier “mainly” because The Donald  was at Mar-a-Lago this week in Palm Beach, and the police, secret service, coast guard, and lots of others in and out of uniform, had A1A closed

from Palm Beach to Southern Blvd.  We were surprised and disappointed that the President didn’t invite us over for lunch, but I guess the police who spoke to us at one of the check-points didn’t pass on our travel schedule. Maybe when we get up to Washington.  Lol.

In any event, it was fun to drive past many of the places we have previously visited, or seen in movies or television programs. All those Miami Vice and CSI Miami episodes ran through our minds as we drove past

the art deco buildings of Miami Beach, and the yacht clubs, golf courses, private homes, and exotic condos from Fort Lauderdale to Boca Raton, to Delray Beach, Boynton Beach, Palm Beach, and all the other beaches in between.  

Our stay on the Gold Coast isn’t over yet, but as we start to head north, Betty & I wonder how long it will really take us to travel from this unreal world, back to the real world again. In the meantime…

Cheers!

As often happens, Betty & I took many pictures on the stretch of Florida coast from Miami to West Palm Beach. Here are a few more:

 

Throughout our adventures, Betty & I have tried to drive a fine balance between planning our itinerary, and being spontaneous. Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages. With rigid, detailed planning of days and stays, we can miss out on unexpected surprises that call us to sidetrack, learn about and experience new, previously unknown destinations. But by leaving everything to chance we find many of the nicest campsites and campgrounds on our preferred route were booked many months in advance and not available to us. It’s not easy to maintain that balance, but this week we got lucky!

Heading slowly northward from the Florida Keys, up the eastern seaboard of the U.S.A., we made few advance bookings. Before leaving Winnipeg in December, Betty & I had snagged a few nights at Manatee Hammock campground in Titusville, in order to facilitate our visit to the Kennedy Space Center. Otherwise, we were open to exploring the Atlantic coast, with fingers crossed that we would find decent accommodations. The three campgrounds where we stayed in the Fort Lauderdale/Palm Beach area were great choices, and we would have enjoyed more time in each.

The Bennett Field Campground in Tiger Bay State Forest provided an excellent base camp for us as we explored the Daytona Beach area. Betty & I had been to Daytona Beach when we were much younger – on spring break – and again with our kids when they were still in their teens. We had driven our class C motorhome onto the wide, flat beach and enjoyed the opportunity to play in the sun, sand, and warm waves. But on our first foray into Daytona Beach last week – on one of our few cloudy days – the town seemed very dowdy and run-

down, and all beach access points were closed, with water lapping up the seawall.  It was a big disappointment! However, a couple of days later, the sun was back and so was the beach. We enjoyed a fabulous day driving for miles down the wide, flat beach, and taking time to park and work on our tans with so many others.   This post was going to be called “The Rise & Fall & Rise Again of Daytona Beach”, until our experience today…

While we were in the State Forest last week, Betty & I decided to take a look at what options lay ahead. We considered possible Boondockers Welcome and Harvest Host sites, and investigated National and State Parks along our coastal route. Gamble Rogers State Park at Flagler Beach appeared to be in an ideal location, but I guess everyone else agrees. It is a small Florida park with sections on either side of A1A highway. The “riverside campground” backs onto the Intracoastal Waterway, while the “beach campground” backs onto the Atlantic Ocean! It books up months in

advance, but Betty & I got lucky with site 64 for last night in the riverside campground, and had a great day visiting the beach from there. We had nothing booked for tonight, and hoped to find a spot somewhere in Ocala National Forest, about an hour away.

Prior to leaving, I drove over to the ranger station and asked: “By the way, do you happen to have any cancellations for today?” Well, it turned out that someone in the beach campground had to leave early,

and their site would be available. “Would we like it?”  Well, the pictures attached to this post don’t do justice to how beautiful this spot is! The sand in each site is carefully raked by campground hosts, and the sites are complete with 50 amp electrical service and water. Of course, the big pond is also within sight of our site.

So this week Betty & I got lucky. Saying more than that would be tmi for our kids and grandkids, so we’ll just leave it there!

Cheers!

If Betty & I were to park our motorhome for an extended period of time, we would set it and forget it, like the commercial says. While we intend to slow down our travels soon, this outstanding overlandish odyssey is constantly taking us through new adventures that require regular adjustments. Today’s post highlights some of the settings required in each new location.

It’s not quite on the level of an airline pilot, but prior to take-off, and after landing our home-on-wheels at a new campground, we need to work through our check lists. Of course, as Quality Officer for Women’s Health, Betty promoted safe surgery checklists in the hospitals where she worked, so this comes second nature to her. In the camp spot, we need to follow different procedures based on the availability of water, electricity and a sewer connection; whether it is a pull-through or back-in site; and whether it is level, shaded, or congested, to name a few criteria.

Is it easier to set up in a full service site, or a boondocking location? One is not necessarily more difficult than the other – just different. Of course, when I’m talking about hardship here, camping in our motorhome is definitely not the same as in a tent. The hard part is remembering which buttons to push at the correct times. Lol.

For instance, the fridge in our motorhome automatically switches from gas to electric, if electric is available. But since we added solar to our roof, we need to manually switch it back to gas if we are boondocking, so it doesn’t drain our batteries. Likewise, if we are boondocking we set our water heater to gas, but run the electric heater if we are plugged into shore power. Regardless of our location, we try to limit the use of electricity,

and have switched to LED lighting, which is still turned off if not in use. Electricity from our solar panels/ batteries also needs to be monitored more closely than 50 amp shore power. We do have longer showers if we are hooked up to a water source, but then have to remember to flush less and conserve water more when we are boondocking. In most locations our generator and solar can provide power to meet our needs almost indefinitely, but our black and grey tanks are only good for a week before we have to find a place to dump them.

These are only a few of the adjustments required when changing locations. This post covers our stops last week, after Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area at Flagler Beach, to Juniper Springs Recreation Area in Ocala National Forest, to Faver-Dykes State Park near St. Augustine, Florida, prior to travelling to Live Oak for the

RVillage rally.  By capturing each location in words and pictures, Betty & I are better able to remember the settings for each of these beautiful stops. Hope you can remember where you are at with whatever you are doing also!

Cheers!