Vacation Week (01-25-13)

Not our vacation week- my brother Ray and sister-in-law Dawn’s vacation week. They flew down from Boston to spend a week with us here in the Keys.  As I flipped through my pictures from the last week, I realized that they will definitely need to recover from their  “vacation”.  Oops. We certainly packed a lot of activities in a 6 day period. 

We started by eating lunch outside, at a restaurant on the water- It’s one of the things I like best about the Keys, eating outside whenever we want.  With the temperatures in Boston this week plunging into the single digits, they sure were happy to shed their jackets!

When Paul and I realized we wouldn’t have reliable TV reception, we scouted out sports bars to find one appropriate for watching the Patriots play in the AFC Championship.  We ended up back at the Sunset Bar in Marathon, where the beautiful view didn’t do much to take the sting away from watching the Patriots lose to the Ravens.

We took the glass bottom boat tour from John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park.  I enjoyed the trip out to the reef- I just love the water down here- the colors are so vibrant, especially when the sun is shining.

It was an easy way to see some underwater wildlife on a beautiful day, although the actual method of viewing left a little to be desired. We were some of the last to arrive at the glass windows, so the view we had mostly consisted of other peoples’ heads, and we had to shuffle around quite a bit to be able to see anything. 

We took a day trip up to the “mainland” to Everglades National Park, and walked the Anhinga Trail, where we saw tons of alligators, and many species of birds, including the Anhinga, after which the trail is named.

  I have always heard that this trail is great for wildlife viewing, so I’ve wanted to walk it for a long time.  It did live up to it’s hype!

After seeing wildlife in the wild, our visit to Alligator Farm was a bit ho-hum,  but we did learn more about alligators and crocodiles, got to take a ride on an airboat.



movie of our airboat ride



resident Panther at Alligator Farm

We also got to visit with the resident Panther.  Apparently panthers are common in this area.  The first time I saw the “Beware of Panthers” sign, I thought it was referring to a local football team or something, but nope, there are Panther Crossing signs all around the Everglades. It turns out that the Florida Panther is a sub-species of the cougar, and is the State Mammal of Florida. Their numbers are dwindling, which is creating genetic issues due to inbreeding.

In keeping with the wildlife theme, we stopped in at the nearby Florida Keys Wild Bird Rehabilitation Center. This center is run completely on donations and works to rehabilitate birds that have been injured.  If the bird cannot be reintroduced into the wild, it can  live out it’s days at this sanctuary. I enjoy seeing the owls, hawks and shorebirds up close and personal.

No visit to the Keys is complete without a visit to Key West (so says me), so off we went.  We elected to spend the night there because it’s a 2 hour drive from Key Largo. Our first stop was the Truman Little White House on Key West. The house was originally constructed as housing for Naval Officers.  It has been used by 6 presidents, but more by President Truman than any other. After only three months as Vice President,  Truman was thrust into the presidency by the sudden death of President Roosevelt. The stress of handling the added responsibilities took a tremendous toll on his health and he was told by his doctors to spend time someplace warm and sunny, to regain his composure.  He chose Key West, and over time spent 175 days of his presidency at
“the Little White House”.



sunset at Mallory Square



Sunset at Mallory Square is pretty much a required outing on Key West.  Watching the sun go down over the water is a relaxing way to end the day.  Except, of course, the day doesn’t end at sunset on Key West. 

After sunset we ate dinner at Margaritaville before hitting the  bars.   Drinks at Sloppy Joe’s was followed by more drinks at Hogs breath Saloon.  I love wandering the streets of Key West.  Everywhere you turn, there’s music!

Back home after our adventure, we spent a quiet night relaxing with some frozen Mudslides. I love Mudslides but I can’t drink the whole bottle myself,so having Ray and Dawn here was a good excuse to make some!

On our last day together we rented kayaks at Robbie’s on Islamorada and paddled our way out to Indian Key. I have no pictures of the kayaking, since I didn’t want to risk bringing my camera.  Ray and I snorkeled for a little bit, but with the wind blowing, it was a bit rough, and we didn’t last long. It was Ray and Dawn’s first time kayaking, and by the time we were headed back from the island, they were paddling (not rowing!) like a well oiled machine!

We ended our visit as it began- eating a meal outside. The weather was perfect so we headed to Snapper’s Seafood Restaurant.

After an awesome dinner we sat and listened to some great music for an hour or so before heading home. 

We had a great visit!

The Lazy Days of Winter (01-16-13)

Life’s a beach.  Our toughest decision for the last two weeks has been a) which beach should we go to and b) should we bike or walk today? 


The weather here in the Keys has been nice and warm- in the mid 80s for the most part (sorry all you friends out there in Q who are freezing your butts off!)

Stop and think a minute about the Keys.  They are essentially a bunch of small islands, connected by a highway. Over time, the old roads are replaced by newer roads, allowing for better traffic flow.

We walked the 2.5 mile stretch of the Old 7 mile bridge that is walk able. The view was amazing. The water here is so beautiful to me.  I could stare at it all day long.

We drove up to Bahia Honda State Park, intending to snorkel for the afternoon, but the wind was blowing so hard, we just lazed on the beach for the afternoon. Bahia Honda is one of the best beaches on the Keys. Of course, because of the coral etc.  the Keys are not really known for their beaches at all.

We discovered our new favorite restaurant in the Keys. It’s called Sunset Grille and Raw Bar.  It has a pool and is one of the nicer places to see a sunset in the middle keys.  But it also had something else we were very interested in…..

… Multiple big screen TVs to watch the Patriots beat the Texans.  Sadly, after installing the Sensar Pro to boost our TV reception, we only went from not being able to see the channel much at all, to being able to see the channel sporadically.  Definitely not good enough to watch a playoff game. This restaurant worked out perfectly for us.  We told the hostess we were there to see the game and she seated us right in front of a TV.  We told the waitress we were there to eat dinner and see the game, so she paced the evening accordingly.  Great service- which is awesome, because I think we’ll be back on Sunday to watch the Patriots play against the Ravens.

Sombrero Beach is about 8 miles from the campground we were staying at- a perfect distance for getting there by bike.  We rode the 8 miles, lazed on the beach for a couple of hours, then biked back home again.

We haven’t done any snorkeling or boating since we’ve been on the Keys, but we still have a few weeks to do that.  This coming week however, we’ll be quite busy.  Tomorrow afternoon my brother and sister-in-law arrive, and will stay with us on Key Largo for a week. I already have a list of things we can do but it’s their vacation, so I’ll let them choose. They may just want to lay on a beach all day!  They live in MA and got 5 inches of snow the other day.  Yesterday it was 18 degrees up there, so Dawn is ready to head south!

We’re on Island Time, Mon! (01-07-13)

   Our playlist consists of Buffett and Marley down here in the Keys.

Usually when Paul and I get to a new place, we immediately start exploring, but before we arrived in the keys, I reminded him that we were going to be there for a long time, and it was just a place for us to relax and wait out the winter months, not so much a place for us to explore.

  I needn't have worried.  The minute we hit the Keys, we both flipped over to Island Time.  The first few days, the truck didn't even move- we rode our bikes and walked the beach, and in general frittered the days away.

Coffee and cocktail hour are both outside on the picnic table. 

Why on the table?  Because this is the view:

We've also taken care of some household chores.  Paul installed our new Fantastic Fan-the vent fan that is in our ceiling.  This one has a remote control, so we don't have to reach up 8 feet to change the fan speed. The real bonus is that the "old one" got moved into the bathroom, so it can now be opened with the flick of a switch instead of reaching all the way up to open it manually.

We don’t have satellite TV, which can make watching TV very frustrating sometimes.  If we’re going to be without it for a short time, it’s not a big deal, we just read books, but some of us prefer TV.  I looked again recently at prices for Dish etc, but it just isn’t worth it for us- especially since you don’t get local network channels.  Since we’re going to be in the Keys for a month and the stations we can pick up with our antenna keep fading in and out, we ordered something called Sensar Pro, which should boost our reception.  We’re in the perfect place to give it a good test. 


  While he's been busy with that, I have been taking care of the year end paperwork and sending my camera back to Panasonic.  For some reason, the lens cover doesn’t open and close properly anymore and it’s still under warranty so off it went. 


 

Speaking of warranty, while we were in Orlando, our two nice Coleman chairs developed tears in the seat.  Much to our surprise, the tag says there is a 5 year warranty on the material.  We called Coleman, and after sending them the specific pictures that they asked for, they shipped us two brand new chairs! They were very accommodating when we told them we move every week or so, and got them shipped quickly.  Great customer service!!

I've never worked so hard to make campground reservations.  I started making reservations for the Keys 11 months ago, as soon as the window for booking opened.  Campsites sell out within seconds of being available, and since we were on the west coast at the time, we had to get up really early to try to book sites at 8 AM EST. Once I got what I could at that point, I have checked for cancelations almost every day, sometimes up to 3 times a day, ever since.  Why bother?  because the state parks are about $43 a night, and the private parks run about $80-100 a night.  I had to book a couple of private parks to fill in some gaps, but have been able to cancel some of them when I picked up more state park sites.  So, from now until mid February, we'll be moving around a bit between Marathon (the middle keys) and Key Largo, but we'll be in the keys for about 6 weeks.

the Last of Orlando (01-02-13)

Oh, by the way, Happy 2013!  Paul and I actually made it to midnight on December 31, but we didn’t go to the RV park party, we just stayed home and watched TV.  I think New Years Eve is a young person’s holiday, but maybe I’m wrong.

Once the kids left, I got “hitch Itch”, ready to move on to the next place, partially because I really miss them after they leave and I need to keep myself pretty busy. We had 4 more days in Orlando though and did manage to find a few things to do!
Two of my favorite days of the year are the day the Christmas decorations go up,  and the day they come down.  I know a lot of people out there know what I am talking about.  The house looks so festive when you put them up:

and so clean and neat (and a little bare) when you take them down:

While I was keeping myself occupied by “undecorating”, Paul found his own project to work on.  This is what happens when Paul gets bored:

That’s our shower enclosure.  Not just the door- the whole thing. We had a leak where the glass meets the fiberglass and when he looked at it, he discovered that there was a problem with the installation of the enclosure.  Now, he had two choices- he could just added silicone to the area that was leaking, or he could pull the whole thing apart and install it correctly.  The course of action he took is pretty obvious.

We had a third “free” day at Universal Studios, so we waited until a “low crowd day” and headed over to ride a couple of roller coasters.

We started with The Hulk.  I must say, this is my favorite coaster ever! Usually, going up the first hill is torturous- that slooooow chugging along, waiting to get to the top.  The Hulk doesn’t do that.  Instead, you are pretty much catapulted to the top, and by the time you get there, you are traveling at 40 mph and are upside down. No time to think, and worry!


 
 I loved that, and also that there was no huge “down” where you lose your stomach.  Just lots of loops and twists. I literally had to hold on to my glasses to keep them on my face.
After a couple of rides and wandering the park for a while, we had dinner at Margaritaville again.






We did some shopping before we left and bought something we’ve been eyeing for a long time:

We love a good campfire but many places don’t have fire pits.  Well, now we have our own!



Blue Springs State Park is one of the best places to see manatees (thanks Elaine!) so we spent a half a day exploring this park.

You can swim, snorkel, and scuba dive at this beautiful spring, but not in the winter when the manatees are there.  After watching them for a while we said, Yup, submerged blobs. 

They don’t do much moving, and only stick their nose out of the water to breathe. We did see a mom and a calf swimming down the river.

I thought this was the funniest picture of the day- just a bunch of friends, hanging out in the sunshine (I wonder if the turtle is afraid if he moves, he’ll get eaten?)!!

And in the Blink of an Eye, They were Gone (12-30-12)

Well, the kids were actually here for a week, but it sure went by fast.  They’ve both gone home now, and I am keeping my spirits up with the thought that we will see them both in May.     Our visit was a combination of relaxing and just hanging out, and running around Universal Studios.  But first- there was Christmas!



Christmas Eve-the trailer was all decked out!

Jess models her new sweatshirt on Christmas morning.

The kids know us so well…they had these glasses engraved for us!

Christmas dinner!  Our traditional non-traditional Chile Rellenos and turkey enchiladas.

Our first ride at Universal was a water roller coaster.  Hmm, maybe not the best idea we’ve ever had.  We were drenched, and took hours to dry off.

We knew that we were braving Universal during one of the busiest weeks of the  year, but we didn’t have too many options.  We had to skip a few rides due to lines that were over 2 hours long.  The one really long  line we did wait in was in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. We waited for over 2 and a half hours,  during which time the ride broke down twice, but in the end, we did experience The Forbidden Journey, and it was worth the wait.

It was so busy at Universal, it was literally wall to wall people, even though we were up, out the door and at the park when it opened.  We were there so long the first day that we decided to stick around and have dinner at Margaritaville,  one of our favorite places.  We sat on the Porch of Indecision, listening to live music while we ate.







 

The culinary highlight of our week was dinner at Emeril’s in Universal’s Citywalk. We’ve eaten here before and had such a great experience we decided to repeat it. It wasn’t as wonderful as our first time there, but we still had a great time.

 

Paul and Stephen both enjoyed  the 5 course Chef’s Dinner while Jess tried the Filet Mignon, and I ordered Emeril’s signature dish- Andouille Crusted Redfish. Both kids were nice enough to share their dessert with their mother!

 

After dinner it was back to Margaritaville for a drink.  We were hoping to hear more music, but they started playing extra late due to the holiday.

In our “down” time, we played Catch Phrase, a family favorite.

 

We also played Monopoly- on the ipad!  It was actually easier and more fun than playing on a regular game board.

I had a great time, especially since we hardly ever see both kids at the same time, because they live so far from each other.  They had their own cottage, here at the RV park, which worked out well, because although our day ends at about 9:30, I know that theirs does not!

The weather in Orlando is not always warm at this time of year, and I did feel bad because there were definitely no beach or pool days this past week, but both kids missed snow storms back home, and as Stephen said, anytime you can sit outside in December, the weather can’t be that bad!