Resort Living!

I'm going to skip over our time in Venice, FL and our visit with Greg and Janet to do those in a later post so that I can tell everybody about our enjoyment of Sun 'n Fun RV Resort in Sarasota, FL. First, the resort is in a great location - only 10 minutes from Sarasota's cultural venues, shopping and incredible beaches. Plus, it's only 20 minutes from the natural beauty of Myakka River State Park. However, that's only if we want to escape what they call "the bubble".

The bubble is the incredible activity filled life within the Resort that is so busy that it's tempting never to leave the park. There's every activity you could possibly imagine: jewelry, stained glass and wood workshops, every summer sport, a huge gorgeous pool, mah jong and other games, weekly folk music jam session, craft activities, dulcimer lessons, etc. etc. Plus everybody is very friendly.

We're here for 17 nights and trying to take advantage of as much as possible. Yesterday, I was one of 65 at the 10:30 water exercise session. Then I went to a craft session that had a choice of 10 different crafts. In the evening, we first went to an hour of "bar bingo" then we went to the folk music jam session. This morning, I'm up a bit early to one of the two weekly Mah Jongg sessions. This afternoon we're going to check out the Pickle Ball and then we'll probably go to the pool. In addition to all the activities, this is a huge park (800 sites) so just riding our bikes around the park is a nice activity.

The price for all this fun - only $5 more a day than the boring campground we were last at. It's a bit above our average site cost but works out well for the budget because we're not paying for RV gas like we do when we're traveling.

We're seriously considering coming here for 3 months next winter. Oh yes - another advantage is that we're only two hours from Disney World so we could meet friends there!

Yikes time to have breakfast and get to Mah Jongg.

The Florida Everglades

We only had two days in and around the Everglades but they were pretty good ones. Our main objective was to see some alligators. We had been promised some at a couple other places we visited down here but we had not had any luck. It seems most of them are hibernating this time of year when the weather is cool and the water is warm down deep.

The first day, we went right into Everglades National Park and made our way to the Royal Palm area. There they have some boardwalks which go out over the swamps and you can see many birds and alligators. However, before we even got there, we ran into a very large number of small birds, some sort of swallows, I believe, but they were moving very fast and in a huge swarm. I got out to take some pictures and discovered they seemed to be swirling around a water hole and taking turns diving down into it. I think they were just getting a drink of water.

As turned out, the alligators were out in force. Along the water they were up on the grass getting as much warmth as they could, although there was not much that we could feel. I guess it must have been better than being in the water. As we went along, we saw more and more, some in the water and some on the land. In one place there were 5 or 6 big (about 20 ft) ones stacked up on some logs. About that time the sun was beginning to peek through the overcast.

As many alligators as there were, there were many many more birds. Egrets, storks, ibises, cranes and lots of Black Vultures. In fact, they had had trouble with the vultures damaging cars in the parking lot to the point that they had hung a couple of dead ones up as a deterrent. I am surprised that the others did not just eat them. I mean, that’s their job, isn’t it?

The second day, we moved on the Shark Valley. Here they have a tram that runs through the park or you can walk or bicycle. We opted for our bikes but only went a couple of miles in one direction before turning back. It was really quite uninteresting. We did see one alligator and lots of birds, but they were mostly off the road and frankly, we were getting somewhat “birded-out”. We went back and down the other loop, where we saw more alligators including some youngsters, only about 1-2 feet long. Very cute.  All in all, it was a very good time, although still a bit cooler than we would like in Florida.

‘09 Close Out in the Keys

It is a dream place to finish out the year, the Florida Keys. We cruised into the Grassy Keys RV Resort on December 23rd for a two week stay. It is very nice, right on the Gulf side, only two years old after an old trailer park was gutted and refurbished. They have a nice little club house, a swimming pool, and docks on the water’s edge for all the fisher’s with their boats.

We found out as soon as we arrived that they were going to have a potluck dinner on the 25th, with the park managers providing a deep fried turkey and everyone else bringing other dishes to share. It was a delicious affair and we met a very nice couple from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Laurel and Michael. We hit it off right away and ended up playing the game of Sequence with them. Ellyn and I had played this same game in Michigan with our “next door” neighbors. We had so much fun, we went back the next evening for a rematch after we went out for a nice dinner with them.

On the 28th, Ellyn and I went to Key West to take a sunset sail that Logan and Maureen had gifted to us for Chanukah. It turned out to be a real adventure as it was a pretty windy day, which is a good thing if you are on a sail boat. They took us out and sailed for about an hour before sunset. They us help with the sails, if we wished to, which I did. They even brought out some little canons and fired on one of the other sailing boats, which fired back.

The next day, we traveled in the other direction on the Keys to Key Largo to meet up with our friends Lynn and Rob from Alabama, who were down to visit with their son, Dan, who works as a dive instructor. We had a great time with them, got to see Dan’s work place, went to a bird sanctuary where we got to feed the pelicans, and had a couple of great meals.

On New Years Eve Day, we took to the water at Curry Hammock State Park. It turned out to be a perfect day for it. The sun was out, it was warm enough for swimming suits and getting mildly wet, and it was one of the last calm days we had. After that day, it got very windy, especially at night. We had some nights that the RV would rock from the wind and the slideout covers would be rattling in the wind. I had to tie down the flag on the back of the RV to get some sleep. We had a couple of days lazing on the beach, riding our bikes on the bridges, and walking on a nature trail. We collected lots of little shells, but not too many larger ones. We saw dolphins, crabs, a sea hare, many birds, a dead Portuguese Man-Of-War, other jelly fish possibly alive and spiders. It was a relaxing time for us.