Vero Beach, FL 2010

This is the shuttle on the launch pad ready to be launched on Feb. 7, 2010 at 4:39 AM this will be the last night time launch.

This Encore park Vero Beach campground. It is a very friendly park with nice facilities. They have a huge dog park which Nicky loves. Nice concrete pads and lots of trees.

We came here because it was at Thousand Trails special and it put us within 12 miles of beautiful beaches and 61 miles south of Kennedy Space Center. We spent 2 full days at the space center. There was a lot to see and do. They had a ride that assimilates what it feels like to launch in a shuttle. Pretty awesome. All of this is history I lived through. Makes me feel really old.!!!

Two astronauts that didn't make it!!!

Various rockets above and below a picture of the space uniforms over the years.

This believe it or not is a picture of the flight plan. Enlarge this and look closely!!!!

Below is a picture of the Space Station.

I remember this clearly.

I was in my first year of college when all this took place.

This is the astronauts restroom. They also have a shower room.
After spending 2 days at the Space Center we decided to visit some of the local nearby parks.

This Historic Jungle Trail was the main roadway until super highways took over but it has been preserved and it is a lovely ride in car or on a bike.

This was taken on a hike we took at St Sebastian River Preserve State Park. This park is only about 3 miles south of the campground.

This picture was taken on the Historic Jungle Trail road.

The city of Sebastian is full of history about a man named Paul Kroegel. He homesteaded here. He loved this area and went to great lengths to protect the brown pelicans in this area. They nested heavily on an island now called Pelican Island and Paul was responsible for getting President Roosevelt to make the island into the very first National Wildlife Refuge in 1903. When you drive the Jungle Trail you come to an area with boardwalks and benches all through the island for viewing all kinds of birds.

This is a primitive camping area in St Sebastian River park.

This is just Nicky's favorite animal to chase an armadillo.

I met this cowboy on the trail and decided to take him with me.

The other man in my life!!!

As I said the beaches were only about 12 miles away and no traffic getting to them. There was the main beach at Vero and then beach accesses along route A1A. This was the Turtle Beach access. You walked through this canopy to get to the beach.

A lovely beach and and perfect weather that day.

We pretty much had the beach to ourselves.

We have extended our stay here for two days in hopes of seeing the Feb. 7th launch. It will be the last night time launch. Today we spent the day figuring out where we will drive go to observe take off. Big crowds are expected so it will probably be necessary for us to be there about 3 hours ahead of launch time. We're really excited about it. We'll , of course, update you all after the launch.

Harbor Lakes Port Chalotte, FL 2010

Just before leaving Peace River campground I had to go over and get a picture of this bike. Never saw anything like that before!!
We are staying at Harbor Lakes an Encore park in Port Charlotte for the week. They are nice big sites and nice and level.

This guy came to the picnic table right outside my kitchen window each morning and waited for a handout. I guess the camper before us was feeding him.

This was the area provided to take the dogs off lead. Nicky really enjoyed his run here.

One day we drove over to Fisherman's Village at Punta Gorda. Lots of little stores and restaurants.

The drive over was very pretty.

Lee would not do this with me so my pirate is missing a face!!!

It seems as though every city in Florida has gotten into painting murals on the walls of the city buildings.

One day we drove over to the dog beach in Venice so Nicky could have his day at the beach.

The following day Lee and I and our neighbors, Judy and Dave Boron from Ohio went to the Blind Pass Beach. We had a lot of fun getting to know Judy and Dave and hope to meet up with them again before the winter is over. This beach is located just north of Englewood beach the signage it above.

Dave, Judy, Judy and Lee.

It was a beautiful cloud free day about 77 degrees. What a great day. Tomorrow 1/29/10 we are off to Vero Beach on the Atlantic side. Almost exactly due east of Port Charlotte about 155 miles.

Isn't this beautiful?? We drove through miles of tree canopy like this on our way to the beach today and the gorgeous homes along the way were incredible.

Peace River Wauchula, FL 2010

Here we are at Thousand Trails Peace River in Wauchula,FL. This is one of our favorite places. Nice small town and our campground is along the Peace River. It is finally warming up here in the 70's the last several days.
This is Sadie. The manager of the park,Elnor, has two black standards and Nicky has thoroughly enjoyed playing with her.

See, you can tell by the smile on Nicky's face that he thinks Miss Sadie is something.

Here they are playing ball.

Sadie also enjoys walking the trails with us.

Our good friends Lou and Carol Hands from Michigan. We've been able to fit in a couple of nights of cards, hope to get together some more before we go to our next destination.

This is a picture of Ed and Janie Jenkins. They are the former owners of our RV. Ed is the campground pastor and has packed their meeting house. That is Miss Molly Ed is holding.
They will be in Pennsylvania this coming summer so we hope to get to see them sometime over the summer.

We went to Lake Placid with Jim and Tracy Tull and their daughter, Tandy. It was a beautiful day and we had a lovely lunch in town.

Jim, Tandy and Tracy

Here's the four of us in front of one of our favorite murals.

All the walls in the town have a mural on them. All the murals tell you something about the history of the town. You learn a lot if you use the guide book and the history behind each mural. As you can see they even decorate the trash cans.

This is one of my favorite murals. When the sun shines on this it is incredible.

This is a mural in the process, one that has been added since we were last there.

This is another new one.

They started in the 90's and now the city is truly the city of murals.

This is Keith Goodson, artist. He just finished restoring this mural and was putting on the protective coating on it the day we were there. The coating runs $75.00 a gallon. Keith has also done many originals here and other places.

This is Harriet Porter with Jim and Tracy. Harriet is President of the Lake City Mural Society. She explained to us that the mural they are standing in front of costs about $5,000. They must be re coated about every 5-8 years also. The Lake City Mural Society works strictly off donations no tax money is used. That's impressive when you realize the costs involved.

Thought you might get a kick out the this signage.

This is a full view of that $5,000 mural.

This is Friday night Live in Wauchula, FL. Every third Friday they shut down Main street and have an event. Each time with a different theme. This week it was Wauchula Idol. Ten contestants competed for the winner of Wauchla Idol. They also had antique cars on display.

This is Sylvia one of the contestants.

Here's Jim checking out one of the cars.

Tony, winner of the Wauchula Idol contest.

We left home on Dec. 27th and spent a very cold night outside of Roanoke, VA and then a very cold night outside of Atlanta, GA. The third night we spent just outside of Orlando,FL and it was much warmer. On the 30th we pulled into our campground in Orlando and it was a beautiful, sunny, warm day about 73 that afternoon. Since then the temperatures here have been running almost 20 degrees below normal. We've had maybe three nice warm days. However, when we consider what we could be dealing with we are happy we are here. At least it gets into the high 40's and 50's and 60's during the day. The nights have been chilly but nothing compared the the northern temperatures. Above is a picture taken from the field that we exercise Nicky in at the campground
This is our campsite here in Orlando Thousand Trails campground. The second day we were here I was taking my 5 mile walk around the campground and I spotted the camper of our really good friends, Jim and Tracy Tull. We were thrilled meeting up with them again we really missed them.

We also met up with Rob and Bonnie Wall and their standard poodle, Jet. He and Nicky enjoyed seeing one another again. It was fun catching up with them again and finding out what's new in their life.

We also got together with our good friends Marie and Keith . We were able to spend time catching up with one another and spent an evening playing Mexican Train and drinking Keith's home-made Kuluha. Notice the pretty new carpet Marie picked out for the RV.

Since the weather was lousy Lee got busy with projects inside the RV. He put new faucets in the kitchen sink, the bathroom sink, and the shower. He replaced the sun shades with roller shades in the living-room. We like them much better and they look like they were made for the RV. He put the add a drawers under the kitchen table also. It looks great. There are advantages to colder weather!!!

Christmas 2009

Christmas brunch at Nana's house. Three of the 5 children and families were in attendance. We had a great time. Our youngest son Brandon and his dog, Roscoe, spent Christmas eve and Christmas night with us.
These are pictures taken at my sister's house on Christmas eve. We also went to the candlelight service at church that night.

My son, David, and his daughter, Isabella, learning to make Nana's sticky buns so they can carry on the tradition of sticky buns on Christmas morning.

My sister, Jill, and her new husband, Barry, and Barry's daughter, Jen, taken at Jill on Christmas eve.

Jill and I taken Christmas eve.

We had a fantastic holiday season with family. How can anyone believe that there is something more important than family. We cherish our time with them and look forward to making more memories when we return from our winter in Florida.

The day after Christmas it got up into the 40's and the snow that was on the ground melted and we were able to take off on December 27th without any problem. God is good!!

We arrived at Orlando December 30th the weather was in the 70's and after 2 very cold nights on the road here it felt very good indeed.