Back on the road again.

It has been a wonderful month at home. I love the wood stove, watching my chickens, rooms full of space, my own washer and dryer, the dishwasher, friends and family to visit and my queen size bed. It has been great watching spring arrive and celebrating Easter. We have done a lot of planning and preparing for the next 4 months. Part of that has been starting a new blog. Here is the link:

http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog/crossroadcanada/1/tpod.html

It's easier to upload lots and lots of pictures. It also gives you a neat map so you can find us. There is still a spot for you to write comments -which we love!!!! So travel with us!

Grace

The "View From Here" Feb.19

Traveling

Traveling around the Florida Keys has made me very lazy. I seldom have the ambition to write any more. Since staying in Myakka State park, we have been in constant travel mode! We have been back in the Florida Keys now since late January. We spent another four days in Key West and have stayed at a variety of State parks and RV campgrounds since. Along the way we have met a lot of great new friends and traveling companions. RVing is addictive! You meet people of like mind who are travelers and explorers of the country. Travelers! We sort of like the freedom of the road, but also crave contact with people we can share that with. Not all people we meet here are like that. Many are older retired folk who just want to be in Florida because it’s warm. They come to one or to spots and stay put for the whole winter.
The traveling folks, the ones I first referred to are far more ambitious. Some live in their RV’s full time and have sold everything else they have, while others still have a home base but spend most of the time traveling the roads of this great country learning what it’s all about. That’s us too. Some how we always end up recognizing each other when we meet. We show up with bikes and kayaks and other things needed for life on the road strapped on the back of our RV’s. We have a certain willingness to say hi to each other, and always want to trade notes on where we’ve been or tips on how to modify our RV’s or great web sites on traveling info.
Lately amongst all the other fine folks, we’ve begun to meet other, people with Winnebago Views / Itasca Nivion RV’s. It turns out we are part of sort of a growing sub species of travelers. Our small but very versatile motor homes are fast becoming the choice of many of us wandering folk. In fact it’s almost attained a cult status with whole web site dedicated to our following. There are even conventions in many parts the country just dedicated to people who own Views and Navions.
So when we meet on the roads we always flash our lights at each other. In camp grounds we usually say hello. Often we end up visiting, and often we end up eating supper together. Last week we ended up dancing the night away with fine folks from Tennessee, inside even, at their place. Two nights later we had a barbeque at our place, really cranked the tunes and again danced the night away, outside this time! Great fun. Since then we have again met another couple with the same rig again. The same type of independent minded, free spirited folk. They all want to come visit Canada some day soon. So some day I can see a bunch of us getting together for an extended road trip across our own great country. Grace and I are busy scoping out the itinerary this year!
At the time of this writing we are staying in Curry Hammock State Park just Noth of Marathon. It is a very beautiful quiet almost Zen like place right on the ocean. It has a lovely quiet beach with soft white sand that is always peaceful to sit on. We are here for twelve days till February 26th. From here we will be making our way North again till we arrive home, Lord willing Mar. 5th.

Another child in the family

Good morning all. Just a quick note in case not everyone has heard. Congratulations to Rene and Tanya with the birth of their fourth son " Cody Jasper " and to Jasper and Wilma with their ninth grandchild. Having two precious babies of our own makes us know how special that is. Lot's of love to all. Dad

The "View From Here" Jan. 27

Places we've been, things we've seen

Leaving Key West I've found that some times it's been kind of hard keeping up with this blog. There have been so many people, places, experiences, ..... and some times one just gets lazy. But, it's 4:00 AM in the morning and I'm listening to some great music on "Concerts on Demand" on CBC radio, and it seems like a great time to write again, so here go's.

Meeting people along the road has been just amazing. The last day in Key West we were parked out at Higgs Beach. I opened the door and there was this guy I'd met earlier at Long Key. He said he was headed back there the next day. I asked how he'd got reservations. Over his I- phone. Said he'd noted that there was another space available yet if we were quick. Five minutes later we had it booked with his phone through the internet! Amazing!

We spent another five more gloriuos days backed up on the ocean at Long Key.

From there we headed up to Ft Myers RV resorts. Right next door, not a stones throw away, there were Nicole and Dan with their friends! How fun. Grace and Nicole went out and got their hair done together. Dan and I spent a bit of time shopping. We had supper together one night on Ft Myers Beach with them and their friends. It was nice to meet family from home.

From there we headed up to Myakka River State park. A beautifull place 36000 acres in size. It covers a number of different types of Florida topography trying to keep it much the way it would have been in it's natural state. There are huge tracts of "dry savannah", mangrove swams, higher land areas of hammocks, and there are two lakes connected by the Myakka River. The park is filled with abundant bird and wild life of every kind. We saw alligaters sunning them selves on the banks of the river, wild turkeys in the bush, white tail dear on the savannah, and wild pigs along the roads and just about every where really. They have a canopy walk back off the road in one area where we were able to walk through the tree tops and see a whole other eco system as it grows up there. Also at one end was a tower from where we could look out over the whole of the park and see it form on top. Kind of cool. There were also many trails and bike paths, and we did a lot of biking. Another slice of Florida.

The day we left, unbeknownst to us, some one else was waiting for our campsite. They drove by once or twice and spied on us to see if we were leaving. We didn't know it and niether did they but our paths were to cross again much later. Anyway they got our site when we left.

The "View From Here" Jan. 24

The View From Here Sunday morning Jan. 24
Chapter Three: The people we meet
Once again we found ourselves headed down the road. Our plan was to spend some time in Key West and hopefully be there for New Years eve. We new it was expensive to be there but were still surprised when after trying a few different places that the only site to be had was five miles from down town, was $135.00 a night and would only be available for two nights! We took it anyway, parked our rig, and took a bus into town that same night yet to scope out the downtown. We walked down Duval street and eventually found ourselves in the famous Sloppy Joes bar where Hemmingway spent a good bit of time writing in the 1930’s. The place is supposedly still pretty much the same as it was then, and this evening it was packed to the boards with people, and a great rock band playing our kind of music. Another couple sitting along the wall on one side invited us to sit with them and we soon struck a relationship. Turns out they were military people and by virtue of that fact they were entitled to stay at the navel installation only two blocks from down town at a fraction of what local hotel rates were. Once again we found ourselves treated to the great American hospitality that we’ve encounterd so often along the way here. Within twenty minutes Steve and Vicky had us booked into a lovely room beside them for the next three nights, as their guests in the best location in town. The next four days we spent riding our bikes around Key West. We spent long afternoons on the beach, and evenings watching the sun go down at Mallory Square or eating half price at happy hour in one of the many bars down there with our new friends. We spent New Years Eve together, first over supper, and then down town watching one of the greatest parties ever on Duval Street with thousands of others from all over the world. Quite a celebration!
Another thing American folks take very seriously is their football. New years day, before leaving town, we spent some time with Steve and Vicky down town watching the Rose Bowl. The bar was filled with Ohio fans, Steve and Vicky are from Ohio (one of the teams playing. The opening of the game, on big screens all around us, with the singing of their national anthem, their patriotism to their country and their flag, and their incredible sense of celebration made my hair stand on end. These folks have truly got a lot to be proud of in this great nation of theirs.
Alas again we hade to go and we said our fair wells. As a last parting gesture they gave us their brand new lawn chairs cause they were flying out later that night and couldn’t take them with them. Leaving town we once again felt we new a bit more about what it is to be American. Cool huh?

The "View From Here" Jan. 8

The View From Here Friday morning Jan. 8
Chapter Two: The people we meet
A day after Joan & Al left we met we met Jennifer walking the beach. She was a nice, classy woman. She said she liked Grace’s earrings, and wouldn’t you know it before I new it they were talking about books. Well pretty soon Jennifer and her husband Tom were invited over to our place for a beer and more chit chat. They are from Utah and were on a road trip through the Keys. They are cyclists and had their expensive road bikes with them but were scared to take them out for fear of salt damage which gets into everything around here. Ours although they are new and OK, are not expensive like theirs and because we use them all the time are already completely covered in rust so we had no trouble sharing them a day or so with them. In fact Tom serviced them, blew up the tires a bit, and brought them back in better shape then when they left. So another friendship got started. We celebrated Christmas together with a fine meal. We had some great talks. We have an invitation to come to Utah some day and who knows, we might just go there. Most of all we met some fine folks from another part of the USA who taught us a little more about what it is to be American! It finally came time for both of us to move on, but once again, we have some fine memories.

The "View From Here" Jan. 4

The View From Here Monday morning Jan. 4
Chapter one: The people we meet
A happy and blessed new year to all of you. Grace and I wish every one who comes here a peaceful, safe, joy filled year in 2010. We are doing well. After arriving down in the Keys here we spent two full weeks in one spot at Long Key State park at mile marker 62. This park is about half way to Key West and is particularly unique ( and nice to stay at ) because every site backs up, facing South, onto the Atlantic Ocean. Every morning we woke up with the sun coming up across the water, and each night it went down in a huge ball of fire. If there were clouds in the sky they would be all scalloped and red and seemingly on fire. Pretty spectacular. Needless to say this park is in high demand and it is hard to get a site in here. People make reservations for the reservable sites 11 months in advance and you are only allowed to stay here for two weeks at a time. Still there are ways around it and we managed to score a first come first serve site for two weeks last month, and now we are here again!
Traveling is a good way to meet new people and we have met many great folks along the way. During our first two week stay here we met Joan & Al. They are a couple from Arizona, who travel for their work and have lived in their motor home for most of the last ten years. They shared many interesting stories about that. They flew here for the holidays and rented a car at the airport. They then went the thrift store to buy all their pots and pans and cutlery, lawn chairs, blankets and sheets, towels, books, a table lamp, and any other camping needs they had. Then to the lumber yard for scrap fire wood, a cement block and a bit of rope. We watched them set up camp when they arrived. Then, armed with their books and inflatable lawn chairs tied to the cement block they headed out into the ocean. They dropped the cement block in the water and sat there in their chairs anchored in place reading till the sun went down, watching a spectacular sunset right from their chairs in the water. We had a great supper together around the fire one night. Grace and Joan are both addicted to reading, so they spent ages talking about books, and swapping ones they’d read Another night after it blew so hard that every ones tents, including theirs blew flat and filled up with water, they slept over with us the next night in the spare bed above the seats. They were great company, but alas, they had to go home and get ready to head to their next job … in Alaska! We missed them when they left.