A new year begins in the RV

 

When we ended the 2022 blog we were in Fort Lauderdale Florida, the date was December 31 2022, New Years Eve. 

Dispatch from the road 2023

January 1 2023

The RV was 80 percent ready to go, having put away all the outside stuff yesterday. Millie and I drove to the Peter Pan diner for our 3rd meal here inside two weeks. The diner was not as busy as I expected, maybe all the regulars were sleeping off New Years celebrations. Breakfast was very good as usual; this has been our go to place to eat out. 

Not to be insensitive, but this blog is mostly written so Millie and I can look back and reminisce about our travels. That said, a lot of the clientele of the diner is gay. It is located in Wilton Manor which has a large gay presence. That’s not accurate, they pretty much run the town; they have even painted the downtown parking meter poles in rainbow colors. That’s ok, my comments are just for our record, they don’t bother me and I don’t bother them, I’m sure we are both here at the Peter Pan because it’s good food at a reasonable cost.

Dessert at the Peter Pan restaurant

Back at Easterlin County Park after breakfast we finished securing the RV for travel and hooked it to the truck. We drove a short distance through the city and entered the Florida turnpike for our journey south. It was a quick trip of only about 65 miles to our destination. The turnpike delivered us literally at the door step of Southern Comfort RV Resort. 

Florida turnpike from Ft Lauderdale to Homestead

We have snowbirded here in the past and it hasn’t changed much at all in the 3 or 4 years that we’ve been absent. It seems pretty much the same, even the girls in the office and Oscar the maintenance man are still working here. I admit, it’s a far stretch to call this campground a resort, but it’s nice enough and the price is right for our budget.

Southern Comfort RV Resort

In the past we were always on the outside row backed to an open field. This gave us a little more privacy because there were no camper neighbors behind us. Also most of us o parked our vehicles in the field on the hard coquina surface which gave the front a wider boulevard type feel. There is now a fence on the perimeter, it was put there when they built a small gambling operation in the field. It is defunct now with its entrance closed off. You don’t often hear of a casino going out of business, but this one apparently did.

Our RV in site 308

Anyhow, our assigned site (308) in on one of the interior roads, the neighbors all around are very quiet and we like the new location just fine. Our site has thick well established grass and a fairly new concrete patio out our entrance door. 

I knew there are a lot of fire ants here and I guess when I backed in I disturbed them because I saw them right away coming up on the pad. I circled the pad with some fire ant granules I brought with us and haven’t seen them since. 

extended stay parking pads

I also brought pads to rest the tires on. We will be parked here a month and they will keep the tires from sinking in the moist soil and they are also crescent shaped so the tires will not get flat spots from sitting. I use them in the storage lot and they work great.  

 

January 2-6th 2023 Monday thru Friday

Since our arrival we have just continued our life of leisure. We read books, Millie worked her puzzle book and at night we watched a little video entertainment. We had finished watching “Better call Saul” before we left Fort Lauderdale so we did a little searching on Britbox for a new series to follow. We found two that we’ve started, a britbox murder mystery called “Deadline” and the latest season of “The Blacklist”. We also have the fifth and final season of Ripper Street on DVD and will soon start that. In the interim we re-watched the final two episodes of season four to reacquaint ourselves with the show. We only watch DVD’s when we are on the road traveling and it’s been some months since we’ve watched Ripper Street.

Kim Wexler and Jimmy McGill from "Better call Saul"

We had hoped to go to the drag races at the Homestead speedway on Friday but they have not been held in some time and maybe are cancelled permanently. It was not a Hot Rod Association sanctioned event, but just a local promotion for people to basically “run what you brung”. You could be in a homemade race car or your momma’s mini van and the line up is random so you could be racing against anything.  It was always an entertaining event for us.

Drag racing at Homestead-Miami Speedway

We’ve been to Wal-Mart and Aldi’s, driven over to Ross’s Dress for Less to pick up some Amazon packages I had delivered to a secure locker there. We’ve eaten at The Farmers restaurant; the food is still excellent, but much more expensive than when we were last here. 

"Robert is Here" Fruit Stand

Millie with the animals at Robert is Here

On Friday we drove to the west of Florida City to a produce stand called “Robert is Here”. It is now a tourist attraction and apparently must see in South Florida because it was crowded with people. The business started innocently enough many years ago when Robert’s father set the young boy at a lonely country intersection with a trailer of produce. It has grown into an open air market that still sells produce but is more known for its large variety of exotic fruit from all over the world and it’s menagerie of animals in a make shift zoo out back. There are no beasts of prey, just friendly cows, goats, giant tortoises, poultry of all types and an aviary of exotic birds. 

The original fruit stand

What really surprised us was not that Roberts was still attracting tourists, as it is the road to Everglades National Park, but how much the area has grown. Florida City is not what you would call a booming metropolis; there are no fancy retirement developments, not even any retirement mobile home parks. The housing is old Florida concrete block design. They were probably nice back when the Air Force Base was active 30+ years ago. It is largely populated by working class Hispanics and the whole town just seems to have that working class vibe. Not that there’s anything wrong with that but the new developments springing up on the west side don’t seem to fit in.

The new construction is massive with hundreds of homes. They are build like a lot of new neighborhoods with large houses on small lots. The ones that front the road are all two story, all identical, all have 5 bedrooms and 4 ½ baths and they cost over $500,000. IMHO this means their target buyer is an investor who will make an AirBnB out of it. 

The big question is who will rent them, there can’t be that many people who want to stay outside the Everglades National Park. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’ve been there, it just isn’t that interesting, most tourist can see all they want to see in a day. I can’t imagine why anyone would want to stay an extended period. 

But then, what do I know, there’s people getting rich by posting video’s of themselves putting on make-up and game developers make fortunes selling kids imaginary things, on make believe lands. Ya’ll better hurry up there’s a new land rush in Florida. This time they’re not selling you a building lot in a swamp, there selling next to it! 

I admit I have a very weak memory; It’s plagued me my whole life. I’ve been writing notes so I don’t forget things forever, especially when we are getting ready to depart from home on a trip. I start planning early, sometimes weeks early to make sure I don’t forget something important. Even so, there is always that moment, usually in the middle of the night when I have this light bulb moment and think,” how did I forget that!”

In the middle of our stay here in south Florida we are planning on going on a cruise ship. I’ve been on a cruise before and could easily go the rest of my life without another, but Millie has never had the experience. We booked a three day cruise out of Miami on the Carnival Conquest. It only has one destination, the island of Bimini a short 90 miles out to sea. It will give Millie an introduction to big boat cruising to see if she likes it without us being captive for a week or longer if she doesn’t.

The new cruise ship terminal in Bimini

Back to my bad memory, the cruise leaves the US and goes to a foreign port. You may have guessed by now, I forgot our passports. I didn’t just leave them on the desk or the table by the door, I completely forgot that we would need them. They were home somewhere, I wasn’t sure which one of my secure locations they were in, but they were 700+ miles away locked up in an unremembered safe place.

Luckily, I have a friend I trust completely. Doug is one of those people who is on this earth to serve his fellow man. He may not admit it but it’s true, he’s a retired policeman who spends much of his time helping his family and all of those around him. I called Doug on Saturday morning and he immediately jumped into action. He has keys to the house so getting in was no problem and I think I knew where the passports were locked up. I was pretty sure they were in a lock box that was inside a gun safe with the keys hidden in a different location.

The one and only

We had fun watching him on our security system and helping him operate the European lock on our hurricane door and finding the keys to the safe, but there were no camera’s when he actually got to the safe. Doug’s a smart guy so he didn’t have any trouble opening the safe or the lockbox, we just helped by telling him via the cellphone where the light switch to the safe closet was and keeping up the lighthearted banter that we always pass back and forth. 

The first of problems became apparent after Doug’s preliminary search of the lockbox, the passports were not there. While Doug searched more intently a 2nd time I was trying to think of where else they might be. I had another smaller gun safe, my daily use safe for my concealed carry weapons. I usually kept seldom used checkbooks and credit cards in there and maybe I dropped the passports there. After that there’s a file cabinet, but I don’t remember ever putting them there. 

When Doug finished his thorough search and came up empty handed again I suggested he look on the shelf near the top and lucky for us there they were. Unfortunately, when Doug looked at them he told us they were expired! On an impulse, I asked Doug to get our birth certificates, which he had found in the box and to send them to us with the expired passports. I knew there was an expedited procedure for passports and passport renewals, but wasn’t sure what documentation I would need to do that. Maybe the birth certificates would be needed.

My friend Doug took everything directly to the FedEX offive and sent them to me here in Florida. In the interim I looked at the government passport site and saw the current wait time for a renewal was 7-9 weeks or 4-5 weeks if I pay extra for expediting. Neither option would do us any good, the boat leaves in 6 days. I then went to the Carnival Cruise website and looked at the posting about required documents. I didn’t fully understand the requirements so I called them directly and was told I could board the boat with just an official government issued picture id and a birth certificate. Also we will be able to go ashore in Bimini without a passport.

Thank you Carnival Cruises for having customer service rep’s who can speak clearly in English, know what they are doing and don’t keep you on hold forever. And of course a big thank you to Doug, I owe you buddy!

PS: Adding pictures to this posting I realized I hadn't taken but one picture of Millie this week and none of myself. I've added the picture of Millie at the fruit stand paragraph and here is where I've been spending my time writing.