Boldt's RV Castle

Manatee Arts & Crafts Festival and Wine Tasting

2012-01-25T19:01:00.001-05:00

We have been having a lot of fun lately. Let’s face it folks-isn’t that what retirement is supposed to be all about? I know that’s the version of retirement we signed up for. We went to the Manatee Arts and Crafts show, held here in Crystal River, last Saturday, Jan. 21. On the way there, we decided to eat at Hardees instead of Kim’s for breakfast and it was really good! We both had coffee and an egg, cheese, and bacon biscuit which actually melts in your mouth. The small round hash browns are quite good as well. The Hardees in Homosassa is a very busy one. They seem to have locals who bring in their own coffee mugs and get their coffee refills free-a regular coffee club. After eating breakfast we headed to Crystal River to the downtown historic area where they held their arts and craft show.

The vendors were actually set up on both sides of US Hwy 19, which is the main, 4-lane highway heading north/south thru the area. We got there at 10 AM and it wasn’t too crowded, but a lot of walking was involved. We brought a lawn chair so I(Jeff)could sit down when my back started tightening up and I needed to rest it. We showed excellent fiscal restraint (The State of the Union Address last eve has influenced vocabulary today). We only bought two koozies designed to hold water bottles(yes, water for real), a quarter pound of peanut butter fudge, and lemonade to sip on.

By the time we had left we had seen many of our neighbors and friends from Rock Crusher. It was a beautiful day for the show though. The festival also had an entertainment area where musical acts played throughout the day. We passed on that. They also ran shuttles to the Seven Sisters Spring area which was open so folks could walk the new boardwalk and see some manatees. That line was way too long for us to wait. It was a great way to spend about 4 hours on a gorgeous Florida winter day.

That same night we had a wine tasting event in the clubhouse. You were asked to bring a bottle of wine in which they would wrap it in a bag so no one knew what wine they were tasting. We were also to bring a snack to share. There were about 23 people there for the first time this event was held. Two of the ladies acted as servers and brought around the wine and poured it in our glasses to taste. We rated 9 white wines and 8 red wines on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being the best. After tasting all the whites, we all were asked to submit our highest rated. We then did the same with the reds. There were a few that we really did like and then there were some that tasted like apple cider vinegar or worst yet what transmission fluid might taste like…yuck! We had brought a Muscadine Red wine from the Smoky Mountain Winery in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. It came in second place(really first) in the red category. I say ours was really first because the first place choice, once revealed was simply Welch’s grape juice with Sprite. Obviously, not a wine and should have been disqualified. Barbie and I both noted that on our ratings sheets that it was Welchs. Guess we know what had NO alcohol in it. :-) The snacks were very good and much needed with all that wine. But then again, we did pour some of the tastings in a discarded glass because of the nasty taste. Prizes were awarded to the top two of each category and the gifts were very nice. Now we need to have a beer tasting night. :-)

Sunday we had some rvers ride up on their bicycles and introduce themselves. You see we actually know Chuck and Ayn as “Roadlife”, their log-in name on RV.Net Forum, an rvers forum on the internet we both follow. We had communicated through the forums as being at Rock Crusher Canyon. We have met so many fellow rvers through either this blog, RV.Net Forums, iRV2.com Forums or the Escapees Forums. These sites are full of great information with the opportunity to meet fellow rvers down the road.

On to a new topic. Our bed is really getting to us in a bad way. We have been sleeping on it for a year now and the mattresses that they put in these RV’s are on the low end of being comfortable. We had put on a two inch thick memory foam mattress pad on the 6 inch rv mattress back in March of last year. But now the whole bed makes us feel stiff in the morning and is most uncomfortable. Jeff has had to move out to his recliner chair in the middle of the night because of his hip, and not his back, for the last two weeks. We have rotated the bed’s mattress a couple of times but there is really no change. We feel that we are sleeping on the wooden platform with little cushion and not the bed anymore. We don’t want a Sleep Number bed since we had that in the stick house and got rid of it. Do any of our readers have any suggestions on what kind of bed is good and comfortable for them? We’re leaning toward some type of memory foam. We had a Bamboo memory foam mattress in our motorhome, we purchased from Overstock a few years back, which was all right but we don’t know how that would survive for fulltimers. If you have any suggestions or preferences that have worked for you, please let us know.

For the first time this winter, we finally ate at the “Freezer” this past Monday. This is truly an old fish company’s freezer in which they converted it into a bar type atmosphere which serves fantastic steamed shrimp and other fish. Check out some Freezer reviews HERE. We had garlic toast and steamed shrimp with a pitcher of their Cedar Key Red draft beer.The menu is not extensive but what food they have is great and the beer is cold! We love the atmosphere and the folks you see there as well. It was a great “happy hour” start to the week.

Today, Wednesday, Jan. 25 we went to Home Depot for some supplies to make a pvc drying rack to attach to the ladder of the rig.

I also bought pvc to build a support to place under our long slideout awning to keep water from pooling when it rains. That is tomorrow’s assignment. Afterwards we went to Dan’s Clam Stand for some clam chowder, shrimp, fries and hush puppies. Everything was very good again.

Thursday, Jan. 26 we are headed to the One Buck Coffee Club at 8:30am in the clubhouse. We gather to drink coffee, tea, or hot chocolate and solve the problems of the world. Afterwards there is a meeting for people interested in assisting to develop the park’s activity calendar for next month. Jeff will attend that.

We hope to attend the Ocala RV Show this Saturday when the weather will be better than Thursday and Friday. There is rain on the horizon for the next two days off and on so those might be great days to clean the inside of the rig??? Perhaps Saturday we’ll make the hour drive to Ocala.

Whew…I think we’re done. Soooo…until next time….

RV Supershow & More

2012-01-19T11:43:00.001-05:00

We went down to our house in Valrico, Florida last Wednesday to prepare ourselves for our day long adventure to the Tampa Fairgrounds where the Florida RV Supershow was held. Every type of rv is represented at the show from Class B camping vans, truck campers, Class A and C gas as well as diesel motorhomes, travel trailers, fifth wheels and even park model homes. There is everything from a couple thousand dollar pop-up campers to over $2 million dollar Class A buses.

The admission cost was $10 per person without a coupon or $9 per person if you had a coupon. Seniors Day on Wednesday was also $9. We brought Jeff’s scooter along so he would enjoy the day much better without having to worry about his back giving out on him. For those of you who have never attended this show, it is huge and covers alot of ground. We even took Kozmo who spent most of the time on Jeff’s scooter on the floor taking in EVERYTHING! She looked like she was a kid in the candy store. She was very well behaved and got many compliments on her cute looks and behavior.

We arrived at the Super Show at 9:15am Thursday and saw many old friends. We saw Pat and Sandie Gregory, Tom and Sharon Mann, who were all from the Roamin’ Rigs, the FMCA club we used to belong to when we had the motorhomes. We saw many people from Rock Crusher Canyon RV Resort who drove to Tampa for the show, and two couples from our place in River Vista RV Resort in Dillard, Georgia. We ventured to the vendor building which was overly crowded. Since the weather on Wednesday was a wash out, senior citizens were everywhere. We saw Karen and Rob, the managers from River Vista, manning the River Vista booth. We actually won a free night in one of the cabins provided we spend money for three nights. We ran into Roy from Quandra Bigfoot Jacks who put on our hydraulic jacks last May. If you want these jacks he is located in Lakeland, Florida. We went through many fifth wheels. We saw great kitchens in the Heartland Big Country fifth wheel and saw beautiful bathrooms in the Mobile Suites made by DRV. We saw a great plan in the Thor Redwood fifth wheel in regards to the entertainment section located in one of the slideout areas. A new fifth wheel made by Palomino called the Columbus was different in that the kitchen island actually moved to your liking. They also had a fantastic side by side wall hugger recliner with a middle hand section in this model. I believe these are referred to as “theater seats.” I would really like to replace our sofa with this beauty. But all in all, if we could put all of the things we like into one fifth wheel, then we would have a new fifth wheel. But that “ain’t gonna happen”. :-)

While in the Valrico area we just had to eat at some places that don’t exist in the Crystal River area. We ate at Zaxby’s chicken and had great chicken with fries, cole slaw and Texas toast. We ate at Five Guys and had their great burgers and fries with wonderful iced tea. We stopped on our way back to the rig Friday in Brooksville at the Chick Fil-A and had their chicken sandwich. They have a new Tortilla Chicken Soup which was very good-quite spicy. We have plans on stopping at Buffet City, a Chinese restaurant located in Brooksville. Hopefully we will get there this week. Nick and Terry Russell from the Gypsy Journal magazine and blog, have recommended this place several times since they have been down here in Florida. We ate at Dan’s Clam Stand here in Homosassa this evening for dinner and just loved it as usual. We wish Sherry and Charlie could have been here to enjoy the great clam chowder and shrimp with us. We are thinking of you both!

Kozmo continues to amaze us with her “mannerisms”. We have included some pictures of her outside in the dirt, on her new outside pillow and her time in her inside bed. We put a fleece blanket on her inside bed and she just loves it. But her best time still is lying on the dirt outside our rig. She even smells like dirt sometimes. Luckily her bath time is coming up so she can smell like a princess again.

On another positive note, I went to a new doctor last Monday here in Crystal River and really like him. My blood pressure, heart, pulse and thyroid is great! This past Monday the 16th, I went for a bone density scan and my osteopenia is holding its own for the last three years. Blood work is next month and a follow up with the doctor in regards to this is also scheduled for February. I am happy to find someone up here in Crystal River so in case I do get sick I don’t have to travel two hours to Valrico to see my old doctor. We are both going to look into optometrists in this area soon. This past Tuesday evening there was a barbequed chicken dinner with Buckaroo Bruce’s baked beans, cole slaw, roll and iced tea. Ninety three tickets were sold for this dinner. It was quite good as well!

Lots more to look forward to this week… Saturday morning blueberry pancake breakfast in the clubhouse, a wine tasting gathering will be held in the clubhouse on Saturday evening where every couple brings a bottle of red or white wine that all participants will blind taste. Voting will be done and a prize awarded to the couple who brings the favorite red and white wines. We all are also to bring a snack to share. Sounds like fun huh? Saturday and Sunday in downtown Crystal River is also the Manatee Arts and Crafts Festival. We really have enjoyed this in past years. Many vendors (about 100) line the streets with their craft items. There are additional food booths, musical entertainment and boat tours of King’s Bay. They even are running shuttles to the Seven Sisters Springs area where the manatees all huddle up in the crystal clear spring waters. We’ll no doubt spend a couple of hours enjoying the festival AND contributing to the local economy. :-)

That’s about it for now. Until next time….

2012 – Off to a Good Start

2012-01-06T21:00:00.001-05:00

We celebrated New Year’s with Jeff, aka Big Daddy DJ, DJ’ing the Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park New Year’s Eve Dance. There were probably about 95 people in attendance and they all seemed to have a lot of fun dancing, snacking, sipping adult beverages, talking to each other and eventually feeling quite stiff and sore the next day. We heard of no one complaining of hangover type symptoms Sunday, but we did hear of alot of achy knees and sore backs from all the dancing. It’s amazing how a bit of alcohol can cause one to do do things they regret later. :-) This was probably the best turn out for a Rock Crusher New Years gathering yet.

Sunday, we were invited to Canadian friends, Allan and Ruth’s rig for some great conversation and snacks and more adult beverages. We met some neat people who were all from Canada and a lot of fun to be around. The game of Ladders, otherwise known as Bolo Golf to us, was played and enjoyed on their site. Kozmo was invited to the gathering and met two other puppies named Breezy and Lola. She already knew Allan and Ruth’s dog named Henry and they are all so sweet !

Allan & Ruth

We haven’t done much of anything around here except try to keep warm the last three days. The lowest temperature we had was 23 degrees on Tuesday morning. We stayed warm with the two electric heaters on after the heat pump shut off below 30 degrees. We had to put the furnace on for two hours to get the chill off though. We hate to use the furnace as it uses so much propane. We were happy today to sit outside today and rake a lot of leaves into beautiful piles. It was a beautiful 70 degree day. We even took a golf cart ride without getting cold. Spoke with lots of people in the park. You can tell the “snowbirds” are arriving in force. It is good to see them again.

We went with three other couples to Peck’s Old Port Cove restaurant in Ozello which is about 25 minutes away. The company and food were great! Jeff had his usual peel-n-eat garlic shrimp which helped in preventing vampires from attacking him at night :-) and I had the fried shrimp, scallops and oyster platter which was very good. Peck’s is near the end of Ozello Trail road which has many curves and marshes on both sides of the road as it heads west towards the Gulf of Mexico. It can be intimidating while you drive out there. We know not to be out there after dark because there are no lights to guide you on the road. Many of the houses out there are on stilts. But then again if a hurricane came through, you would have to evacuate because there would be water over the roads very quickly. The restaurant had burned down several years ago but had been rebuilt since it was so popular.

We helped out on Thursday morning in the clubhouse to launch a new club called the 1 Buck Coffee Club. It costs a dollar for unlimited coffee. One must bring a 16 ounce or smaller cup for the coffee, tea or hot chocolate. We brought some donut holes from Dunkin Donuts and some other people brought some cookies and pumpkin bread. Even though the temperature was 35 degrees, about a dozen people showed up for coffee and we made a good dent in solving the world’s problems. We hope it will be a weekly event because the people said they enjoyed getting together like this.

We have several food events in the park coming up. Saturday morning is another breakfast at the clubhouse . These are held every other Saturday. Since we won a free breakfast coupon at the last breakfast during a raffle, we will only have to pay for one this time. Next Tuesday is a soup and salad night which was very popular last year. There are two choices of soup and several dressing choices for the salad. For $5 a person you can fill up on soup and salad. Later in the month are a hotdog w/fixins night, a chicken barbeque, and spaghetti dinner. Throw in a Sundae Sunday one week and a strawberry shortcake night the next Sunday on top of those events. Oh, and how could I forget a wine tasting gathering on a Saturday evening---oh boy!

We will be traveling to Valrico on Wednesday afternoon to prepare ourselves for going to the RV Super Show in Tampa on Thursday. We know it is Senior Citizen Day on Wednesday but last year there were so many people that we got a little frustrated. We even get to bring Kozmo this year since they allow mild tempered pets on leashes. She certainly qualifies. We will head back to our rig on Friday. Maybe we will see some of you there at the Super Show on Thursday.

‘Til next time… hope your new year is going well for you!

Anniversary & Happy New Year

2011-12-29T12:34:00.001-05:00

Yes, today is Barbie’s and my 38th anniversary. On December 29, 1973 in the beautiful surroundings of Highlands Hammock State Park in Sebring, Florida, we tied the knot. What a great 38 years it has been. It has flown by. I’m so fortunate to have my best friend at my side since then. We’ve both had careers in education that have allowed us to lead comfortable, satisfying lives. Now we are able to live our retired lives doing what we have grown to love---the rv lifestyle. We’ve made many new friends. We still have so many places to go and things to see. Happy Anniversary Barbie-I love you!

These are some of our favorite pictures taken within the last couple of years. My plan was to post a wedding picture and others since then but many are pre-digital age and at our sticks-n-bricks home.

It’s hard to believe that New Years Eve is just a couple of days away. Big Daddy DJ will provide the music for the party/dance here at Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park.

Big Daddy DJ is trying to decide which outfit to wear for New Years Eve. What do you think?

OR OR

From Boldt’s RV Castle, Barbie, Kozmo and I wish you a healthy and Happy New Year! Thank you for checking in and following our adventures.

We salute each and every one of you!

‘Til next time-next year…………..

Merry Christmas

2011-12-23T09:18:00.001-05:00

To our family and friends and all who read our blog, we hope you have a very Merry Christmas!

For us, we’ll be spending Christmas here in Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park with our fellow rvers. Enjoy the holiday season!

‘Til next time…….

Cedar Key, Tablet, Steps & Boat Parade

2011-12-18T14:13:00.001-05:00

Barbie is writing here today. I wanted to get you caught up with some of what we have been doing lately. First, we went to Cedar Key two Saturday’s ago to meet up with friends Steve and Cheryl Beringer and their puppy McGee, whom we met at our summer/fall home park, River Vista RV Resort in Dillard, Georgia, last summer.

They summer/fall in the Clayton/Dillard area and winter in Titusville, Florida, at the Great Outdoors. They were staying at a fairly new campground in Cedar Key called Cedar Key RV Resort. We had beautiful weather that day and sat outside and talked and had a great time. They took us to a place to eat where they have a fish market next door to a restaurant, which was about mile away from the campground called Robinsons. Everyone had shrimp and crab cakes, except for me. I had the shrimp but no crab cake. Their hush puppies were absolutely delicious! Soups ranged from clam and corn chowder to grouper chowder and it was good. Of course, we brought Kozmo along and she and McGee got along fantastically! Cheryl gave Kozmo a snack from Blue Buffalo. It was a pumpkin and cinnamon biscuit, which she really liked. It was so cute to watch McGee eat a baby carrot. He just puts it between his paws and chomps away. Apparently that is his daily afternoon “happy hour” treat. Kozmo just doesn’t like raw carrots, but occasionally she will eat cooked ones. Steve and Cheryl got us hooked on the Blue Buffalo products since they have natural ingredients which are very healthy for dogs. Jeff and I took Kozmo to the Pet Supermarket in Inverness to stock up on some Blue Buffalo canned dog food and treats for her. She absolutely loves the beef stew and chicken with vegetables. We also got her some pumpkin with cranberries soft chews and bacon, egg and cheese biscuits. I swear, Kozmo is so spoiled, but she deserves it. We thanked Steve, Cheryl and McGee for a very nice day and hope to see them in Titusville during the winter months, or if not at River Vista in the spring. They just recently bought a site at River Vista.

A few days later, we went to Spring Hill to do some shopping. We stopped at Best Buy and Jeff purchased his first Tablet. I swear I didn’t know the difference between a Tablet and an IPad, but now I do. His is an Acer Iconia 10 inch tablet. It is a neat device which will definitely be used everyday. It is very addictive to play some of the free games that Jeff downloaded, like Poker Square Solitaire or Tabby Cat Solitaire. Jeff was even getting involved in a game racing app where you drive a car by “steering” the tablet as his car races on the course against other cars. Crazy for sure!!! While at Spring Hill, we went to Pet Smart and got some more Blue Buffalo products there for Kozmo. She went inside with me and I tried to entice her with toys, but she snubbed them. That girl just doesn’t like toys. I purchased two new cans of the Blue Buffalo food and out we went. We can’t believe how nice the Spring Hill area is set up. It is only 40 minutes away from Rock Crusher and an easy drive until you get to Spring Hill. That is when it starts getting congested on Highway 19, but it was more bearable than Highway 60 in Brandon. We stopped at a place called Olive Tree Diner and had their specialty gyro sandwich. I had a cabbage soup with mine, which was good and Jeff had potato salad which was also good. However, the gyro was lacking. The meat tasted like it had been in water to keep it warm and it lacked a good taste. Needless to say we won’t be going back there again. It prides itself on having the best gyro in town… we wonder if they make the only gyro in that area.

I am so proud of Jeff. This past week we went to Home Depot and spent an hour in there looking around for the materials we needed to build some wooden steps for our entrance into the fifth wheel. He was on his feet for an hour and then helped load the wood into the truck and never had a problem with his back. I think his endurance has really improved. He used to just stand and walk around for a half hour before his back started to strain. And, we certainly don’t want a repeat of the back issues he had from June of 2010-October 2010 when he couldn’t even walk at all for a while. After we bought the wood we ate at Arby’s and had a very good Philly Steak sandwich. We have eaten those type of sandwiches in shops that specialize in Philly Steak sandwiches in Crystal River, but we can’t believe how much better the Arby’s is compared to those places.

We worked on the steps for two afternoons and then ran out of screws before we could finish the railing. So out to Home Depot again to get some more screws. It looks fantastic for two rookies who haven’t built something as big as this in a long time. The thing is really sturdy and heavy too. See the picture below. The only thing we have to do is stain it. But already we just love it! And, Kozmo prefers these wooden steps to the slippery metal ones on the fifth wheel.

We ate at Kim’s Café for breakfast on Friday and then went to get our tags renewed for the truck. We didn’t know you could renew our truck tags in Citrus County even though it was issued in Hillsborough County until this past week when we went to pay our taxes on the Rock Crusher site. It was very convenient for us. We could have renewed on-line but this is so much easier. The line for Citrus County tax office was very minimal. I only waited three minutes. After the taxes were paid, we stopped at a Sweetbay Supermarket in Crystal River. I had never been in this particular store and probably won’t go back again. It is an older store with narrow aisles. They were nice in there but the Homosassa Sweetbay is much roomier. I usually shop at Publix, but it is good to try out something different for a change.

Yesterday we had breakfast in the clubhouse here in the campground. They had blueberry pancakes, eggs, sausage, hash browns, potatoes with onions and green peppers, grits, fruit salad, coffee and juice for $5.00. They also had a 50-50 raffle and we won a free breakfast. Two weeks ago we won $10, which paid for the breakfast. Luck is on our side. We have new neighbors, named Roger and Judy who are from Massachusetts and they dined with us. She is a retired paraprofessional who worked in the library system. So we talked a lot about books which I absolutely love!!! Following breakfast, there was a craft show & sale held in the clubhouse. Campers could sell items they have made. I came out with 2 rings, one bracelet and a coin purse—all for only $15 total!

Last night, we went to the Homosassa Christmas Boat Parade and took Kozmo with us. We went last year and it was great! The no see-ums weren’t bad this time and we had a great time! Jeff took some great pictures while I held Kozmo in my arms for an hour. She actually met another dog named Max, who is a 6 month miniature pincher who absolutely loved her. But the most precious thing was Kozmo falling asleep in my arms for the first time ever. She even gave me a kiss, which she has never done when I hold her. She usually just freezes in my arms. Talk about a “Kodak” moment!!! Too bad we didn’t get a camera shot of that. Check out our favorite boats below. As always, click to enlarge the view.

Which one is your favorite?

We are headed tomorrow to the “stick” house in Valrico. Jeff has a dentist appointment at 3:30 and then a doctors’ appointment on Tuesday at 12:30. So hopefully we will get back to Rock Crusher late Tuesday afternoon. I am trying to get a doctor in Citrus County so I don’t have to travel to Valrico if I get sick.

It’s another gorgeous day in Rock Crusher Canyon here in Citrus County. Folks are really getting in the holiday spirit here in the campground. See…..

‘Til next time….

Country Rocks the Canyon

2011-12-11T22:30:00.001-05:00

Well, let me start by saying WE survived the weekend! From what you ask? This weekend, specifically Saturday, the “Country Rocks the Canyon” music festival was held in the open-air amphitheater sitting in a small canyon formed by digging an old limestone quarry adjacent to the now Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park here in Crystal River, Florida. Below is a view from the sky that I got from Google Earth of the area. Click on the picture to enlarge it. I’ve labeled key landmarks. You really get no feeling of being in the canyon which you are in the area labeled “lower level”. Plus, behind the covered stage is a rock wall of the quarry. Where the campground area starts (on left edge where lower level meets trees) sits a hundred or so feet above that lower level as well.

The campground, which is our winter home (we own our site), has 398 full hook-up sites. You see only a small, lower left corner of the campground in the picture above. Next is a view of the lower level and covered stage area. This is a view of the seats right in front of the stage only. To get a proper perspective look back at the overhead shot.

Back to the adventure……. The campground was slightly less than half full last Thursday with snowbirds like us. Nearly all of the remaining sites will be filled with the arrival of the last flock of snowbirds at the end of December or the first few days of January. Last Friday, we were told that a couple over 200 rvs arrived to fill up the park for the weekend. Of course, they came for the festival. They were in all types of rvs (no tents allowed in RCC) and brought their golf carts or all terrain vehicles, bicycles, grills, coolers, boom boxes, fire pits, firewood AND lots of DRINKS. These country music fans know how to party! There were parties everywhere Friday evening. Quiet hours are to be from 11:00pm to 8:00am ---YEAH RIGHT. Not this weekend. Below, I’ve also listed some park rules that I feel were violated this weekend by underlining the violations.

ALCOHOL: Responsible alcohol use is restricted to those people 21 years of age and over. No alcohol will be served at any Park function, although participants may bring their own refreshments.

CAMP FIRES: All fires must be contained in an above ground fire pit with a mesh cover. Such fire pit must be of commercial manufacture or homemade of a design similar to commercial made units. ABSOLUTELY NO GROUND FIRES. Firewood may be purchased at the gatehouse.

SPEED LIMITS: The speed limit is 10 miles per hour for ALL vehicles (golf carts and bikes included).

VEHICLES: Loud vehicles of any type are strictly prohibited. ATV and four wheelers allowed only while on trailers. Golf Carts and Bikes require permanent head and tail lights after dark. All drivers must be licensed, and stay on paved roads.

BICYCLES: It is highly recommended that riders wear helmets and use head lights and tail lights after dark.

NOISE: Please respect your neighbors by keeping all noise at your site at a low level. Noise that can be heard beyond the boundary of your site is often disturbing to your fellow RVer’s.

NUISANCES: No one should become a source of annoyance which interferes with anyone’s peaceful enjoyment of their site or the park.

PARKING: Only one (1) RV and two (2) additional motor vehicles (auto or truck) and one (1) trailer (boat, motorcycle, utility, or enclosed utility) is allowed on any one site. No extra tents other than screen rooms which may not be used as sleeping quarters.

All of us that call this park home understand this one weekend and tolerate it for the most part. Park security was visible all weekend and Citrus County Sheriff’s Dept kept two cars of officers in the park all night Saturday. The partying Friday night lasted way beyond midnight. We took several tours on the golf cart during the weekend to check out “the entertainment”, meaning the guests. Ah yes, I remember those days. :-)

Saturday morning it was quite quiet. Sleeping before the concert I suppose. You see, this was a festival with music beginning at 3:00pm and going to midnight or so. Check out the line-up below.

2:00pm-Gates Open
3:00pm-3:45pm- Cason
4:15-5:00-Neon Truckers
5:30pm-6:30pm-Michael Ray
7:00pm-8:00pm-Colt Ford
8:30pm-9:45pm-Justin Moore
10:15pm-11:30pm-Eric Church

From about 4:00pm on the campground was quiet. You could hear the music from the canyon faintly from most sites. Down near the clubhouse you could understand lyrics etc. I will say the campground staff kept all non-registered camper vehicles out of the park. They had special windshield stickers for we residents and weekenders. No sticker-no entrance. As a matter of fact, good friends, Bill & Linda Forrest, from Auburndale came up to visit us Saturday and after we met for lunch at Dan’s Clam Stand in Homossassa Springs, they had to park outside the campground gates and ride in with us so we could visit a few hours. At about midnight Saturday, you could tell the concert was over as you could hear the folks starting the parties back up. Somehow we fell asleep and didn’t wake up until about 9:00am. From 9 until about 1:00pm today, Sunday, there was a continuous flow of weekenders leaving. At 3:00pm ( I’d seen enough of the Tampa Bay Bucs being destroyed by Jacksonville) we took a golf cart ride around the campground. It was back to normal in “our little piece of heaven”…..at least ‘til the second weekend of December 2012.

‘Til next time……..

Kozmo at the Keyboard

2011-12-01T14:59:00.001-05:00

Can you believe it? I get to talk now. I’m on my little laptop and will write this blog.

I’m that cute little 15 lb, 8 year old terrier mix that was rescued last February by my Mommy and Daddy. I know you’ve seen pictures of me before if you’ve read our blog. Mommy and Daddy contacted Leonard, Sheldon, Howard, and Raj from the Big Bang Theory tv show and they asked them if they could create a device that could translate “doggie talk” into “human talk”. This has been an ongoing project for a few months now and the great scientists have done it! They created a machine that I bark into and out “pops” the words. Amazing huh? We are not sharing with anyone until the patent becomes a reality and we become billionaires.

Anyways, my Mommy and Daddy are the best human parents in the world!!!

They love me unconditionally and I love them sooooooooooooo much. How many fur-pets do you know who get to travel all over and visit places like the Great Smoky Mtn National Park or walk on Virginia Beach like I did this summer.

I am so lucky to be a member of the Boldt family. They took me to the stick house in Valrico this past week and I had a blast! Mommy’s car was started for the first time since September since it has been there, and we all went to get it washed since it was filthy. Daddy and I stayed inside the car while Mommy washed it and I watched her but wasn’t afraid when the water looked like it was going to get me. The noise scared me a little bit at first though. Afterwards Mommy wanted to go to Target to shop for an ottoman for the fifth wheel. I stayed inside the car with Daddy, but I didn’t want to tell Mommy but I don’t like her car. It scares me when I am sitting between them on the middle console on my two pillows. The console is not big like the one in our truck. It is really short and narrow, and I don’t like the back seat---I can’t see back there. Plus, Mommy drives too fast and sits so low that I shake and shake and slide off the pillows sometimes. Daddy has to hold on to me and he doesn’t like doing that much-he says I make him nervous. I tried not to cry and be a big girl, but I couldn’t wait until we got back to the stick house. Mommy was back to the car in 35 minutes with her new ottoman and a few groceries. I saw that she got me some chicken to go with my Caesar’s dog meal and I couldn’t wait to eat it. It was good too! After we left Target we went to Marco’s pizza to get a salad and a pizza. Daddy’s mouth was beginning to hurt from the temporary crown that the dentist put on his tooth that morning so he needed some “happy” pills to make it not hurt anymore. Mommy called them aspirins. I gave him kisses until we could get home and he could get those pills. He said that I was his medicine right now. That made my tail wag!!!

Mommy and Daddy gave me some pizza crust and some pepperoni from the pizza after I ate my dinner. I was so good and didn’t beg so Mommy would give me more but then I burped. Then she stopped. Next time I will hide and burp so she can give me more.

I helped Mommy clean out the master bedroom closet. She had some pants in there and I told her which ones to donate and which ones to keep. She also cleaned out her jewelry chest and I was hoping to get some nice necklaces to wear on my collar. She said she would make me some necklaces since hers were too long for me. My Mommy spoils me.

Even though I met some new puppies while Mommy walked me in the complex those days, I was ready to go back to my real home with wheels in Crystal River. Before leaving for Rock Crusher Canyon, we came across a dog that didn’t like me. He growled and was going to bite me so Mommy picked me up and kept me calm. I don’t know what his problem was—just an old grouch I guess. That dog was a real bully but my Mommy saved me. We left at noon time Wednesday after talking to Dewane and Bev, our neighbors. We stopped at Camping World for a new clear plastic thing to put on the sewer hose. People loved me at Camping World and I was on my best behavior while standing in the cart. We stopped at Popeye’s chicken and Arby’s roast beef place which was at the Travel America gas station across from Lazy Days. Mommy and Daddy gave me some bites of chicken and roast beef. We drove through the entrance at the park and got back home to our fifth wheel at 4:05 and I just love being back. The squirrels were talking to me from the trees and I scared them when I tried to run after them when Mommy took me for a walk. Look at all of our trees when you come in the park. Lots of squirrels in them trees, I’m telling ya!

But, the squirrels know who “rules this campground”… ME!!!

Mommy went to bingo last night and left me with Daddy for three hours. I was so tired from the trip that I slept most of the time she was gone. Daddy just watched tv and played some golf game on his computer. I don’t get it—he said he played the St. Andrews course in Scotland and the Kiawah course in South Carolina. I never saw him leave his recliner chair. Mommy didn’t win anything so they were talking about putting a sign on me that says “will work for food” and standing on Highway 19 to get attention. I think they were joking. Mommy only lost $4.00 from playing 10 games. When she took me out at 11 PM she had to put my t-shirt sweater on me because the temperature was 42 degrees. I did my business and ran back in because I was so cold and still tired from the trip. Mommy and Daddy didn’t have to ask me if I wanted to go “night night” upstairs like they do every night. I just took off and ran up there fast and fell asleep dreaming of chasing and catching squirrels.

Well, I better stop now because my Mommy and Daddy taught me how to type on the computer and my paws are getting so tired from writing this blog. Hope you like the pictures.

Til next time… I will “pant” for you.

P.S. Mommy helped me write this after the machine translated into human words.

P.P.S. Mommy didn’t have any drinks before she helped me with this blog….she’s just a little crazy sometimes! ;-)

Still Having Fun

2011-11-29T13:04:00.001-05:00

Since last time I wrote (Barbie) we have been enjoying ourselves and doing chores around our site here at Rock Crusher Canyon. We have weeded most of the lot and cleaned off the pavers. We have a bit more to weed and Jeff wants to trim some of the trees a little, but it is looking so much better. In between weeding and organizing things, we just had to stop and eat at some of our favorite places in the area. We have eaten at Dan’s Clam Stand two times and went to our favorite Chinese place called Mr. Wang’s. The fried shrimp at Dan’s is a favorite but their clam chowder is THE best, I’m telling ya. Jeff had the garlic house chicken at Mr. Wang’s and I had the honey chicken. They both come with fried rice, egg roll and your choice of soup. We love their hot and sour soup so we pay extra for that. We still can walk out of there at $20.00 or less and still manage to bring home containers of food.

Our Thanksgiving dinner was held at the clubhouse in the park. I brought some pea salad and it was a hit. There were about 85 people in attendance. Some people even sat outside in the enclosed pool area and loved it out there. We sat inside near the TV to watch a football game while we ate. We mainly talked to two other couples who sat at the table with us instead of watching the game. Bruce, Carol, and Florrie are three people in the park who cook for the massive crowds that appear. They did a fantastic job of preparing the turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, gravy and rolls. Everyone was asked to bring a side dish and we were selective about choosing which side dish to eat since this past Halloween we both got an intestinal disorder for 24 hours following that pot luck in Georgia. I also had bought a turkey breast for us to eat on since we like some leftovers from Thanksgiving. I also made stuffing, cranberry salad, sautéed brussel sprouts and we ate that on Saturday. Sunday Jeff made his mac and cheese to go along with the leftovers. This week we plan on making corn pudding, sweet potato succotash and leftover brussel sprouts to go along with any turkey or other meat that we have around. I was planning on making a turkey vegetable pie if I have any turkey leftover. If not, I will make the vegetable pie without the meat.

There were many “weekenders” in the park the week of Thanksgiving. Most of the people were very nice but some of the kids were inconsiderate by riding their bicycles around the park at night with no lights on and recklessly during the days. We even had one of our residents get hit from behind by a six year old on a bicycle that lost control of his bike. She got both of her arms scraped and needed to be helped up off the ground. We heard loud voices and some music after midnight on Saturday morning. It sounded like some people had a bit too much to drink. Needless to say, some of us were happy to see that crowd leave on Sunday. Jeff DJ’ed the “Welcome Back” dance on Saturday night and it was a success. About 50 to 65 people showed up from 7 – 10 PM in the clubhouse. Many kids came by early and wanted to hear some of “their” songs which we didn’t have. So Jeff played some of the line dances that some of the people like. The Cha-Cha Slide, Electric Slide, and other types of songs were enjoyed by the kids and adults as well. After 8:30 most of the kids had left and the “older” crowd was there to enjoy the music and dance.

We enjoyed a strawberry shortcake “gathering” at the clubhouse on Sunday evening. It was VERY good!!! About 25 people showed up for that. They (Bruce, Carol, and Florrie) are very generous with their portions. They offer either biscuit or the sponge cake along with three scoops of ice cream, strawberries, and whipped cream. It costs $4 and was very much worth it. This coming Saturday there is a breakfast in the clubhouse that is always very good. The Rock Crusher folks like to eat!

We went to Kim’s Café for breakfast this morning and enjoyed Mike and Sandy’s, the managers of Rock Crusher Canyon, company. Afterwards we got back to the rig to get ready to head to Valrico for Jeff’s dental appointment. We won’t be there long as we really don’t consider it our home anymore since we got the fifth wheel. We enjoy seeing our neighbors Dewane and Bev while there but don’t look forward to starting on getting rid of “junk” and organizing the things that we want to keep. We figure it will take us three years to get it all done if we go to the house once a month for two or three days while we are wintering down here. We are in no rush as you probably can tell…..hahaha

‘Til next time….. enjoy the moment!

Love Being Back at Rock Crusher Canyon

2011-11-16T20:09:00.001-05:00

Barbie writing this at the moment.

We arrived back to Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park in Crystal River at 2:00pm on Monday following a nice 4 hour drive from Ho Hum RV Park in Carrabelle, FL. We noticed right away the warmth and humidity compared to where we were for most of the summer and fall. But, we are NOT complaining. It feels good to be back “home” for the next almost six months or so. Jeff backed the fifth wheel into the site with ease. We had to get it “perfect” so I got out the measuring stick making sure we weren’t crooked on our paver covered site. I never trust my eyes on this because I don’t see things as straight as well as I used to many years ago.

BACK HOME !

We noticed our lot needs some clean up due to weeds and leaves that have accumulated the last six months. We left here early last May. But, those projects will come in time. We got the important things done today, which is the cable hooked up and the DirecTV working in case something happens to the cable. Plus,obviously the water, electric and sewer hook-ups and all jacks down and all four slide out rooms extended. We were so tired that we went out to Arby’s for take-out. Before we did that we needed diesel fuel desperately for the truck. We kept looking for places along HWY 19 to stop during today’s drive south. We never seemed to find the right place. Diesel was $3.95 at the Race Trac station in Homosassa. We noticed later on that it was $0.14 cheaper at the Race Trac in Crystal River. We didn’t fill up the first time because it stopped us at $85.00, so we feel better that we can go somewhere else next time and save a few cents.

Tuesday was the kind of day that I wanted to get out and tackle the weeds and get the golf cart that was stored in our utility trailer out and charged up. But, first we went to breakfast at our favorite little spot in the area, Kim’s Cafe. They do a great two egg, home fries, bacon (or sausage patties) and toast breakfast for $3.00. Barbie got a breakfast BLT (with egg). After arriving back at the site, it was back to the chores. The golf cart was an easy chore but I didn’t spend too much time weeding due to my head cold. I was hacking and congested and just plain miserable. Jeff did some weeding and that helped out a lot. I am usually a “witch” when I get sick so I am not nice to be around. Jeff went to the clubhouse at 6:30 pm to check out a karaoke fella that is new to the park this winter and also to mingle with some people who had just finished a grilled chicken dinner. I decided to stay in the rig and put a breathe right strip on my nose and load up on Vicks and Afrin Nasal Spray and make sure I had a full tissue box handy. Apparently it helped because I slept pretty good. Now today, Wednesday, I feel much better. I got out and weeded and used the leaf blower to get rid of lots of acorns that have accumulated from the oak trees around here and covered the pavers. Jeff went to another meeting at 10:30 this morning dealing with activities that the park is planning this season. Jeff is booked to do four DJ dances this season. They’ve scheduled a “Welcome Back” Dance, Saturday, November 26, the big New Years Eve Dance, a Valentines Day Dance and an End of Season Dance on Friday, April 13. He found out that bingo will be starting back up again on Wednesdays beginning at the end of November. That is something I want to do this year.

We went to Dan’s Clam Stand for lupper (lunch/supper) at 2:00 this afternoon. Very good meal! Jeff had fried shrimp and fries and I had a burger and fries. His shrimp was excellent and mine was very good too! We both had a cup of clam chowder as well. Dan’s has the BEST New England clam chowder. If you are reading this Sherry, we thought about you and Charley today while eating our chowder!!! January is not too far off. :-) We then went to Publix, where “shopping is a pleasure”, for some items. It was then that I realized that I really miss the Ingles Supermarket that we use in Clayton, Georgia. Don’t get me wrong… I love Publix too but Ingles has more of a variety, plus it has a Starbucks inside. :-)

We are going to start making a list of things that we will do soon. One of the things we need to get finished is the weeding first. Jeff wants to build wooden steps that lead into the rig. The ones we had made in Dillard are structurally sound and built to last a long time. So Jeff will tackle it using the same measurements and wood that was used on our Dillard steps.

Kozmo tells us that she loves being back in Crystal River. She “told” me yesterday that her paws love the grass and pavers on this site compared to the gravel on our site she had to endure in Dillard.

One Happy Girl !

Plus, she is back with her “friends”, namely the squirrels. No rabbit hunts here, but squirrels galore.She sat outside today just looking at the squirrels in the trees while I was weeding. She said that she wishes the weather were less humid though. Our high temperature today was 83 degrees with humidity near 85% this morning.

‘Til next time…..from the beautiful Nature Coast of Florida….

Ho Hum in Carrabelle, FL

2011-11-13T13:04:00.001-05:00

We finally decided where we’d stop overnight on our way from Foley, AL to Crystal River, FL. We decided to stop at Ho Hum RV Park in Carrabelle, FL. right on the Gulf of Mexico. We spent a couple of days here about a year ago and enjoyed the peace and quiet around here. The drive yesterday from Foley here took six hours of driving. The park is only about half full. The snowbirds haven’t all arrived yet. Once we pulled in we decided to stay two nights not just one. This is one of those campgrounds in an area where you better want to kick back and relax as there is not much around here. The park is small and except for it’s location right on the water, full hook-ups, good wifi and cable tv, there is not much else to do. But, as I said, it is peaceful. There is no pool and certainly not a park to bring kids-as a matter of fact, on the info/rules sheet they give you at check in, rule #1 is “NO children.” After we set up and ate some dinner last evening, I watched some college football and Barbie played on the computer and read before retiring early. Today, we’re gonna take a drive and get a bite to eat. Maybe I’ll watch an NFL game-who knows? I’ll include some pix from Ho Hum RV Park below.

Nice views huh-and with some Jimmy Buffett music playing, and me sitting here in shorts and t-shirt in 70 degree weather-it doesn’t get much better my friends!

Tomorrow we head for “home” at Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park in Crystal River, FL.

‘Til next time……..

Enjoying Our Stay in Foley, Alabama

2011-11-09T21:04:00.001-05:00

Barbie starting this blog today. :-)

We love it here in Foley! We left River Vista last Thursday at 9:55 am and the cool temperature of 36 degrees. As we put the slides in , ice fell from them. The ice had formed on the slideout awnings. We were happy to have put the sewer away the day before. The water hose was a bit frosty and stiff, but we didn’t have any problems with running the water through it. We arrived at Bremen, Georgia at the Yogi Bear Jellystone Campground at 3:30pm. It was drizzling when we got there so we set up as quick as possible. The ride was about 5 ½ hours. This campground has rabbits running around, a parrot and snakes inside the clubhouse, and a pot bellied pig in a huge pond area. Kozmo sniffed at the pig briefly and then just moved on as though she wasn’t interested in him/her. She was VERY interested in all the rabbits around. The weather was very windy and cold when I was walking her at 11:00 pm. I thought perhaps she was just interested in looking for rabbits and not wanting to do her “business”.

Yogi Jellystone

We left the next morning at 9:45 for Greenville, Alabama. This was a better day to travel with lots of sunshine. We arrived at Sherling Lake Campground at 3:30. What a very nice place! We had full hookups and the campground was very nicely laid out. Kozmo and I took a walk down to the lake but since we were pressed for time , we didn’t actually go on the docks. This will definitely be a stopover again in the future. The only thing we need to remember is that they only accept cash or check, which was fine for us but some people freak out if they don’t know about that ahead of time. Since the evening was a bit cool at 48 degrees, there were many campfires around us which made for a great smelling atmosphere.

We left the next morning at 10:35 for Foley. We arrived at Foley at 1:45 CST. The campground , called Anchors Aweigh RV Resort is a very nice one! We got a back in site that Jeff did a great job in backing into. We had a bit of trouble with undoing the hitch pin. This place has concrete sites and lots of grass for Kozmo to enjoy. They even have an enclosed dog area for running around and playing with other puppies. We’ll post some pictures of this place in the next post. It took us a bit of time to adjust to the one hour time change and then followed by the daylight savings time one hour change on Sunday. It certainly made the days longer! What is nice though is that when we wake up at 6 am, it is nice and bright outside. It makes you want to get up earlier. I have been fighting a cold for the last 4 days; right after we both got sick a week ago Sunday with some intestinal distress problems. So, I went to bed to “read” at 8:00, which it was really 7:00 due to the set back of the clocks Saturday night before we went to bed. I got up at 11:00 pm to take Kozmo out and Jeff finally came to bed after watching the Alabama/LSU game at about that time. I think I have had my share of sleeping for awhile… I am tired of sleeping…haha

We went to explore Sunday. We decided to eat at the Shrimp Basket , which was excellent, at 12:30pm. Jeff got all you can eat shrimp with fries and shrimp slaw and hush puppies and I got the shrimp and oysters combo with new potatoes and shrimp slaw. We will go back there again for sure! Excellent food-very reasonable prices. Kozmo patiently waited in the truck for 40 minutes while we ate. We then proceeded to the Gulf Shore Beaches and visited Gulf State Park. This is a place where we will stay if we are in the area again. They have pull-thrus and back ins and are spaced very nicely.

Gulf State Park

We took the Foley Expressway back to town, which costs $3.50. It does save the stop and go traffic the other way. They even gave us a biscuit treat for Kozmo at the toll booth which was a nice touch! We had decided earlier to enjoy a milk shake at a place called Shakes, which is right around the corner from the campground. Jeff had fudge brownie “concrete” , which is extra thick frozen ice cream custard, and I had a reeses’ pieces concrete, which was too sweet for me. If we go back, I will get banana instead. They even have a key lime milk shake. I am glad we are only staying here a week because we could go to this place quite often.

The weather was beautiful Monday morning. I wore shorts with a sweater when walking Kozmo at 7:45 this morning and had to take off the sweater because it was a bit warm. We are headed out today for Camping World and drive thru other campgrounds in the area. But, we are definitely going to eat at Lamberts Café III, home of throwed rolls, today.

Later…with Jeff at the keyboard.

LAMBERTS was all we heard it would be! Wow, the food was great and they entertain you as well. Let me explain. First, on the web site, click on the fun facts under the “ABOUT US” tab (or click on fun facts). Those are some amazing numbers! Back to the food….you order an entree: beef, chicken, fish etc. With that you get your choice of a couple sides. But, you ALSO get “pass arounds.” They provide "pass arounds" at no charge to those ordering from the menu. These "extras" are brought to you by servers carrying pots or other containers of fried okra, fried potatoes with onions, macaroni and tomatoes, steamed cabbage, black eyed peas, and sorghum, apple butter and honey. LAMBERTS is, of course, known for their Throwed Rolls, and everyone enjoys catching a roll or two. Made from scratch and baked fresh all day, every day--hot rolls from LAMBERT'S are not only fun to catch, but delicious to eat. Did I say-they are huge! Spread some real butter on them or get adventurous and try some country sorghum molasses on them. We put apple butter on ours….YUMMY. But, the real fun is catching a roll. Even more fun is watching other people catch them, or at least try to. Dozens of hot rolls are flying through the air every few minutes at LAMBERT'S, so be alert and have a roll.

Oh yeah, I had round steak as they call it, AKA, country fried steak. Barbie had meat loaf. Needless to say, we brought home two styrofoam boxes of food! Oh yes, I did mention entertainment as well. Besides the throwed rolls, our waitress offered us after dinner mints if you open a box.

Mint anyone?

And, of course, one last stop as you leave.

‘Til next time…….

Halloween – Headed South

2011-11-02T20:48:00.001-04:00

It has been a great summer and fall up here in Dillard, Georgia, at River Vista RV Resort. We have thoroughly enjoyed our friends, the countryside, relaxing and the dances we’ve DJed here at the park. But, the leaves have turned, Halloween is behind us and the past 5 mornings the temperatures have been in the upper 20’s. Sooooo it is time to head south! We’re getting the last few things done today and we’re hitching up the “Castle” and pulling out tomorrow morning. Tomorrow’s journey will take us across northern Georgia to the western side of the state to the Yogi Jellystone Park in Bremen, Georgia. This park is just off of I-20, just east of the Alabama state line. Microsoft Streets and Trips software says it should take about four and one-half hours. We’ll see about that. Friday, our plans are to travel a little over three hours and then stop at Sherling Lake Campground in Greenville, Alabama, which is just off of I-65 and south of Montgomery. Then on Saturday we’ll drive the final three hours to Foley, Alabama, for our one week stay at Anchors Aweigh RV Resort. We’ve never camped in this area but have always wanted to do so. We hope to explore the area and see if we can catch some “throwed rolls” at Lambert’s Cafe. In addition, to the beef, chicken, fish, pork, etc, or other main entrees with veggies, we hear they provide "pass arounds" at no charge to those ordering from the menu. These "extras" are brought to you by servers carrying pots or other containers of fried okra, fried potatoes, macaroni and tomatoes, black eyed peas, and sorghum and honey. Makes me hungry thinking about it. I’ll be sure to report back on the place. After our week in the Foley area, we’ll head “home” to Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park in Crystal River, Florida. We’re looking forward to seeing our friends and getting back to Rock Crusher for the winter. It seems like a lot longer than last May that we left RCC.

Let me backtrack to this past weekend. River Vista hosted their last activity filled weekend of the season, celebrating Halloween. Between the weekenders here for the events, and a 40 rig American Coach Owners Association Georgia Rally held here, the campground was full. There was popcorn ball making, pumpkin carving and movies for the kids. Friday night at 9pm, a cocktail party was held for the adults. The originally booked piano player canceled, so they managed to get a local musician that plays guitar and fiddle and regularly performs at a couple of local venues, to entertain. It was a shame that only about 18 folks attended and some of those were the work campers and managers of the park. Of course, the rain all day and into the evening probably caused a low turnout. Saturday was a beautiful, yet cool, day. There was a covered dish dinner for the weekend campers at 4:30pm on one side of the Mountain Village Center in the park, and the rally group had a catered dinner for themselves on the other side. The dance, with Big Daddy DJ as host, was to start at 7:00pm BUT, there was a large crowd in the Center watching the final minutes of the Florida vs. Georgia football game (and many in their rvs, I’m sure), we decided to wait until the game ended. It was a wise decision as once the game was over the Mountain Village Center filled with costumed kids, costumed adults, rally goers and the rest. We had a GREAT time watching the dancers, as well as announcing the kids and adults costume winners as well as the best decorated rv sites. Included below are some pictures from the evenings activities. Everyone seemed to have a great time as we had folks, both kids and adults, on the dance floor all night. That was the last of the five dances we’ve DJed since May at the campground. I’ve had a blast-plus the cash has paid for a few meals out along the way! :-) Big Daddy DJ is already booked for a New Years Eve Dance and Valentines Dance at Rock Crusher Canyon with hopefully a couple of other events there or at other rv parks in the area this winter.

It’s time to finish up some odds and ends before going to bed.

‘Til next time……

Catching Up

2011-10-27T23:11:00.001-04:00

We’ve been back here at our site in Dillard for about two weeks now. That time has flown by pretty quickly too.

On the last day on the road of our journey home from Williamsburg, VA, and the area around there, we encountered drizzle the entire day, from our overnight stop at Ft Chiswell RV Park near Wytheville, VA, to Dillard.

The last day on the road.

We were gone 17 days and that was the most rain we had encountered the whole time away. As we pulled up in front of our site, we found the posts and beams up for our “coach house” we were having built. As a matter of fact, Kevin and Kenny, the carpenters doing the job, had a huge blue tarp covering the beams and they were huddled under it. They were quitting for the day because of the rain. It was a couple of days later before the green tin roofing panels would arrive and they would finish off the roof and the trim work. We couldn’t have it painted right away until the pressure treated lumber thoroughly dries out. The paint job starts Monday. We’ll add two ceiling fans to it when we return next spring. We’ve enjoyed it in the few days we’ve had it and look forward to a lot of use next summer. I’ll include some pictures of the new addition below. Click on them to make them larger. I’ll include more pictures of it in future posts.

BEFORE

DURING

Our good friends, Pat and Sandie Gregory, who have an rv site up in Franklin, NC, 30 minutes north of us, invited us up to their place for a cookout last Friday. Also, coming were the Schurects and Collins who are members of the Roamin’ Rigs, the FMCA rv club we all belonged to in Florida. The Schurechts and Collins were camping over in Hiawassee, GA, about an hour west of us, to see the leaves change. It was a great afternoon with good friends and burgers, hotdogs and all the fixings.

Then, last evening, Wednesday, we hosted Pat and Sandie for dinner.

The Gregorys and Jeff

Barbie fixed lasagna, sauteed mushrooms, garlic bread, an antipasto salad and flan for dessert. It was a great meal with super company. We won’t see them until we are all back in Florida. They will leave Sunday morn and we leave for our “long way home” on Tuesday.

We had gotten an email earlier this week from Steve and Linda Coleman, longtime friends, and now fulltimers for the past 8 years. I taught at the same school with Linda in the late 70’s and then coached football with Steve in the 80’s. They also are former Roamin’ Rigs members as well. Coincidently, they were coming here to River Vista for an American Coach Motorhome Owners Club Rally. Forty coaches from the group will be here from Wednesday through Sunday. Steve and Linda came in a day early and we spent Tuesday evening catching up with them.

River Vista will be full this weekend with the rally and the weekenders for the Halloween Weekend activities planned. Lots of activities for kids (crafts, pumpkin carving, games, trick or treating, movie, costume contest, etc) plus tomorrow (Friday night) a cocktail party for adults with a piano player entertaining is on the agenda. Saturday, there is a meatball sub and side dish dinner plus Big Daddy DJ is hosting a Halloween dance for all from 7-10pm. It will be our last dance of the season. It’ll be a busy weekend but should be fun. I’ve gathered a bunch of oldie Halloween type music to play. It should be fun!

We will depart our site here in Dillard Tuesday morn and head for Foley, Alabama, and the Alabama Gulf Coast area. We’ll take our time and spend two nights on the road before arriving in Foley at Anchors Aweigh RV Park on Thursday, November 3. We are gonna stay there 7 days and explore this new area for us. After that we’re headed to our “other home site” at Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park in Crystal River, Florida, for the winter. We’re anxious to see our friends there for sure.

We’ve got a lot to do between now and Tuesday so my next blog will probably come from Foley, late next week. Oh yes, for those of you wondering, Kozmo is just GREAT!

‘Til next time……

Bethpage Camp Resort, Urbanna, VA

2011-10-10T20:35:00.001-04:00

The trip from American Heritage RV Park in Williamsburg to Bethpage Camp Resort took only 50 minutes on Thursday late morning. Barbie went in the office and checked us in at 12:25pm. Bethpage is a Woodall’s 5 Star campground and in 2005-2006 Bethpage was recognized as the National Park of the Year by the National Association of RV Parks and Campgrounds. They have about 500 grass sites and 30 concrete supersites. Plus, their are about 400 permanent sites that have trailers or park models on them. All the sites have 50 amp service with water, sewer, cable and a great wifi system. Nearly all sites are shaded by rows of predominantly pine trees. Their is a marina since part of the park is on the Rappahannock River along with a huge pool and water park. They have a large rally center and smaller activity building. They have “THEME” weekends from April through October nearly every weekend. This past weekend while we were there, it was OctoberFun Weekend. There were food and craft vendors lining the street in front of and inside the Activity Center Saturday and Sunday and a DJ played from 6-9pm Saturday. The campground was quite packed with weekend campers. The weather was great in the 70’s during the days and in the low 50’s at night. I don’t know if I have ever seen as many campfires in a campground as I saw Saturday evening. What an atmosphere and aroma! Friday we spent some time driving through, as the locals call it, “Rivah Country”. Barbie drives during these day excursions and she nearly freaked out Saturday driving over the Norris Bridge which crosses the Rappahannock River. You see the bridge was narrow, only 2 lanes with no shoulders, it had very low guardrails on the sides, plus it was tall and looooong. As a matter of fact, once we got over to a Walmart in Kilmarnock to pick up a few items, she asked me to drive the return trip. I thought she was joking at first, but no, she was quite serious. At one end of the resort they also have a miniature golf course and creamery that serves Hershey’s ice creams. Well, over the weekend, between the 3 of us, yes Kozmo too, we sampled banana pudding, Reese’s peanut butter chocolate, blueberry cheesecake and pumpkin flavored cups. DELICIOUS, enough said! This is a place we’ll return to down the road I’m sure. Below are some of the pictures taken during our stay.

‘Til next time……

Williamsburg, VA Area

2011-10-07T18:54:00.001-04:00

As I said in the previous post, we arrived in Williamsburg last Thursday, September 29th. We spent 7 nights at American Heritage RV Park. Picture hint: Remember you can click on any picture to enlarge it.

Park Entrance

This was our base to explore the “Historic Triangle,” ---Wiliamsburg, Jamestown & Yorktown. We spent the week in the area researching, touring the area, and of course, shopping. We discovered that the Historic Triangle gave birth to the United States, and our huge nation grew from this tiny place in Virginia. In that same tiny place, Europeans, American Indians, and Africans first lived together and became the seed of the American people. The first permanent English settlers sent by the Virginia Company of London, England were at Jamestown. The ideas of revolution were fanned at Williamsburg. Independence was won in the final victory at Yorktown.

The National Park Service's Colonial Parkway joins the three historic attractions of Colonial Virginia with a scenic roadway carefully shielded from views of commercial development. Intended to help visitors mentally return to the past, there are often views of wildlife and waterfowl along the roadway (and crossing it). The only human development that can be seen from most of the parkway are the two loading piers of Cheatham Annex, part of the Naval Weapons Station Yorktown which borders the inland side of much of the parkway, a testament of how this area still plays an important role in the United States Military.

Near the James River and York River ends of the parkway, there are several pull-offs. The Colonial Parkway is free of tolls or user fees.

The Parkway starts in Yorktown, passes through Colonial Williamsburg and ends in Jamestown. No commercial vehicles are allowed to use the parkway for transportation, although commuter traffic has picked up drastically in the past decade.

JAMESTOWN:

The first permanent English settlement in the New World was established at Jamestown in 1607. Today, Jamestown Festival Park and Jamestown Island attractions is open to visitors. Included are re-creations of a native American village and colonial fort, and archaeological sites where current work is underway.

There are two major areas at Jamestown: the former Jamestown Festival Park, a living history museum which includes the replica ships and is operated by the Commonwealth of Virginia, and is now known as Jamestown Settlement; and the National Park Service site which includes Jamestown Island and the ongoing archaeological projects is known as Historic Jamestowne.

WILLIAMSBURG:

In 1699, the capital of Virginia was moved from Jamestown to a location on high ground at Middle Plantation at the suggestion of students from the College of William and Mary, which had been established there in 1693. Middle Plantation was soon renamed Williamsburg, in honor of King William III, and it was a busy place until the American Revolution.

William & Mary

After the capital was moved to a more secure location at Richmond in 1780, Williamsburg became a largely forgotten and sleepy little town for almost 150 years. All that changed in the early 20th century was due to the preservation efforts of Reverend Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin, rector of Bruton Parish Church and the generosity of Standard Oil heir John D. Rockefeller Jr. and his family, who shared a dream of restoring the old colonial capital city to its 18th century splendor, and made it come true.

Today, the result of those efforts, Colonial Williamsburg, is a large living museum of early American life. It has dozens of restored and recreated buildings and reenactors. It is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world. The Visitor's Center (right off the Colonial Parkway) features a short movie and provides a place to start and leave automobiles, which are restricted from the restored area. A wheelchair-accessible shuttle bus service is provided.

Pictures of Colonial Williamsburg follow.

YORKTOWN:

The third point of the triangle is Yorktown where General Cornwallis surrendered to George Washington in 1781 the last land battle of the American Revolution. There are two large visitor centers, battlefield drives, and a waterfront area. Pictures of Yorktown follow.

Victory Monument

Yorktown Battlefield

Bridge at Yorktown

Notwithstanding the amazingly successful efforts to provide a non-commercial atmosphere at the three Historic Triangle areas (and on the Colonial Parkway between them), there are many hotels, motels, campgrounds, restaurants, outlet malls, shops and stores, gasoline stations, and amusements close by.

Much of the info above (EXCEPT for the pictures), I got from Wikipedia.

One of our favorite shopping stops was at a Yankee Candle “Flagship” Store in Williamsburg. This store had every fragrance they make plus every size candle and every other type of item they make from car fresheners, to diffusers, wax beads, scented oils, home air fresheners, even hand soaps, hand sanitizers and lip balm. We bought a few items there for sure!

One of the more interesting places we ate was at the Yorktown Pub. Barbie enjoyed her fried oysters and I enjoyed my crab cake. The local micro-brewery beers were quite cold and tasty. See pictures below.

This past Tuesday we took a day trip to Virginia Beach-right on the Atlantic. We really enjoyed walking their great boardwalk and walking the beach. I‘ll include some pictures below of that trip, including the tunnel (under water) we had to travel in Norfolk.

All in all we enjoyed our first trip ever to this area! But, it was time to move on.

We hitched up and left American Heritage RV Park about 11:30am, Thursday, October 6. In 55 minutes we pulled in to Bethpage Camp Resort in Urbanna, Virginia. More on Bethpage in the next post.

‘Til next time……..

On the Road

2011-10-02T23:01:00.001-04:00

After a delay of four days because of rain, we finally left our site in Dillard on Monday, Sept 26, and headed east to visit Barbie’s sister, Linda, and her family in Selma, NC. Selma is just off of I-95 in eastern NC. We really had no problems hitching up the 5th and making the trip to Selma. According the Microsoft Streets and Trips software, it was a 369 mile journey. We stopped once at a rest area to eat lunch and walk Kozmo, and stopped a second time for diesel for the truck. We arrived at RVacation RV Park in Selma at 5:10pm. This is really a great overnight stop for anyone traveling I-95. It has full hook-ups, all level gravel pull thru sites and a small catch and release lake-with lots of ducks, huh Kozmo?

Our site

Guess who’s chasin’ ducks

There is no pool and no cable but it had a great wifi system and with our antenna up, we found 29 over-the-air digital tv channels. Like I said, a great stopover on I-95. After we got unhitched, set-up, and ate some sandwiches, Linda and her two sons came by to visit. My sister-in-law can sure talk as she didn’t leave to go home until 1:40am! Needless to say, we slept in Tuesday morn. Linda came over at about 2:30pm and we went to a local drive thru chain in the area called “Cookout.” They have all the typical fast foods plus over 40 flavors of old fashioned ice cream thickshakes. The burgers were really good but the shakes were outstanding! I had a peanut butter/fudge shake and Barbie had a peanut butter/banana shake. Did I say they were OUTSTANDING? We brought the food back to the 5er and Linda’s husband, Dwayne, and son, Keith, joined the three of us. They all could not get over how much room we had inside the fifth. They loved it too. Tuesday was an early evening with Linda leaving at 7:30pm. Wednesday after spending the morning in, Linda, Barbie and I went to a local discount store, JR’s, to pick up a few items. This place has about everything but food items, although they have some snacks. I’m sure most of their business comes from the sale of tobacco products, wine and perfumes/colognes---all at discount prices. As a matter of fact, they claim to have the world’s largest cigar humidor. It must be 200 ft by 75 ft in size, packed full of cigars and a small supply of pipe tobacco and accessories. It was really strange to see smoking was permitted not only in the humidor but throughout the entire store. Plus, we found out once we got there, you can bring dogs inside provided they are in the shopping cart. Of course, we didn’t know, so Kozmo was back guarding the fifth. After shopping we stopped and ate at a Bojangles Restaurant before returning to the campground. At 5:00pm, Barbie took Linda up on their offer to use their washer & dryer. She went over to their house and I stayed with Kozmo in the fifth. Linda has 10, count ‘em, 10cats and 2 dogs, so we felt it best not to take Kozmo over there. Besides, Barbie and Linda got to spend some alone time and chat. After a good nights sleep, we hitched up Thursday morn and headed for the next stop on our abbreviated journey, American Heritage RV Park in Williamsburg, VA. We left at 11:10am and after a rest stop for 25 minutes, we arrived in Williamsburg at 3:00pm.

Linda & Jeff

Linda, Barbie & Kozmo

If you follow this blog, you knew our plans were to head up to New Jersey and then through Pennsylvania to visit Barbie’s parents, her other sister and some of my cousins. Then, we were also gonna spend time in Pennsylvania Amish Country around Lancaster. Then, we’d be back to Dillard by Oct 26 to DJ the Halloween Dance. Well, those plans changed since we finally spoke with the carpenter that built the deck on our site in Dillard. Why you ask? Well, we’re going to have a “coach house” addition built on the deck. Essentially, it is a 21 ft by 10 ft covered roof over our deck. The coach house roof will tie into the shed roof. Below is a picture of our deck and I have drawn(roughly I’d say) a sketch of what it may look like with the roof-over. We’ll add a couple of ceiling fans and outlets as well. It will give us a great covered area for our outdoor table and chairs that we can relax under.

Sketched “coach house”

Anyway, Kevin, the carpenter, can finally get to it and will start it October 11. We’ve been on hold waiting for Kevin to finish other jobs for a good bit of the summer. We wanted to be there while it was done AND we wanted it done before we left to head back to Florida November 1st. Soooo, our trip to visit the relatives had to shortened significantly. In the end, we decided to check out the “Historic Triangle,” of Williamsburg, Jamestown, Yorktown areas, at least before heading back to Dillard. More on our Williamsburg area experiences in another post coming the next day or so.

‘Til next time…

Hodge Podge

2011-09-18T20:41:00.001-04:00

Barbie writing here today……

We traveled to our Valrico, Florida home on Sept. 6. We just took the truck and left the 5th wheel in Dillard. The trip went smooth. We left at 7 A.M. and got in Valrico at 6:20 P.M. after stopping for gas twice and food to eat. Jeff drove the whole way down so I got to vegetate and watch the scenery while playing with Kozmo. Jeff had a dentist appointment on Wednesday, which went very well. He has to get a crown on a tooth when we get back down to Florida in late November. On Thursday, he had his doctor’s appointment, which also went very well. He is good until December; when he will need his annual blood work done. That will be about the time that I will have to see my doctor for my 6 month checkup.

When we were in Florida, I spent Wednesday and Thursday mornings pulling up weeds that had grown through the rocks while we were gone. I had sprayed down some great Round-up Extended 4 month spray and it did work in most of the spots. However, we were gone a little over 4 months and the rain and sunshine took its toll on the little suckers that wanted to grow through the rocks. I was thankful that it had rained and the weather wasn’t excruciatingly hot so the weeds were easy to pull up. I sprayed some more of that “love potion” on the rocks again. Hopefully the rain will stop and and so will the weeds. We also cleaned the leaves out of the gutters.

Weeds Gone !

I tried to clean up the inside of the house since it was a bit dusty, but time wasn’t on our side for this trip. I took Kozmo to Pet Smart to buy her whatever “she” wanted. She put her nose up at all the squeaky toys and chews. She did like the new halter I bought for her. I asked her if she wanted blue or pink in color and she pawed at the pink one. Now that she has it, she doesn’t like it too much. But she understands that “Mommy” and “Daddy” need her to wear it whenever other puppies are around so she doesn’t pull and crush her vocal chords and make her cough or slide the collar off her neck and over her head. Whenever we are down at the stream here in the park we let her roam the area without a leash since she just loves it down there. Whenever we see other puppies coming, we put the halter on. While at Pet Smart she wanted her favorite little soft biscuits. Kozmo was a bit upset because there was only one other puppy in the store and that puppies’ owner was a snob and didn’t want her dog associating with my dog. I felt sorry for the little puppy because she really wanted to make friends with Kozmo and so did Kozmo. We spent 40 minutes in the store while “Daddy” was at the dentist. After I picked up Jeff from the dentist, we went to Tijuana Flats for our supper. We love that place. We each got our favorite chimichanga with black beans and rice. The weather would have made it impossible to sit outside with Kozmo since it was drizzling off and on.

We also managed to get take out from a Brandon favorite of ours, La Septima, on Thursday. We both enjoyed a pressed Cuban sandwich with a deviled crab. The place was not crowded since they now close at 3:00 at their Parsons Avenue location and it was 2:20 in the afternoon. They opened up a newer place about 2 miles away on Lumsden and Kings Avenue , also in Brandon, which has outdoor seating in addition to a larger inside dining room.

I did manage to bring back some “much needed things” from the Valrico residence to our 5^th wheel. Things like a food processor ( I have two of them in the house), spices, foot tub massager, more candles, Gatlinburg wine, and some books that I have to read so that I can read more on the Kindle when I get done with them. Haha We also brought back a dog bed that Kozmo didn’t like when we got it for her and had left it at the house. She was laying in it at the house, so we figured we’d bring it back. Now since we have it in the 5th wheel she has slept in it three times during the day. She mainly hides her biscuits in it and wipes her face on it after she eats. At least it has a purpose for her. LOL

We are now getting ready for our three week trip. We still haven’t decided on where we are going other than to Selma, NC to see my sister, NJ to see my parents and my sister who lives in Unionville, NY, and Jeff’s cousins who live in Claysburg, PA. We thought about going to the Lancaster area again since we loved it there when we visited it about 10 years ago. So, we are up in the air, but will make a decision before we leave hopefully this coming Thursday, Sept. 22. After our trip, we are headed back to Dillard for about two weeks. Jeff has to DJ the Halloween Dance on Oct. 29^th.

After that we definitely know we want to leave November 1 and head down and spend a few days on the Alabama Gulf Coast before getting to Crystal River for the winter.

Wish us well in our planning of the trip…. Until next time….

Busy Having Fun

2011-09-05T20:06:00.001-04:00

We finally got our landscaping completed on Tuesday of last week. Our landscaper, Brian Cabe, put 6 “little evergreen trees” in along the side of our site. There is a proper name for the little trees that will only grow to 8 feet tall in about 10 years or so and not be but 30 inches in diameter-but I don’t remember it. Brian also added new mulch to refresh what was already on the site. He also laid down some more gravel to the front of the lot where we park the truck and golf cart. Below are some before and after pictures.

Before AFTER

We were planning on taking a day trip to Gatlinburg on Tuesday but postponed it until Wednesday. The weather was nice but hot in Tennessee. We bought 6 candles at 3 different places in the Crafters Loop to see what kind we really like so that we can go back in October and buy some more. Another stop on the loop, Misty Mountain Soap Company, has very nice lotions and soaps for sale in their new facility in the Crafters Loop. Their Mountain Energy lotion is very good for softening up the skin and just smells great! We bought a present there for Barbie’s friend Linda whose birthday was Sept. 4. Next door to this place is More Than Just Candles. They sell a soap that you use to wash dogs with and it is supposed to leave in all the great oils that dogs are supposed to possess. We will see if that works. Barbie usually uses baby shampoo to wash Kozmo.

After leaving the Crafters Loop we headed for Pigeon Forge. We didn’t have enough time to tour Cades Cove this trip or visit freinds Tom and Wendy, formerly of Rock Crusher Canyon where we winter. We did stop for a big treat at A & W Root Beer in Sevierville. We both got root beer floats for our lunch and nothing more. They were delicious! Next time we head up there we will have to call Wendy and Tom in advance to be sure they aren’t working at Dollywood and have some lunch with them. This trip was so busy that we knew we wouldn’t have enough time to see them. If you are reading this Wendy and Tom, see you in October.

The only “disgusting” thing on the trip was a stop in Cherokee at a picnic area. Kozmo had to go “take care of business” and the area was just as we were going into the Smoky Mountain Park. The smell was terrible. It smelled like garbage had been strewn across the area and never cleaned up. We hurried up and got out of there after she did her business, but will never stop there again.

I was getting ready during the week for the DJ’ing I was doing here in River Vista on Saturday, Sept. 3. My play list is getting very extensive. It took a few hours to go through it and pick my songs for the Street Dance. I stopped on Friday evening long enough for us to head to Clayton to see Brad Garrett play at the Rock House Park, which is next door to Praters Books. Brad, during the days this summer, has been working on remodeling the cabin next to us. He and his band played from 6 to 8 P.M. and they were GREAT!!! They were going to play at Main Street Bar and Grill from 9 to midnight that same night. Brad has a very nice voice and played many good country songs. There wasn’t much of a crowd but the atmosphere was neat.

Brad Barrett & Band

We ate at Zaxby’s for dinner before heading for the concert. We just love Zaxby’s! When we head back to Crystal River in November, I guess we will have withdrawal symptoms until we find one close by. I think the closest one is in Ocala, an hour’s drive. :-( We probably would go that distance, since another favorite restaurant of ours is Tijuana Flats and that is located in Ocala, also.

Saturday, Sept. 3 was a great day. The campground was almost full. We counted 8 empty sites. Children were everywhere with adults either cooking out or just enjoying the pool area. There was a barbeque supplied by River Vista from 6 to 7. They served grilled chicken, baked beans, potato salad and a roll plus iced tea. It was very good! I DJed from 6 to 10 that night.

Big Daddy w/new banner

It started to rain about 6:10 but it didn’t last that long. How do you like my new banner? You wouldn’t believe how many dancers there were in the street during the night. Of the four “Street Dances” we’ve done this summer, this was the largest crowd with the most dancers.

“Locals “line-up

We had kids and adults dancing to the oldies, country and dance favorites. I think the Cha Cha Slide drew the largest crowd. Everyone was having a great time. It was really funny that little kids come up to request Justin Bieber or Miley Cyrus songs, which I don’t have in my repertoire.

People were starting to leave the campground on Sunday because of the threat of Tropical Storm Lee and the rains on the way. It did start to rain last night around 11. We put all of our things away since we are leaving for Valrico Tuesday morning. It has been raining off and on today. Poor Kozmo got drenched the two times Barbie took her out, but she loves to get dried off. I have a dentist and doctors’ appointments on Wednesday and Thursday of this week in Valrico. We hope to leave Valrico on Friday and head back up to Dillard so we can start getting ready for our vacation to PA, NJ, NY, and NC.

Until next time….

Not Much New and Some Reminiscing

2011-08-27T13:29:00.001-04:00

It has been a long time since we have posted. Sorry about that-we ARE well. Nothing really outstanding has been going on with us. We have been relaxing following our daily routines and just planning everyday what we are going to eat. :-) Priorities, doncha know!

Last night Barbie went to play bingo in the park. That was the second time that she went down to the pavilion and tried to play. The previous Friday she was one of only two people who showed up, so they cancelled it. Last night there were four people and they played three games. Each card costs $1.00 so Barbie played two cards. She won two out of the three games played and after expenses cleared $8.00. Not bad considering the small amount of people that showed up. It was held in the pavilion next to the pool area outside and the weather was very pleasant.

A Good Sam Club chapter is holding a rally here at River Vista this weekend and was using the Mountain Center. During the daytime, temperatures were very hot with the high being 92 degrees. Today we are supposed to get very nice weather with highs about 82 degrees. Barbie called her parents who live in New Jersey this past week and they were oblivious to the hurricane heading up in their area. Hopefully the winds and rain will subside so that damage will be minimal. They live on a hill with two gigantic oak trees on the two sides of the house. We hope that the river which empties into a pond at the end of the road at the bottom of the hill doesn’t overflow. Barbie can remember years ago growing up in Hawthorne, NJ and floods occurred and almost knocked out the little bridge that was right down the hill from their house. Of course the best part about living in Hawthorne was the winter time when blizzards would come and shut down school. Since they lived on a hill, there were about 38 steps that needed to be de-iced before anybody went anywhere. Her grandfather would get up extra early and shovel and throw rock salt on the steps so the family could go to work. What a great guy he was!!!

We went to eat last weekend in Franklin, NC to a place called Cajun Connection. It was fantastic!!! We really haven’t found any place to eat up here that has great seafood. This one has it! I had shrimp creole followed by a shrimp basket which was outstanding! Barbie had blue crab soup followed by an oyster basket which was equally as good!!! Since this was our only meal of the day we ate their dessert of bread pudding, which was to die for! We will definitely go back there. Today we are headed somewhere to eat since we haven’t eaten out since Monday of this past week.

Kozmo is being her usual wonderful self!!! She loves her golf cart rides and her truck rides for sure. She gets so much lovin’ and is spoiled OH SO MUCH!!!!

I got booked to play “Big Daddy DJ” again for the Labor Day weekend on September 3 for the park.

Big Daddy’s business card!

River Vista is 100% booked for the Labor Day weekend. They are having hot dogs and smores, a bonfire and a movie Friday evening. Saturday, a two day horseshoe competition will begin followed by a barbeque dinner. I will be playing light music from 6 - 7 as the dinner is going on and then I will play from 7 – 10 for the “Street Dance”. Sunday morning there will a pancake breakfast followed by the final rounds of the horseshoe competition. There is probably more going on and we will report back next weekend to let you know how everything turned out.

If the weather holds up as forecast we will be headed to Gatlinburg, TN on Tuesday. We have various stores we like to visit and hopefully will have some time to see Cades Cove again. Of course Kozmo is going with us so she can experience the beautiful mountains!

‘Til next time……..

What’s Happenin’ ?

2011-07-30T16:47:00.001-04:00

Not much...

Barbie writing here… let me get you up to date with what we have been doing since the last blog posting.

The day before Jeff’s birthday, Thursday, July 21, I “surprised” Jeff with a neat picnic lunch at Black Rock Mountain State Park in the Mountain City area of Georgia. It is only a 15 minute drive from our site at River Vista. The day was hot in Dillard but by the time we made it to the top of the mountain it was 7 degrees cooler, at 82 degrees. We had a beautiful view (check out the pictures below) and a wonderful lunch, according to Jeff.

This was Kozmo’s first picnic and she even enjoyed it. I had made a four cheese pasta dish with chicken, peas, garlic, mozzarella cheese and olive oil with seasonings. We also had our first heirloom tomato from the plant that I have been cultivating out on our deck. It was delicious! I can’t believe I have the ability to plant something and actually keep it alive and produce something so good!!! LOL Anyway, we also had homemade peanut butter chocolate chip cookies and a sangria jello for dessert. The time was relaxing and gorgeous. We met another couple from Gainesville, Georgia who were up for the day enjoying their picnic, also. We found out they have a Jayco fifth wheel and a Labrador retriever whom they adopted a few years back. Kozmo didn’t get too close to the pup because they were afraid their pup might do something to her. She was ready to give out kisses though. :-)

On to Friday, July 22, Jeff turned 59 years young. We celebrated by eating out at The Stockton House in Clayton. The food was fantastic! Jeff had chicken marsala and I had the trout almondine. No dessert for us since we had waiting for us at home a chocolate “wacky” cake with milk chocolate/peanut butter icing that I made for the birthday “boy.” It is a very easy cake with no eggs or butter in it. The Stockton House is a nice place but really needs to tend to its growth of foliage leading up the stairs to the entrance.

The rest of the weekend was devoted to cleaning, laundry, reading and computer “traveling”. I cooked some darn good meals over the past week, like crab cakes and a spinach salad, fresh creamed yellow squash with a ground beef tomato sauced pasta dish, and another spinach dish with roasted sweet potatoes, onions and walnuts with a mustard based dressing. We also managed to eat at Mishima Express in Clayton with both of us getting hibachi chicken dinners. This is a great Japanese style cooking restaurant! We ate at the Valley Café for breakfast on Thursday, July 28 and took a walk through Fred’s discount store and didn’t see much of anything there. On Friday, July 29, we went to Oinkers for “lupper” and it was fantastic….again!

It has been hot up here, as it is probably in a lot of places. But the nights are not that bad. When I usually take Kozmo out at 11:00 P.M. it is warm but not stifling. By the way Kozmo has developed many “hobbies” lately. She loves taking golf cart rides with us looking for rabbits, walking down by the stream and watching the ground move because of the ground moles that have built their tunnels almost everywhere, and jumping back and forth inside the rig from Jeff to me when she sees hummingbirds on the window feeder on my side and doves and other birds in the bird feeder on Jeff’s side. I am constantly looking down at the ground now to make sure those ground moles don’t appear and bite us. We haven’t seen any since they come out at night. Kozmo is really fitting into the “Boldt Retirement Home” very nicely!

We have started seriously looking for campgrounds that we will be staying at when we head to Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Selma, North Carolina area in September to visit family. We have decided not to head for the Indiana and Ohio areas since we don’t want to be on the road longer than 3 ½ to 4 weeks for this trip. Jeff is really getting into DJ’ing here at the park and we don’t want to miss out on all the Fall festivities around here. Speaking of DJing gigs, the owner of the campground confirmed with Jeff this afternoon another street dance to be held next Saturday here at River Vista. Dillard is hosting the Kansas City Barbeque Society’s Georgia State Championship Bluegrass & Barbeque Festival next Friday and Saturday. There is a near full house expected here at the campground. After folks get their fill of Bluegrass & Barbeque they can come back to River Vista and kick up their heels to some good old time rock and roll, country and dance favorites. It’ll be a good time, after all Big Daddy DJ will be playing the favorites!

Until next time…live for the moment!

Good Friends

2011-07-19T15:57:00.001-04:00

We had a great time with our great friends Linda and Bill Forrest on July 11^th and 12^th.

They live in Auburndale, Florida. Barbie worked with Linda at Mann Middle School. She is still teaching 8^th grade history there. They became close friends and just love it when they get together. They had bought a Class A motorhome this past year and stopped to visit towing their utility trailer, which houses their Gold Wing motorcycle. They stayed for two nights here at River Vista. They were headed to West Virginia to pick up their son and his family and then travel to Maine to visit family and have a good time. We took them to Fatz Café in Franklin, NC, which is 20 minutes north on US 441, Monday night and had a fantastic meal! After eating breakfast out Tuesday morning at Kountry Vittles (which took 45 minutes to get the meal), Linda and Bill went for a motorcycle ride to South and North Carolina. The weather was nice and not hot so their ride was fantastic. Barbie and I went to Ingles for some grocery shopping for the barbeque that we were making for the night. When 6 PM came around, Linda and Bill came up and we ate grilled burgers, potato salad and pea salad and then topped off the evening with homemade blueberry cobbler with vanilla ice cream. It was a great meal with great conversation. Linda brought some Reisling wine which made it even more entertaining. We went down to their rig at 9PM and they showed us their homemade laundry line made with PVC pipe which was attached to their ladder. That will be a project for me in the near future. We said our goodbyes Tuesday evening with the lightning bugs flashing in the night’s soft breeze.

Thursday, July 14 and Friday, July 15 were rainy type of days. We need the rain up here and we just sat around and read and cleaned up a bit. Our other great friends, Sandie and Pat Gregory and their two grandchildren, Kyle and Katherine, came by Friday to visit us.

They live in Brandon, Florida, and have the grandkids for two weeks. They own an rv site in Franklin, North Carolina in a place called Great Outdoors RV Resort.

They have a beautiful rv site at the crest of a cleared off hilltop with long range mountain views. They also have a cabin site in another area of the resort which will be developed later on. They stayed for a couple of hours and the grandkids are getting big and are very well behaved. Kozmo mainly stayed in my lap the whole time they were here. But Kyle did give her a treat which she tenderly took from his hand. They brought us some great corn on the cob which they picked themselves in North Carolina along with some beautiful sunflowers. They were headed to Santa’s Land in Cherokee, NC, on Saturday followed with horseback riding on Sunday before departing for Stone Mountain, Georgia, on Monday. We don’t have the energy to keep up with all that they do. They always have a great time though. After they left Barbie fixed us a taco salad dinner, which was very good.

Barbie has been cooking a lot so we treated ourselves to Mishima Express late Saturday afternoon. Kozmo stayed in the truck with the windows down since the temperature was 73 degrees. The food is great! We both usually have the hibachi chicken which comes with brown rice, carrots, and mushrooms on the side. With two iced teas, the bill was only $16 and it is a filling meal. Their house “shrimp” sauce that you can top off the meat and rice is truly outstanding.

We took a ride to Clayton on Monday to pick up prescriptions at Walgreens and then went to Highlands, North Carolina via Warwoman Road and Highway 28. It is a very curvy ride with nothing really around to look at except some beautiful mountains.

Our purpose was to make a deposit and get cash from the Bank of America, which has the closest branch for us in Highlands, NC. Highlands had temperatures of 73 degrees at 3:00 PM, the elevation being 4034 ft, and the place was very crowded. There wasn’t a place to park on the main drag so we decided to head back down to Dillard. You can really tell that the tourists are back when you head to Highlands on a Monday and see it so crowded.

Since my birthday is this Friday, Barbie has a surprise planned for me, so she says, on Thursday. She told me to pick a place to eat on Friday, which is what we usually do for our birthdays. She is hoping for great weather for the surprise Thursday, so my guess is a picnic up at Black Rock State Park??? She has been wanting to do that all summer. I’ll let you know.

‘Til next time…remember to live for the moment.

Late Night TV

2011-07-13T23:06:00.001-04:00

I probably should have written a blog about this topic long ago, but now is as good a time as any. We usually go to bed at 11:00pm or earlier each night. Barbie and Kozmo will usually head to bed first and I will follow later, sometimes after I watch the 11:00 news. But, during the course of each weekday evening I’ll usually check the DirecTV guide to see which guests are on the late night talk shows. If there are some interesting guests I’ll DVR them so we can check them out the next day. At 11:30, it’s usually “The Late Show” with David Letterman. Every once in a while it may be “The Tonight Show” with Jay Leno. But at 12:35am, the ONLY show I’ve DVRed is “The Late Late Show” with Craig Ferguson. I got hooked on Ferguson only about a year ago when my back was shot and I spent my nights sleeping in my recliner chair and couldn’t sleep well at all because of the meds or whatever. He is a Scottish–American television host, stand-up comedian, writer, actor, director, and producer. He took over “The Late Late Show” from Craig Wilborn in January 2005. The guy is hilarious. He has no co-host, no band but he has a talking “skeleton” machine, Geoff Peterson.

Geoff Petersen

Geoff’s debut appearance was on Monday, April 5, 2010. Geoff Peterson was designed and built by Grant Imahara of the Discovery Channel show Mythbusters. He has neon blue eyes, a metal mohawk and wears an over-sized suit with his name scrawled on a contestant's name tag from The Price is Right. The robot is voiced by Josh Thompson, either live or as a set of pre-recorded phrases. Geoff makes comments regularly that contribute to the comedy of the show. There are “other” regulars such as “Secretariat”, a horse (2 humans in a horse costume) that dances out on stage for a brief appearance as Ferguson and the audience “dance” in the background. Occasionally, a white rabbit puppet manned by Ferguson, does the shows opening. Each guest’s segment ends one of 3 ways: 1) the guest may choose to play a “mouth organ”(harmonica) with Ferguson, 2) the guest my choose to have “an awkward pause” with Ferguson and most recently added, 3) the guest may choose to hold Ferguson’s “glittery ball”, which is a miniature mirrored disco ball. Needless to say, the show is filled with many sexual innuendos. I’m smiling or laughing the entire hour. If you’ve never checked it out, you really should…it is different.

What prompted this blog was that last night on Letterman’s Show he brought Regis Philbin to serve as his first ever co-host on “The Late Show.” The two of them together was hilarious. It was an awesome show. Ferguson followed with guest Julie Chen. I can tell you that we spent two great hours watching those show today.

Well, so much for late night tv.

‘Til next time……..

It’s July

2011-07-05T21:30:00.001-04:00

This past week has been a busy one-yet enjoyable for sure. Last Monday we had a nice three hour plus visit and dinner with one of my former guidance counselors, Donna, from Tampa, FL. Donna was traveling to visit another former guidance counselor we both worked with, Nancy, who with her husband retired to a cabin in Murphy, NC a couple of years ago. Donna had called and we made plans for her to stop by our site here in Dillard, chat for awhile and catch a bite to eat before she moved on to Murphy where she planned to spend a couple of days. It was great visiting with Donna and getting caught up with the people I used to work with. We got a bite to eat at Mountain Man Grill here in Dillard just about a half mile from the NC state line on US 441. After some great burgers, we headed back to the 5er and Donna headed into NC. We also made tentative plans for Donna to drive up and visit us at our site in Crystal River, FL during the winter season.

The middle of the week was filled with running errands and enjoying “The Good Life.” Saturday, we drove to Franklin, NC, to a small arts and crafts show. We left seeing some nice local crafts but we resisted the urge to purchase anything.

River Vista was about 95% full for the July 4th weekend. There were cookouts, the pool was full all weekend, there were games and movies for the kids as well. Saturday evening a local woman and her son, who happen to be related to one of the work campers here at River Vista, played some old bluegrass tunes. Sunday was the big day. There was a golf cart and bicycle parade through the campground that included about 25 golf carts and a dozen bicycles or so.

As usual, CLICK on any picture to increase the size for better viewing.

Jacked up golf cart

The campground then hosted a hotdog cookout. For $1 you got a hotdog (with chili, sauerkraut, onions, relish, catsup, mustard, however you wanted it), a bag of potato chips and either iced tea or lemonade. They also had ice cream sundaes for 50 cents a scoop with toppings and there was also a watermelon seed spitting contest. All of those activities led up to the big “Street Dance” DJed by yours truly at 7:00pm.

THE “Big Daddy DJ”

There was a great turnout for the dance with young and old, weekenders and River Vista Falls View residents in attendance. We played outside in front of the Mountain Village Center and the dance floor was the street. It worked out great. The weather cooperated and folks used the rocking chairs from outside the Mountain Village Center, the adirondack chairs from the playground, their golf carts and their own collapsible lawn chairs to sit on.

The Line-up

We played oldies, country, old time rock-n-roll and all type of dance favorites like: electric slide, polkas, conga, cha cha slide, Cupid shuffle, macarena, boot scootin’ boogie and more. It was a grand evening that we ended by playing an emotional “God Bless the USA.”

Apparently it was well received as we had numerous positive comments. The best part is the developer of River Vista, Clark, wants to sit down with me and discuss doing some future events. I’ll keep you posted.

Monday was a pretty laid back day until the local fireworks in Dillard and up in Franklin, NC in the evening. I don’t know if it was just me or not, but I saw fireworks over River Vista, or did I dream it ? :-)

‘Til next time……….

Day Trip: Hiawassee, Young Harris, Blairsville, Helen, Georgia

2011-06-25T22:44:00.001-04:00

This is Barbie writing this blog today while Jeff tries his best to win spider solitaire. LOL

We went on a day trip this past Tuesday, June 21, to Hiawassee, Young Harris, Blairsville, Helen, and around the Lake Burton area on our way back. This area in northern Georgia has always been a favorite of ours. The day was a very nice one weather wise. It did get warm as the day progressed. The highest temperature was in Helen at 90 degrees. Of course Kozmo went with us and she had a nice time, so she told us later on in her doggy talk. We stopped first in Dillard for some diesel gas for the truck. It has come down in price being $3.82 per gallon in this area. We saw it just recently at $3.76 in Clayton. If it comes down more we will be saving some more money on our trip up north later in the summer and fall.

We enjoy riding around the Hiawassee area because Lake Chatuge and it’s coves seem to surround the town. It is a beautiful area. Hiawassee is also the home of the Georgia Mountain Fair which is held in August and has an abundance of local craftsmen and women demonstrating and selling their crafts. Many country acts perform as well. We’ve attended in past years and really enjoy it.

We made a stop at Vogel State Park to see the ducks and stretch our legs. As you can see by the picture, Kozmo really had a great time checking out the ducks!

In Helen, there were lots of tubers in the river having a great time.

We found that unusual for a Tuesday afternoon-all the tubers. Helen wasn’t too crowded but we drove through town and Kozmo got a close-up of a horse drawn carriage. For those of you that have never been there, Helen is a small alpine designed village that caters to the tourist industry.

We had to make a stop at Fred’s Peanuts in Robertstown, just outside of Helen, for some Cajun boiled peanuts and pork rinds. We can remember the first time we ever had Fred’s peanuts. Fred was younger then and the peanuts are just as good as they were 20 years ago. Notice Fred’s decor below.

We also stopped at Stovall’s Covered Bridge in Sautee, outside of Helen. Years ago we caught about a dozen trout right under that bridge. At that time we didn’t have an rv, so we cleaned them in our hotel room in Helen and iced them down for the trip back to Florida.

Also in that area we passed an Indian burial mound and the Old Sautee Store.

We had camped about 18 years ago at Unicoi Springs State Park in our 32 foot travel trailer. When we went through the campground Tuesday we didn’t see many places that our 39 foot fifth wheel could fit into today. Unicoi Springs is also the home of Anna Ruby Falls.

As we were coming back from Helen, we passed the Lake Burton Trout Hatchery where all the trout stocked in local streams are raised and drove through Moccassin Creek State Park and saw many campers.

We also saw devastation from the tornado that came through this region in May in the Lake Burton area. Many workers were tearing down trees and leveling off the land to get the area ready for people to build their homes back up again. If you click on the photo and look closely, you can see the path of that tornado. They certainly have a long way to go but are making remarkable progress.

We never get tired of the mountain views and the pretty landscaping that surrounds many of the areas up in Northern Georgia. We feel very fortunate to own a RV site in Dillard that we can come to in the summertime to enjoy.

After our day trip, Kozmo was wiped out. She was very tired and slept through the night without hardly moving. She enjoys her truck rides very much.

‘Til next time…..

A Little Bit of Everything…for the past 2 weeks

2011-06-17T21:55:00.001-04:00

It has been a long time since I have posted, and since Jeff is spending a lot of time reading from a Kindle and practicing on his new diddley bow (more on those topics later) I figured I would post today so our friends and family know we are just fine. I’ll try and get you caught up on our activities of the last two weeks. So here goes Reporter Barbie :-)

We took Kozmo to the vet on June 3 for the first time since we got her at the end of February. She supposedly had shots, a check-up etc in January. But, I wanted to make sure she was fine and up to date with blood work, etc. The vet, named Dr. Oakes, and his assistant, Joe, are great professionals located at Rabun Animal Hospital in Mountain City, GA. The place is very clean and they treated Kozmo like a queen.

Her blood work came back normal and she is in excellent shape for a girl that will turn 8 years old. Since we don’t know her exact birthday, we decided that July 4 would be her big day. So most likely we will have a birthday party for her……I will make Doggie Peanut Butter cookies and she will have a great day of being outdoors among puppy friends here at River Vista Mountain Village…haha

On June 4, I turned 56 years young and Jeff took us out to La Cabana, a Mexican restaurant in Dillard. It was fantastic! We both had fajitas with Mexican flan for dessert. We were so happy when they opened up another location in Dillard in April. They have a location in Clayton, which is 10 minutes south of us that we’ve visited previously.

On the subject of food, we went to Kountry Vittles in Rabun Gap for breakfast last week and it was very good and inexpensive. We actually had fried bologna with our eggs and it tasted so good!!! Neither of us has had fried bologna in many, many years. We haven’t been eating out like we used to because I just love our kitchen in the fifth wheel. I have been cooking lots of great stuff, such as spaghetti casserole, a ziti casserole, grilled pork loin, chicken ala king, and homemade soups and desserts. I had to cut back on making sweets because we are eating too much. So now I only make sweets once a week. Last night I made a cherry cobbler and put vanilla ice cream over it. Jeff said it was delicious!!! When you retire and you think of what you will eat for the day or even the week, it seems like life just revolves around food. But, we now have time to enjoy the food and the shopping. Ingles is my FAVORITE grocery store and I can spend hours in that place. They also have a Starbucks kiosk in the store which doesn’t hurt either. I can still remember when I had 17 minutes to actually eat my food when I was teaching. We had to walk the students to the cafeteria and usually waited for the last lunch of students to come out before we took them inside to sit down. Then it was our time to eat, use the bathroom and clean up before we were required to pick them up at the cafeteria. I often wondered why the teachers’ union wasn’t called since we never got 30 minutes of duty free lunch time which is called for in the teacher contract.

I started growing some heirloom tomatoes and yellow squash once we got up here. The tomatoes are coming out and the yellow squash is showing up in clusters. We can’t wait to eat them….. and hopefully not get sick. LOL

We finally broke down and bought a Kindle. I think we owe that to Nick Russell, publisher of the Gypsy Journal magazine and a fulltime rver. He writes a daily blog, Nick’s Blog, and just published his first book called The Big Lake. He put it on Amazon.com as an e-book for 99 cents. We bought the Kindle and downloaded his book first. It was a fantastic read! Jeff read it first, then I read it. Now Jeff is reading two other books on it while I have decided to finish up all of my books that I have in the rig before I order anything on the Kindle. By then, we might need another Kindle so each of us has one???? I still love going to used book stores and buying the paperbacks at a very reasonable price. I even go to the Rabun County Library if they have the book I am looking for.

We took Kozmo to “Goats on the Roof”, a local tourist stop/country store in Tiger, on Thursday. This place has goats to feed that actually graze on the buildings roofs. See pictures below. The store has homemade jams and vegetables, beverages, snacks, tee shirts, and local arts and crafts. They have a deli that serves Amish food but we didn’t try it this time. I thought Kozmo would like the goats but she was very nonchalant about it. There was a mama goat and her four very white baby goats in a pen when we walked her to the fenced in area. She sniffed them and just wanted to leave. They just stared at her. It was very cute.

We had a little trouble with our golf cart a week ago. One of the batteries had two cells which would not hold the distilled water when I tried to top them off. When we took it out, four of the sides had expanded and cracked. We took it down to our buddy Eddie in Tallulah Falls at All-American Carts where we purchased it last year and he gave us a battery. Eddie’s a story himself. When we went to look at golf carts last year we met him. Just so happens he attended the same middle school in Brandon that I taught at and retired from last June. Small world huh? Unfortunately that first battery he gave us was a bad one. I had charged it up and we took the golf cart for a ride and it stopped down the hill from us. Jeff pushed it while I steered it for awhile as it died out. Our neighbor, another Jeff, helped us out with pushing it into our site with his cart. Thank heavens he did because I thought Jeff’s back was going to cause him some trouble pushing it uphill himself. Eddie came back out to our site Monday morning at 6:45 and brought a new battery and fixed the control panel for free. He is such a great guy!!! We recommend people go buy a golf cart from him.

During one of Jeff’s “surfing” adventures on the internet he came across a “diddley bow”. The diddley bow, according to Wikipedia, is a string instrument of African origin made popular in America, probably developed from instruments found on the Ghana coast of west Africa. The diddley bow is rarely heard outside the rural south. Other nicknames for this instrument include “jitterbug” or “one-string,” while an ethnomusicologist would formally call it a “monochord zither.” The diddley bow derives from instruments used in West Africa. There, they were often played by children, one beating the string with sticks and the other changing the pitch by moving a slide up and down. The instrument was then developed as a children's toy by slaves in the United States. They were first documented in the rural South by researchers in the 1930s. The diddley bow is typically homemade, consisting usually of a wooden board and a single wire string stretched between two screws, and played by plucking while varying the pitch with a metal or glass slide held in the other hand. A glass bottle is usually used as the bridge, which helps magnify the sound. The diddley bow has traditionally been considered an "entry-level" instrument, normally played by adolescent boys, who then graduate to a "normal" guitar if they show promise on the diddley bow. Jeff’s always wanted to play a musical instrument so he figured if it was to be, it would be with a diddley bow. He must be resorting to his adolescence. He ordered one online that was made by a gentleman from West Virginia. It along with a small amplifier arrived a couple of days ago. I’ll let Jeff keep you updated on his progress and post some pictures of his new “toy.” :-)

Well, I’ve written much about really nothing. I think I was reliving a Seinfeld episode where our lives are really about nothing but we make it seem glamorous and fulfilling for us. Maybe they will make a TV sitcom about us……”Boldt’s Castle Chronicles”.

Remember to live each moment to the fullest!

Alive and Well---very well

2011-05-31T21:04:00.001-04:00

Yes, we ARE alive and well in Dillard, Georgia. I know it has been a while since the last post. I have no real excuses either. Yes, we have been busy …occasionally. Yes, we’ve been out and about….occasionally. Yes, we’ve been enjoying “the good life” ….more than occasionally. Here are some pictures around the campground and our site for starters.

Notice in a couple of the pictures above the new entry steps we’ve built for the 5er. We actually had a friend do the work. He is currently renovating the cabin next door as well. The steps are great. We just need to get some stain on them.

River Vista recently hired a new couple to manage the resort. They’ve been on the job for a little over a couple of weeks. This past weekend they organized many activities for the full house that was here camping for the Memorial Day Weekend. The activities started on Friday morning and went through Sunday evening. We were booked to DJ a Memorial Day Weekend “God Bless the USA” Dance Friday evening. It was held inside the Mountain Center. About 40-50 folks stopped in and the kids never sat down-they danced to anything and everything. We were told their were also folks sitting outside on the wooden rockers. We also were asked to do a brief ceremony Sunday morning where we played a few patriotic songs and I did a brief tribute to those American soldiers that have made the ultimate sacrifice followed by the playing of “TAPS” and “God Bless the USA” It was very well received-it moved the many who came to the flag pole for the ceremony. Below is the agenda of activities and a few more pictures.

If you want to see all the photos that appear on the River Vista Mountain Village Memorial Day Activities Facebook page , CLICK HERE.

‘Til next time………

We’re Here – in Dillard, Georgia

2011-05-13T12:53:00.001-04:00

We arrived here at our site in the Falls View section of River Vista Mountain Village in Dillard Tuesday at about 2:30pm.

Sunday morning at about 10:15am we pulled out of Sanlan RV Park in Lakeland, FL. We stopped at a rest area on I-75 just north of Gainesville and enjoyed a lunch of deli sandwiches , chips and drinks that Barbie had prepared for us. At exit 2 just over the state line in Georgia we stopped to fill the Dodge truck up with diesel at the Flying J. We had no problem getting the 3 cents per gallon discount using our old Flying J rewards card. The only reason I mention this is that others have had to “register” their old cards before they would be recognized for the discount. We paid $3.99 a gallon. We then hopped back on I-75 for 3 miles before exiting at Lake Park to check in to the Eagles Roost RV Resort for the evening. The campground is one we’ve stayed at many times in our travels. With a Good Sam discount we paid $33 for the night. It has long, concrete pull thru, full hookup sites and an adequate wifi network. It has many trees but we were a little disappointed that the sites were a bit unkept with bottle caps, cigarette butts and the like littering the grounds. We took our time Monday morning as we knew we only planned to travel 120 miles north to the Perry area. We left Eagles Roost at 11:00am and drove for 90 minutes before stopping at a great Georgia rest area at mile marker 108. We ate another great deli sandwich and chips lunch at a picnic table in the rest area. I haven’t had salemi and swiss sandwiches in awhile but those I had those two days were outstanding! We pulled in and checked in at Twin Oaks RV Park at 2:00pm. This is a regular stop for us on our way north each trip as it is a Passport America campground so for the full hook-up, 50 amp site with a strong wifi network we paid $16 for the night. They have no cable tv system but our DirecTV worked great and we were able to get the digital network channels from the Atlanta area on the antenna. Tuesday morning we left Twin Oaks at about 9:00am and drove until we topped off the gas tank in Eatonton. We’ve used this Citgo Truck Stop many times for diesel fuel. They are less expensive than most and have a well stocked convenience store. We paid $3.97 a gallon for the diesel. We then pulled over at a cute roadside park in Baldwin on Route 441 for a little lunch. Ah, those deli sandwiches sure were good. Have I said that yet ? We pulled into our site at about 2:15pm in Dillard. We stopped and chatted with neighbors then we had more than enough help getting the 5er onto our site for the first time. Let me just say, it was a lot easier backing the old motorhome on the site. But, hey, this was our first run with the new fifth wheel. It’s gotta be easier next time. It had to be just right on the site since we plan to be here until September or so. It took about an hour to get it in the site, leveled, electric, water and sewer connections made, and the four slideouts extended-with all the neighbors ~~helping~~, er distracting us. Poor Barbie was backing it in, I watch the perimeter and give directions from outside (it works better switching roles we’ve learned), but she also had “helper #1” giving directions in the drivers side window AND “helper #2” giving directions thru the passengers side window. Enough said. :-)) Once we got all set up we relaxed for the remainder of the evening and watched tv. Oh yes, I did call DirecTV and had them switch over our local channels from the Tampa area spot beam to the Atlanta channels. We’ve spent the past two days settling in, getting a few groceries, visiting with the neighbors and enjoying the peace, quiet and weather here in Dillard. All we need to do now is either get the golf cart sufficiently charged or get new batteries for it-we’ll see.

Oh, in case you were wondering, Kozmo was great on the trip and seems to like our deck here quite well. She doesn’t seem to care for the gravel that the 5er sits on though! And, oh yeah, she loves the deli meats and cheeses also!

I’ll take a bunch of pictures for the next post. But, until then check out this great article that appeared in the Knoxville (Tenn) Daily Sun about River Vista and the Dillard area. Click HERE. See why we love it here?

‘Til next time…….

From Rock Crusher to Sanlan RV Park

2011-05-06T23:03:00.001-04:00

We hitched up the “Castle” and left our winter home in Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park in Crystal River, FL, Wednesday shortly after noon. Two and a half hours later we were setting up to spend the night at Sanlan RV Park in Lakeland, FL. The plan was to spend Wednesday night at Sanlan and then take the “Castle” 8.1 miles to Quadra Manufacturing to have the “Bigfoot” Automatic Quad Hydraulic Leveling System installed on the 5er. We had to have the 5er at Quadra at 8:00am Thursday morning and leave it there overnight until noon Friday. After dropping the 5er off we headed to our Valrico stix-n-brix home to spend Thursday night and take care of some housekeeping issues before heading out Friday to pick up the “Castle” and back to Sanlan to spend Friday and Saturday nights. Our first stop on the way home to Valrico was to catch a fast food breakfast. So Egg McMuffins were in order for Barbie, myself and Kozmo, of course. We don’t know if it was Kozmo’s first Egg McMuffin or not but she seemed to thoroughly enjoy it. After getting settled in at Valrico, Barbie went out and bought some groceries, made a trip to Lowes for some Round-Up and some a/c filters while Kozmo and I rested. I received an initially upsetting phone call Thursday pm from Quadra Manufacturing telling me one of their “helper” employees who was assisting with our job up and quit late Thursday pm. Before I got real bent out of shape, Rita, the wife of the owner, explained that her husband, Roy, would have the job done but could he have until 4:00pm, not noon on Friday. Phew, not a problem. We were going back to Sanlan anyway and that is only 20 minutes away. That also gave Barbie some additional time Friday to get her “tasks” around the Valrico home completed.

Friday morn I left Valrico at 7:00am to take my truck to Tampa Spring Company in Lakeland to have my u-bolts re-torqued per the arrangements made when we got the new “leaf” put in each side on the back of my truck at the Ocala shop of Tampa Spring last week. I was the first one there when they opened the doors so they had me re-torqued and back on the road by 8:15. Once I returned we hung out at the Valrico home until 2:30pm when we went and grabbed a bite to eat at Zaxbys before heading to Quadra to pick up the “Castle.” In case you wondered, YES, Kozmo likes Zaxby’s chicken too!

Once we arrived at Quadra, Roy had our Bigfoot Quad System all installed and ready to go. He then showed us what to do when unhitching and then what to do when hitching back up. Then, he made us go through each process, not one time but two times before allowing us to pay the bill and leave. He completed the job himself Friday with no help. He is such an incredibly professional man-we really appreciate his work ethic and his courtesy. If anyone needs or wants any information about the system give Roy Trevino a call at 863 619-8617. He’ll answers all of your questions and take care of you. He is awesome. Now to the system. Wow, such an ease to level the 5er now. No wood blocks, no checking a level for front-to-back and side-to-side level anymore. Once we unhitch from the truck, I simply push the “auto” button on the control box and within 60 seconds we are level. It is REALLY sweet! It will save much time and aggravation on our parts I’m sure.

Setting up once we got back to Sanlan was a snap. Once we unhitched the truck, as Barbie pulled the truck away to move it behind the “Castle” I had pushed “auto” and before she and Kozmo got out of the truck, we were leveled. Barbie’s friend from Mann Middle School, Linda, and her husband Bill brought their new motorhome here for the weekend so we could spend some time together before we head north. I’ll post pictures of Sanlan on the next post.

‘Til next time…….

Mission Accomplished

2011-05-02T11:52:00.001-04:00

It is with deep appreciation that I offer my heartfelt CONGRATULATIONS to all those involved in the planning and execution of the mission that involved the killing of hated terrorist leader, Osama Bin Laden. As one of my favorites, Craig Ferguson, host of the CBS Late, Late Show, says at the beginning of his monologue each night, “It’s a great day for America.” Ten long years and so many dead, we can now close an ugly chapter in our history. I’m proud to be an American!

Click HERE

God Bless the U.S.A.

by Lee Greenwood

If tomorrow all the things were gone
I'd worked for all my life,
And I had to start again
with just my children and my wife,
I'd thank my lucky stars
to be living here today,
'Cause the flag still stands for freedom
and they can't take that away.

I'm proud to be an American
where at least I know I'm free,
And I won't forget the men who died
who gave that right to me,
And I gladly stand up next to you
and defend her still today,
'Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land
God Bless the U.S.A.

From the lakes of Minnesota
to the hills of Tennessee,
Across the plains of Texas
from sea to shining sea.
From Detroit down to Houston
and New York to L.A.,
There's pride in every American heart
and it's time we stand and say:

‘Til next time……

Getting Ready to Leave RCC

2011-04-30T19:56:00.001-04:00

Yep, that is what we are up to-taking care of the little things before we leave Rock Crusher Canyon on Wednesday. We’ve been here at our winter home since November 28th. Starting with today and working backwards, here’s what has been happening with us. After our usual Saturday morning breakfast at Kim’s Cafe in Homosassa, we came back to the “Castle” and began the process of emptying, reorganizing and repacking the basement storage area. We have never really packed it completely since we bought the 5er in late January. Remember, we really have not taken any trips in it other than to take it over to Ocala and back for the warranty work and a couple of add-ons. I’m really surprised that we have more room left than I thought we would. All that remains to be loaded are the lawn chairs, the grill, rugs and those items involved in unhooking from the utilities.

Yesterday, Barbie weeded the planter box in the front of our site. It needed to be done before leaving for the summer. Hopefully it won’t look too bad when we return in November. We were surprised how good it actually looked when we returned this past November. Last evening we dined at Mr. Wang, a Chinese restaurant in Homosassa, one last time. We’ve decided that was our best “new” find this winter. We finally decided to try this place out this year. And, we found it to be excellent and very reasonably priced.

Thursday, we were up and on the road at 7:00am to be at Tampa Spring Company in Ocala for our 8:00am appointment to have a “leaf” added to our springs on both rear sides of our Dodge pick-up. When we took the “Castle” to Suncoast RV a couple of weeks ago, their tech thought that since our hitch weight is a tad heavy at 2235lbs, some extra support may be in order. So I contacted the manager at Tampa Spring described my truck, the “Castle” etc and he explained the options and costs for each, then recommended adding the leaf to the springs. Knowing nothing about the matter, I went with his recommendation. He said we could re-address it when we return to RCC next winter if I wasn’t satisfied with just that being done. I’m good with that since this was the least expensive fix and this is the fix he has used in the past with success on a Dodge 3500. He also suggested we have the u-bolts re-torqued in 500 miles, so we’ll have that done in Lakeland at their sister store next Friday morning.

So, Wednesday morning we’ll head out of here and head south on I-75 then east on I-4 to Lakeland where we’ll spend the night at Sanlan RV Park. Thursday morning we’ll have the “Castle” at Quadra Manufacturing where we’ll have the Bigfoot Auto-Leveling system put on the “Castle.” They’ll keep it until midday Friday so we’ll spend Thursday evening at our stix-n-brix home in Valrico before picking up the 5er Friday about noon. We’ll then go back and spend Friday and Saturday nights at Sanlan before starting the trek north a week from tomorrow. These plans etched in jello then include overnight stops in Lake Park, GA and Perry, GA before arriving at River Vista in Dillard, GA for a good portion of the summer. We are hopeful that the weather that has terrorized the southeast this past week is history with no repeat in sight.

To all of our followers and friends, be safe in your travels!

‘Til next time…….

Warranty Work & Time w/Friends

2011-04-22T12:09:00.001-04:00

Last weekend we spent some time cleaning and rearranging “things” in both the cargo trailer, aka “The Prince”(that we use for storage) and in the 5er as we got ready to take the “Castle” to Suncoast RV in Ocala to handle some warranty issues and a few add ons we wanted. Somewhere around midday on Sunday, our blogger buddy, Carolyn, rolled in and parked in the site next to us. She had left her winter base at Citrus Ridge in Davenport a few days earlier and had spent a couple of free nights at Chassa Oaks, a few miles south of Homosassa, before arriving here at Rock Crusher Canyon.

Chassa Oaks RV Resort Clubhouse

Chassa Oaks is one of the newer ownership parks in Florida. Carolyn had been inquiring about their sales prices etc as she enjoys this area of the state. After RCC, her plan was to leave RCC Thursday and move on to visit her son as she works her way back to Tennessee where she’ll workcamp some during the summer. After she got settled in she suggested we go to “The Freezer” for some steamed shrimp and cold beer. The Freezer is one of the locals favorite haunts in this area for sure. There is an indoor area that is truly the inside of a huge old freezer unit and there is an attached outdoor tiki hut area.

The back Tiki porch of “The Freezer”

The steamed shrimp there is awesome and the beer is always cold. People watching is also fun there. You see all kinds of folks there for sure. Check out their website to see all they have to offer.

Monday morning we hitched up the 5er to our Dodge 3500 pick-up (for the first time) and made the hour drive over to Ocala to Suncoast RV. We started getting ready to leave at 7:30am and after unhooking utilities, closing slideouts, hitching up and all else it takes to prepare to leave, we finally pulled out at 9:00am. Remember, we had Suncoast deliver the Alpine to our site at RCC initially so that was our FIRST time preparing to leave, hitching up etc. Whew, what an ordeal! Anyway, we had a couple of warranty issues we wanted Suncoast to take care of that developed or we discovered during the 10 weeks we’ve had it. These issues included: replacing an ill-fitting basement utility door, a back rinse fill connection leak under the rig, a leaky valve behind the toilet, a squeaky floor under the bathroom and they replaced some grommets under the stove grates. The new add-ons they took care of were: adding slideout awnings over all four slideouts, putting two maxxair vent covers on the roof over the fans in the bathroom and kitchen, installing a ladder mount for our Winegard Carryout antenna and wired it directly into the 5er. We can leave it there on the ladder hopefully 95% of the time but it still can be disconnected easily when we are parked under trees and we can locate it to a clear view of the southern sky to get the signal. It’s the best of situations. They kept the “Castle” overnight Monday and Tuesday, so we picked it up Wednesday after our two night stay in Valrico. They did a great job and we’re pleased with what was done. As we were hitching up to leave we told them about the difficulty we had hitching up Monday so Chris, the service manager, watched and after having difficulties again, he took the “head” off of the PullRite hitch and noticed some metal shavings and worn metal. He said the head must not have been correct so he put a new head on it – no charge-and it works perfectly. They had put the hitch on originally about a month ago for us. When we got back to our site at Rock Crusher the fun began. Of course I was driving but after trying 30 minutes myself with Barbie directing, we switched roles and I guided her in as she was behind the wheel. It was a bit frustrating as our paved driveway is only about 12 feet wide coming off the road, so turning the 39ft Castle with the big Dodge into the driveway while dodging the recently trimmed tree limbs laying on the edge of the road where we needed to turn made things difficult. But, once we got backed in on the site, we leveled and hooked up in a relatively short time.

While in Valrico, we took a drive to Lakeland to visit Quadra Manufacturing, who manufacture the “Bigfoot” Leveling Systems. There are two locations, the home location in White Pigeon, Michigan and Lakeland, Florida. I had been researching leveling systems for 5ers. I don’t like having to use wood to level side-to-side. The manager was awesome. He gave us a tour of their facility and wouldn’t you know it, they had just finished putting the automatic system on a new Montana, so he demonstrated it for us on the spot. Bottomline, on May 5 & 6 we’ll have the Quad Fully Automatic System put on the Castle. It will make leveling a breeze AND no wood! So our departure date for heading north will be delayed a week but well worth it!

Finally, late yesterday afternoon old friends, Bob and Betsy Lindsay, pulled in across the street from us to spend a week at RCC. We met Bob and Betsy probably ten years ago when we were both members of the Roamin’ Rigs, an FMCA Tampa Bay, FL area chapter. They headed west somewhere around 2004 and we hadn’t seen them since. Our only contact was through rv forums or Facebook. It was great to see them and we look forward to spending more time with them this coming week.

Before I forget, everyone have a Happy Easter!

‘Til next time….

TCB

2011-04-15T23:07:00.001-04:00

The past week has been filled with us “Taking Care of Business.” We’ve done some work in the 5er, around our site and taken care of some odds and ends before we take the 5er to Suncoast RV in Ocala on Monday to have some additions put on it and have a couple of warranty issues taken care of before we head north. For the new additions, we are going to have slideout toppers put over all four slideouts, maxxair vent covers put over two fan areas on the roof, and add a ladder mount where we can place our new Winegard Carryout minidome. Barbie has been busy getting her driver’s license renewed and putting that slip-stop stuff in all the remaining cabinets in the 5er. She has measured and cut alot of that stuff for sure. Nothing will slide around in those cabinets. We also managed to give the remaining 19 landscape timbers we had that have been sitting on our site since we finished our projects this time last year. We gave nine to one of the workcampers here at the park and the remaining ten to one of the maintenance workers here in the park. Speaking of the maintenance guys, we asked them to trim some of the trees around our site and they took care of it the same day. They are in tree trimming mode now as they go in and trim trees as the folks leave for the season and head out. And I must say RCC has cleared out significantly since April began. Now most of the new rvers coming in are the weekenders for 3 days or so. It is a little deceiving as it appears to be more rvers here than actually are and that is because RCC is now allowing the seasonal folks to leave their rvs stored on the same site they occupied for $50 a month until they return next fall. Most of the northerners and Canadians pay $40 or more per month at their home areas we’ve been told so leaving them here for $50 a month made sense as they would save gas money as well as wear and tear on their rvs traveling.

Most of our Florida rving “blogger buddies” have left Florida now-only a few of us remain. It certainly is interesting reading about everyones travels. We really enjoy reading about the places visited and the things done. To all of you , we wish you safe travels and fun times as you continue the lifestyle we all so love. We look forward to each of your “next” blog postings.

’Til next time……

Procrastination, Taxes, Satellite TV

2011-04-08T23:28:00.001-04:00

pro·cras·ti·na·tion

the act of procrastinating; putting off or delaying or defering an action to a later time .

Well, that is exactly what I HAD done with regard to 1) completing and filing our 2010 tax return AND 2) deciding and purchasing the satellite system I wanted to get for the new 5er. I’m pleased to say both situations have been completed/resolved the past few days.

First, let’s talk taxes. Yes, I had been putting off doing the taxes for weeks…months. I guess I knew that 2010 being the year both of us officially retired and with the incomes decreased plus less deductions than past years, we’d take a beating and have to pay more taxes and not get a refund. Barbie had gathered all the documentation and forms and had them ready for me for weeks but…… So after going to Valrico for my make-up dental cleaning appointment Wednesday, I told her Thursday was tax day. So yesterday I loaded up the Turbo Tax once again on the laptop and dug in. Barbie had everything we needed so the PAIN was over in 2 hours and 15 minutes. The dull pain still lingers on a little because yes, we did have to pay more. But, bottomline, we e-filed, sent the return and the payment and it was received and accepted in less than 24 hours. Guess the Feds needed our money bad…but not enough to settle the budget woes. :-)~ I’m trying not to be too distraught! I’m not talking taxes any longer.

Moving on to satellite tv. We had a Winegard Roadtrip Minimax stationary antenna on the motorhome and we have used the DirecTV receiver from our bedroom at the stix-n-brix home for the past 2 years. The system worked wonderfully. You see, prior to getting the Minimax, we had to hand crank the dish up, then manually set the dish to find the satellite. That was tough AND frustrating at times. When we got the Minimax, we just added power and the rascal found the satellite within 3 minutes every time. On the new 5er I knew I wanted the automatic search again but I didn’t want to permanently mount any antenna to the roof. If you can’t get a clear line of site, you’re out of luck with a permanent roof mount. I’ve really been in no real hurry, can you say procrastination, since we have a great 60+ channel free cable system here at RCC and we have used it all winter. We did need to get the new system in place by the end of April when we head north though. So after tossing all the options around, we finally decided to get a Winegard Carryout Automatic Portable antenna.

Carryout with tripod ground mount

Carryout on a ladder mount

It is essentially the same unit as the Minimax we had. It automatically finds the satellite(s) by itself, but it is not mounted permanently on the roof. It can be set on the ground, on a picnic table, there is a ground mount and a latter mount. The portability is a great feature when you get parked around trees. Just move it so you have a view of the southern sky and you are in business. We do plan to add a ladder mount but since the unit weighs only 13.5 pounds, it is easy to move. And, the automatic satellite finder is awesome. So Wednesday, on our way back from Valrico, we stopped at the Camping World at Lazydays in Seffner, and got the Carryout. We also bought a new DVR receiver so we can tape and watch shows as well. Well, this evening after taking Kozmo to Hardees for her bacon and a burger dinner, oh yes her Mommy and Daddy grabbed a bite as well, I decided to test out the new temporary set-up. It took no time at all to set the Carryout on our firepit, connect the power cord and cable and VIOLA…we had DirecTV. Seriously, the only thing that took time was that for this test, I hooked up the old SD receiver we had used previously instead of the new SD dvr receiver. Well, since we hadn’t used the receiver since November, I had to call DirecTV to “reauthorize” it. Once I got off of hold after 10 minutes, it took all of 3 minutes to be receiving the signal. It’s a beautiful thing. So when we take the 5er to Suncoast RV in a little over a week we’ll have them add a ladder mount and we’re good-to-go.

So my friends, ‘til next time……..

WILD Weather

2011-03-31T15:12:00.001-04:00

Today is one of those days that rvers dread! The line of storms that rolled in off of the Gulf of Mexico may end up being worse than many of the tropical storms that have blown thru Florida through the years. I’ve been glued to the tv since 5:30am when the thunder and lightning woke me up. Well, that and Kozmo who was shaking like a leaf in between Barbie and I. Poor thing, she really doesn’t handle thunder, lightning and hard rain very well at all. I kept flip-flopping between a couple of channels and got really good coverage. At our location here in Rock Crusher Canyon, which is about a mile to the east of US Route 19, half way between Homosassa and Crystal River, we have had a ton of rain and a little wind. The wind/tornadoes is what had me concerned obviously. From our site we are not aware of any trees down or damages to rvs, but now that the rain has halted and radar seems to show all is past us, we are gonna go out for a ride around the park and the area for a look/see.

A supposed tornado traveled over Valrico where our stix-n-brix house is so we’ll call the neighbors later and see if all is well down that way. The storms have been flat wicked and we hope our blogger buddies are ok around the area: Margie and Roger and Carolyn in Davenport, Myrddin (Jim & Linda) in Orange Park, Duane and Debbie in Ocala, Donna and Ralph in Largo, Rich and Donna in Wauchula, Jim and Dee also in Wauchula, and Donna and Stu, on road to either Clermont or Bushnell. From what I’ve seen on tv all of those areas have had or will have this bad stuff pass their locations. I recently saw a picture on tv of a what looked like 30 foot or so travel trailer blown on it’s side in the Largo area. The power cord, water hose and sewer hose were still connected as it sat on it’s side-so sad. Hope no one was hurt.

That’s the latest from here. No pictures today-nothing pretty about this day------yet.

‘Til next time……

Time’s Flyin’

2011-03-26T11:36:00.001-04:00

For some reason time seems to be flying by lately. We’ve done nothing special the past few days just the regular retired type days- run some errands, go to WalMart, get some groceries, do some small tasks around the 5er, go out for breakfast or “lupper”, walk and/or ride around RCC on the golf cart and chat, read, and watch tv. Life is GOOD from our vantage point. We do need to schedule a visit to Suncoast RV in Ocala to take care of a couple of small warranty issues and have our slideout toppers installed before the end of April when we head north from Florida.

After a trip to the Homosassa Hardee’s (Kozmo’s new favorite drive thru to visit) Thursday evening, we did drive over to Camp-N-Water Resort, a campground in Homosassa Springs, to visit with our Roamin’ Rigs friends who we holding a rally there this weekend. The Roamin’ Rigs is the FMCA chapter we were members of since 1997 until we bought the new fiver 2 months ago. We got to visit with good friends and they got to meet Kozmo until the no-see-ums about ate us up. I’m telling ya, those no-see-ums are brutal there. Back to Hardee’s and why it is a new favorite with Kozmo. When we went there a couple of weeks ago with her for the first time the clerk spotted Kozmo and asked if she could have some bacon. Well, that did it, plus they are Barbie and my favorite fast food burger place around this area. We’ve been back a couple of more times and I’m telling ya she gets excited once we leave the speaker and place the order as we drive up to the window. Another Boldt that likes to eat! :-)

Tonight should be interesting. I am DJing the last dance of the “Snowbird Season” here at Rock Crusher Canyon. A good many of the seasonal folks have already headed out the past couple of weeks but we’ve had folks checking in, maybe heading north from south Florida or weekenders on spring break. So I don’t know what to expect. I put up a couple of flyers, included my email address and gave folks the opportunity to make early requests to be sure I included them in my playlist. I did have a couple of takers. We’ll also do a 50/50 drawing-so that may draw a few more. We’ll see who will cha cha slide, Cupid Shuffle or chicken dance.

‘Til next time……

Put On a Truxedo

2011-03-19T21:52:00.001-04:00

Yes, I spelled it correctly with the “r” in the word! You gotta be kidding if you thought I put on a tuxedo-I’m retired now! Friday we had a TruXedo installed on the truck.The “truxedo” is a high quality vinyl tonneau roll-up cover for the bed of our Dodge Ram 3500 pick-up truck.

It is held into place with velcro which runs the length of both sides of the bed. It has a self-adjusting system that keeps the vinyl taut across the bed of the truck. A latch, which is hidden and cannot be accessed if we lock the tailgate, secures it in place. When we are parked, we will have the cover secured in place over the fifth wheel hitch and whatever else we have in the truck bed. When we are ready to tow, we simply roll the cover back and fasten the straps to keep it secured behind the cab of the truck. That gives us complete access to the hitch and the bed of the truck. We purchased it at Topper King, in Brandon , Florida when we were in that area this week taking care of doctors appointments for both Barbie and I. It is serving a great purpose already keeping the pollen that is falling off of oak trees out of the truck bed.

We spent 4 days in Valrico this past week as I said. Barbie had her appointment with the retina specialist which performed the laser surgery on her torn retina in June of 2009. It was just the regular 12 month check-up as she has not had any problems with it-knock on wood. Her other appointment was her annual well woman’s check-up. She is good to go! I had my 6 month check-up with my primary care doctor who reviewed my recent blood tests with me. All my readings were right on as well except my vitamin D level, which was a tad low. The doctor asked me if I take a daily multi-vitamin, which I do, so he said we’ll just look at it next time in September. I think my cholesterol keeps surprising him-how good it is considering my weight etc. So, I’m good to go for another 6 months and we’ll check it out again. He also likes to keep an eye on my sugar level because my dad developed diabetes late in his life. I also had a dental cleaning scheduled but the day before I was due to go in, the office called and said the hygienist was ill and we’d have to reschedule. Problem was they said was the next available date was in May. I told them that was a problem as we’d be gone by then. They called me back shortly thereafter and told me of a cancellation on April 6th, so I took it.

Well, that’s about it for now, ‘til next time…..

Hitch Is On & An Extraordinary Dog Park

2011-03-13T21:35:00.001-04:00

Finally, six weeks after we had the new Alpine delivered to our lot in RCC in Crystal River, we have a hitch in our new truck(which we’ve had for 3 and 1/2 weeks). Yesterday, after internet and physically searching for a hitch we wanted for a reasonable price for weeks, we ended up getting our PullRite Super 5th hitch installed at Suncoast RV in Ocala. That was the exact same spot we bought the Alpine. Go figure huh ??? I really thought I could find a hitch I could live with for a lesser price elsewhere, but I couldn’t. We had to have the Dodge Ram there at 8:30am and were told it would be done in the afternoon. Earlier last week we traveled to Valrico to pick up Barbie’s Terrain so she could follow with Kozmo and we could wander around Ocala and not have to sit at Suncoast all day. We also needed to pick up the tow bar and hardware that connected the Terrain to our motorhome in Valrico, as we sold it to an rver here in RCC. After dropping the truck off at Suncoast, we set out to further desensitize Kozmo’s lack of fondness in riding in vehicles and her socialization process in society. The plan was to have her ride in the back seat of the Terrain in her doggie bed, take her with us for the day including taking her to breakfast (she loves Egg McMuffins :-)), visiting two flea markets, taking her in to explore a PetSmart store and visit a dog park in Ocala that Barbie read about online. Well, let me tell ya, the girl had a great day! Check her out in the back seat.

As I said, she enjoyed breakfast immensely. She had a sniffeningly good time walking through PetSmart and taking in the other dogs. She did manage to get some treats , toys and a new collar there. The disappointment of the day was that both flea markets had signs posted saying “NO Dogs Permitted.” Must be a thing in Marion County because in Citrus County you see the pets in flea markets all the time. Oh well…..

Finally, a definite hit was the Millenium Dog Park in Ocala. Check out the website.

Ocala's first Dog Park provides a place for dog owners to let their pets run free safely and legally without a leash. The park is on 4 and 1/2 acres and is located on the corner of South East 24th Street and South East 32nd Avenue 1/2 block off of Maricamp road (464). “No matter the size or breed, your special companion will relish the canine running area, walking path, grassy play area and water stations. There is a separate park for Large Dogs and one for Small Dogs. Small Dogs may be taken into the Large Park but no Large Dogs are allowed in the Small Dog Park. The park is fun for humans too ! Enjoy the fresh air and camaraderie with fellow dog lovers in a lovely park setting.”

The Ground Breaking Ceremony took place on September 6th, 2001.Finally on November 7th, 2003 the Millennium Dog Park Ribbon Cutting Ceremony took place. Millennium Dog Park is a non-profit Park and receives NO financial assistance, the park is run completely by donations.

The summer hours are 8am-7pm and winter hours are 8am-6pm. But, you’ve gotta check out these rules for the park.

PARK RULES

NO UNNEUTURED MALES OR FEMALES IN HEAT
NO PUPPIES UNDER 6 MONTHS
NO CHOKE OR PRONG COLLARS,
BUCKLE, SNAP COLLARS OR HARNESSES ONLY
NO CHILDREN UNDER 12 YEARS
NO SMOKING OR EATING IN PARK
NO DOG TREATS,ETC.
NO AGGRESSIVE DOGS ALLOWED IN THE PARK
(Leash and remove your dog from the park at the first sign of aggression)
ALL DOGS MUST HAVE CURRENT RABIES TAG
DOG FECES MUST BE CLEANED UP BY OWNER
YOU MUST REMAIN IN THE PARK WITH YOUR DOG
IMMEDIATELY FILL IN HOLES DUG BY YOUR DOG
KEEP YOUR DOGS LEASH WITH YOU AND KEEP AN EYE ON YOUR DOG AT ALL TIMES
DOGS MUST BE LEASHED WHEN ENTERING AND LEAVING THE PARK
THERE IS A 3 DOG LIMIT PER HOUSEHOLD

Did they forget anything? Me thinks not! They even have a Memorial Wall where you may purchase a brick for $45 to remember your lost loved one.

Kozmo definitely enjoyed herself, plus it tired her out as well. She relaxed on the way home Barbie reported AND she spent a quiet evening after returning home. See what I mean? Check out those tried eyes.

We finally picked up the truck at about 1:40pm. We’re ready to tow finally, after having the Alpine since January 28th. We will need to take the Alpine over to Suncoast to have some slide toppers installed over the 4 slides and take care of a couple of warranty issues before we head north in 6 weeks or so.

‘Til next time…..

Lazy Weekend…Busy Week

2011-03-08T20:56:00.001-05:00

Last weekend was definitely an “R & R” weekend. Rest and relaxation was the norm. Saturday we did go eat Chinese at a favorite restaurant of ours in the area, Mr. Wang, in Homosassa. It was also a milestone for us and our new furkid, Kozmo. It was her first time being totally alone in the 5er since we adopted her a week earlier. Barbie was the one claiming “separation anxiety.” All the short trips we have made around town Kozmo has ridden with us. She was an angel. I figure she must have spent the time up on the bed in the bedroom sleeping since when I opened the door she was hopping down the steps towards the door. She seemed as happy to see us as we were to see her. She continues to love her and her mommies long walks thru RCC and she has made many fur-friends and really enjoys going to the dog walk in the park.

Sunday, the only significant memories were reading the Sunday paper and watching the races on tv, first the NASCAR race from Las Vegas and secondly the Amazing Race. We did firm up my final DJ gig for the snowbird season at Rock Crusher Canyon. We’ll hold an “End of the Season” Dance on Saturday, March 26, from 7-10:00pm. Anyone planning to camp or be in the area on that day, stop on in and I’ll play your favorite tune(s). Bring your favorite beverage of choice and any snacks you may desire and come join us. I also made an appointment to have a Pullrite Super 5th hitch put on the truck this Saturday morning at Suncoast RV in Ocala. Speaking of upcoming appointments, both Barbie and I have appointments down in the Valrico/Brandon/Tampa area next week. We’ll no doubt spend 3-4 days down there to take care of Barbie’s eye appointment, her well womans check-up and my dental cleaning and my six month visit to my primary care physician. That should do it for our appointments before we start heading north somewhere around the end of April.

Yesterday, we met Duane and Debbie Rowe, who drove in from Ocala, and Charley and Sherry Dilworth, who are camped here in RCC for another week before leaving for Alabama, for lunch. We went to a local spot, Dan’s Clam Stand for food and tall tales. If I remember correctly, we sampled, fried shrimp, haddock, flounder, clam strips, crab cake sandwich and my favorite, their New England style clam chowder. Of course, side items of fries, cole slaw, and hush puppies were included with the meals. As we left Dan’s, the Rowes followed us back to RCC for a look-see.

The Rowes actually camped in Homosassa Springs earlier in the season but didn’t know about RCC then. They may spend some time here next winter. We got to show the group our new Alpine 5er and chat here for awhile before going to Charley and Sherry’s Montana for a walk-thru and more conversation. Charley brought their four legged travel buddy, Cheyenne, a one and a half year old dachshund. She and Kozmo were a trip to watch. I think I mentioned in an earlier post that Kozmo likes to “hide” biscuit treats or chew toys, I guess so Barbie nor I take them ‘til she wants them :-). Well, when Cheyenne came to visit Barbie gave Cheyenne a chew toy but she also found some of Kozmo’s buried “loot” and helped herself. Then Kozmo proceeded to steal Cheyenne’s chew stick when she was hunting for buried treasure. When we went to Charley and Sherry’s rig, the pups were given little biscuits. Kozmo took hers outside and proceeded to “hide” it under some leaves. Well, after the two played awhile, Cheyenne played detective again and found the biscuit. Isn’t it amazing how entertaining pets can be. We sure are enjoying our new addition.

Well, that’s about it for now.

‘Til next time…..

Life With Kozmo

2011-03-03T13:08:00.001-05:00

Well, if you read the previous post you know we adopted/rescued, whatever you choose to call it, a seven + year old female terrier mix on Saturday that we named Kozmo.

She is amazing! She dearly loves attention and is so docile. We’ve heard her growl faintly at the neighbors slamming a door the other day and I heard her whimper softly when Barbie when outside without her yesterday. She has eaten her dog food well, enjoys “pupperoni” snacks, loves Hardee’s burgers and milk. We drove thru Hardees the other day and the lady at the window spotted her and asked if she might like a piece of bacon. Not knowing, we said “sure”, and she loved it and the little burger we gave her also. Yeah, I know …..spoiled. She sleeps all through the night on the bed. It’s a good thing the new 5er has a king size bed in it! She has a favorite blanket already and likes the pillow Barbie bought her Saturday. Let me tell you what she is not fond of at this point. She really is not interested in either toys or those rawhide chews. Another thing she really is uneasy with but gets better about every day is riding in the truck. She wouldn’t sit or lay down the first day or so and she shakes at times, but she is getting more used to it and better daily. We took the 2 hour drive down to Valrico and back Tuesday and about half way thru each trip she finally laid down and rested. We take her pillow and put it on the island area between the two front seats for her.

Let me tell you what she really is enjoying—long walks thru RCC. Barbie takes her out every 4-5 hours. Some walks are longer than others but she loves to go. Could it be because when she gets back, of course she has taken care of business, she gets a “treat.” She now waits for that by the cabinet Barbie has put them in. She doesn’t bark at other dogs(no matter their size), or try to hide, it’s almost like she ignores them after sniffing at them briefly. She has been around many people in the park and doesn’t bark, growl or anything with them either. Barbie has discovered the dog walk here in the park as well. It is a fenced area where you can let the pets roam. It is under the trees and really quite peaceful. Barbie says she loves “spotting” squirrels but doesn’t chase them or bark at them. I’m tellin’ ya we hit the jackpot with this little girl. Each day she manages to crack us up when she takes a treat or pupperoni and “hides” it. Now mind you, we see her all the time. But, she drops it on the bed, in the sofa or on her pillow and then takes her nose and tries to move the covers or pillow and hide it. It is so funny to watch. Last night she must have decided it was time for a snack as she went over and “recovered” a treat from behind her pillow on the sofa. As a matter of fact, Barbie found one hidden in the sheets the other day when she went to do the laundry. And, in case you are wondering, YES, she is recognizing her name and responds to it when we call her.

Below, you can check out the proud Mommy and Daddy.

‘Til next time………

We’ve Adopted !!!

2011-02-26T23:23:00.001-05:00

Do you remember our blog from last Saturday entitled “More Busy Days?” In the last paragraph, I spoke of us going to Inverness to the Pet Supermarket for our weekly “puppy fix” and having an eight year old female terrier mix, Scooter, nearly stealing our hearts. But, we resisted the temptation. Well, today after having our somewhat traditional Saturday breakfast at Kim’s Cafe, this time with Charley and Sherry, we headed over once again for our puppy fix at Pet Supermarket. As unbelievable as it seemed, we walked in and their was Scooter once again. Well my friends, the rest is history. Barbie filled out the application for the Humane Society of Central Florida Pet Rescue of Beverly Hills Organization and we were approved on the spot. So now, it is my extreme pleasure to present to you the newest Boldt’s RV Castle occupant, Kozmo “Scooter” Boldt.

Now you can see why there was NO WAY we were leaving there without her today. She is about 12 pounds and about seven + years old. We’re making July 4th as her birthday. And how perfect, she is housebroken! Her owner was admitted to hospice and she was actually adopted previously but the gentleman found out he was allergic to her hair so he returned her. She has been with a foster family for the last couple of weeks. Barbie actually called the foster mom and they spoke about her for about 20 minutes. It was meant to be I suppose that our paths crossed. She is adorable. She is so calm and lovable. I took her out to the truck as Barbie did some “shopping” for her before we left. We got her back here to RCC and spent awhile outside to let her get used to her surroundings. She loves to take walks we learned. While on the patio, Barbie gave her a little dog treat and she took it, walked off the patio, took her paw and dug a little hole, dropped the treat and then took her nose and covered it with leaves. We were amused I’m telling ya. Once we went inside, she sat next to Barbie on the sofa most of the evening while we did computer stuff and watched tv. She did eat her dinner and had 2 bites of a cookie Barbie had. Can you say spoiled? Whenever either of us gets up to go anywhere in the “Castle”, she’s right behind like a shadow. “Shadow” would be an appropriate name but we said if and when we adopted, we were going to name the puppy, “Kozmo.” We’ll see how long it is ‘til she recognizes that new name. So with that, it’s time to go to bed. Hopefully, she’ll have a good night.

‘Til next time……….

Days Flying By….

2011-02-25T16:58:00.001-05:00

It must be because we are on a run of some gorgeous weather here on the Nature Coast of Florida, but the days are flying by it seems. It’s not because we’ve been that busy but we are flat enjoying everyday life to the fullest. A little tv in the evenings, some computer time in the mornings (and at intervals during the evening when tv bores us), a trip to the store for groceries or some odds and ends, a little time reading, a trip thru the rv park that ends up in conversations with others or a round or two of golf (that would be on the computer) seems to just about fill most days.

We did accomplish two necessary tasks this week. We picked up the new recliner from Badcock on Monday. I’m tellin’ ya it is comfortable. It looks good in the “Castle” and I’ve got “my” slide set up just right. Check it out.

As you can see, I have the chair, my laptop w/stand, printer, end table and reading light in “my” slide--oh yes, AND the tv remote. Plus, in “my” slide I have windows on 3 sides that have delivered great breezes during the magnificent weather. The beautiful thing is with the 5er I can recline in the chair and not interfere with Barbie walking around or anything like it did in the motorhome. We really are enjoying the extra floor space. It’s a great home!

The second task accomplished was we both went to the Lab Corp here in Crystal River this morning. We both had our yearly doctor check –ups down in Valrico a couple of weeks ago and our doctors wanted both of us to have some bloodwork done-no issues just part of a yearly schedule. After the Lab Corp trip (we only waited 45 minutes and we didn’t have an appointment), we ate lunch at Mama Sallys. Having had nothing to eat since last evening’s dinner, we were both quite hungry.

We did make another “lupper” trip to Marguerita Grill, with our neighbors Russ and Jim from Michigan. Russ and Jim have come to RCC for the past few years and always have the site next to ours. I enjoyed another of the medium margaritas but check out this patron. They call that one a “fishbowl.” When I’ve seen them in the past there have been a least 2 straws sipping on it.

And you think that is large, this one is unbelievable – NO, this is NOT from Marguerita Grill! Can you say… GIANT Margarita!

I’d have to say the ONLY disappointment we encountered this week was we were part of maybe 50 rvers from the park that had positioned ourselves to watch the space shuttle launch yesterday afternoon. Well, we “heard” the liftoff on Sirius Radio’s CNN channel but because of cloud cover, we didn’t see the first vapor trail or anything. Oh well, we’ve got two more opportunities I suppose.

Well, another Saturday morning is upon us tomorrow so that means our traditional run to Kim’s Cafe for breakfast. The plan is for Charley and Sherry to join us. We’ve enjoyed each chance we’ve had to eat and chat with them. I believe there are also plans in the works for Duane and Debbie to travel to the Nature Coast area in the near future and the four of us will join them as we did in Leesburg last week for another great rvers “feed and gab” session.

‘Til next time…..I think it’s happy (margarita) hour…..

More Busy Days

2011-02-20T14:51:00.001-05:00

Let’s see, where to start?

Wednesday, we rode with Charley and Sherry over to Leesburg to meet Duane and Debbie for lunch at the Olive Garden. This was our third lunch with rv blogger buddies and we’ve thoroughly enjoyed the concept. Anyone else wanting to meet-let us know. We love to eat and we love to talk the rv lifestyle. We all enjoyed our food selections and especially enjoyed the conversation and fellowship.

Can you tell the food was good?

Read the other couples blogs for their take on the day for more info. It was a most enjoyable day for certain.

Sherry & Charley

Debbie & Duane

We occupied the table for three hours. If we each had shared one more rv tale, we could have ordered dinner. The a little over an hour’s drive over and back to Leesburg was filled with more getting to know Charley and Sherry and vice versa.

Thursday, we had a 1:00pm appointment at Jerry Ohm Dodge in Tampa to finalize the acquisition of our new truck. We had researched and test drove the Ford, Chevy and Dodge one ton diesel trucks. Quite honestly, any of the three would have done a great job for us I’m certain, but for the $$$ we felt that the Dodge 3500 Big Horn SLT Crew Cab 4X2 (say that 5 times fast) with the 6.7L I6 Cummins Turbo Diesel Engine with the 6-speed automatic 68RFE transmission would be the best deal.

We are extremely pleased with the truck. We previously owned a first generation Dodge 2500 Cummins Diesel back in the early 90’s and pulled a 32 foot travel trailer. That truck was terrific and we only parted with it because we moved to a motorhome.

We rode the Suncoast Parkway from just south of Homosassa all the way to the Tampa Airport exit which is a mile from the Jerry Ohm dealership. Once there, since we had cleaned out the Silverado we traded and they had the Dodge ready to go, it only took a short time before we were headed back north for Crystal River. Instead of just hopping on the Suncoast again, I decided to ride over into Clearwater and catch US 19 and travel north. It wasn’t nearly as easy or as quick a drive as the parkway because of the many lights and stop and go traffic. We stopped for dinner at the Pit Boss, a barbeque restaurant in Spring Hill. We both had chopped pork dinners and it was really quite good.

We weren’t home long when we got a phone call from another couple in the park asking if we still had the recliners for sale. When we bought the Alpine “Castle”, we had decided to sell the matching rocker recliners and purchase a new wall hugger recliner. I do not care for the rocker type recliners. So we decided to put an ad in the clubhouse to see if we could sell them. Bottomline, Greg and Mary bought our recliners so we went chair shopping Friday. We visited 4 furniture stores in the Citrus County area and were surprised that we may have to wait 4-6 weeks to get a new chair we wanted. Fortunately, Badcock had a perfect wall-hugger and their warehouse is in Lakeland so we can pick our new chair up Monday afternoon here at the Crystal River store. It’s a good thing, I’m sitting here watching the Daytona 500 in an outdoor lawn chair. Speaking of the Daytona 500, there was just a huge wreck that ruined the day for 10-15 drivers, including my favorite. Oh well, it’s just the first race of the year.

Saturday morning started with a breakfast in the clubhouse made by our park chefs, Bruce, Carol and Florie. Once again a great meal of scrambled eggs, home fries, hash browns, bacon, sausage gravy and biscuits, grits, fruit salad, oj and coffee was served. We sat with Charley and Sherry and made plans to go out for dinner at a local eatery, Cozy Country Kitchen later that evening. Saturday wouldn’t have been complete without a stop at Pet Supermarket in Inverness for another “puppy fix”. We enjoy visiting the adoptable dogs that a couple of groups bring each Saturday in hopes of finding them a loving home. This week “Scooter” nearly stole our hearts. She was an 8 year old terrier mix that was very calm and subdued. Could have been because her owner went into hospice care and her 15 year old sister was separated from her. We spent some quality time with her, Barbie even held her, but we resisted the urge and headed back home. One of these days???????

‘Til next time……

Catching Up

2011-02-15T20:53:00.001-05:00

I’m telling ya that when you “seem” to be busy, time “seems” to pass by quickly between blog entries. I just glanced at my last blog entry which was last Thursday and today is Tuesday. So its time to get caught up.

Friday was a “lost day”---all Barbie and I can remember was that she went to Publix to pick up some groceries. That means it was a computer-reading-television type day.

Saturday started early as we went to breakfast at our favorite breakfast spot, Kim’s Cafe, in Homosassa. Nowhere else can I get two eggs over medium, crispy bacon, home fries and wheat toast for $3.00. The coffee is another $1.25 and they’ll keep bringing it as long as you drink it. The service is fast too. We love the place as it is a gathering spot for the locals. We see the same folks there every Saturday morning it seems. We enjoy the food and the conversation but the bonus is the group of amateur musicians that gather and play just outside of the restaurant each Saturday morning for a couple of hours.

Sometimes they’ll be just a couple of guitars , a banjo and a bass fiddle. But, we’ve seen the group blossom to 10-12 on occasion. They do it because they enjoy playing they say. They play predominantly bluegrass style music. It is quite a happening.

About 3:00pm we headed for Cedar Key which is about 60 minutes north of Crystal River. For you followers of our blog, you may remember we made the same trip just before the new year began. We, once again, had lunch at Tony’s World Champion Chowder Spot and then went to Black Dog Bar & Tables, a beer, wine and cigar bar right on the water. It was the One Year Anniversary Party at BDB&T. The party began at 5pm and we headed back home at 7:30pm. The party went on until after midnight I understand. The food was great, the beer was cold, the music was awesome, the conversation was stimulating and Otis ( the black labradoodle, as in Black Dog Bar & Tables) weaved around the establishment continuously. We enjoy that place –wish it was closer to us in Crystal River.

Sunday we drove down to Valrico (just east of Tampa) to our stix-n-brix home to spend the evening as Barbie had her doctor’s appointment Monday morn. We also wanted to do some truck shopping on Valentine’s Day as well. Gotta get the new truck to pull the new 5er you know! Barbie had a successful doctor’s visit, she did some laundry at the house Sunday night and we visited 3 dealerships and test drove 3, one ton, single rear wheel pick-up trucks. We didn’t get back here to Rock Crusher Canyon until 6:30pm. It certainly was a busy Monday.

On Monday, blogger friends, Charley and Sherry, and Cheyenne, their furkid travel buddy, checked in to Rock Crusher for a month, so we wanted to visit them this morning and welcome them to the neighborhood. We spent some time chatting with them and finalizing our plans to have lunch with them and meeting fellow bloggers, Debbie and Duane.

The six of us planned to meet for lunch tomorrow, Wednesday, in Leesburg, midpoint between Crystal River and Orange City where Duane and Debbie are set up. So, we plan to leave at 10:00am, with Charley driving. It surely will be a nice trip with great weather and fellowship.

After welcoming Charley and Sherry to the neighborhood and getting our “puppy fix” we went and met more “bloggin’ buddies”, Carolyn and Margie, for lunch. Carolyn and Margie drove over from Davenport where they are set up to visit the Nature Coast today. We met them at Marguerita Grill in Homosassa, where we enjoyed seafood lunches and margaritas. Did I mention the margaritas? :-)~ Margie enjoyed a small one, I had a medium, Barbie had a draft beer and Carolyn sampled both a small and medium margarita – at the same time.

We had good conversation, good food, and really good drinks on the patio looking out onto the Halls River. A good time was had by all!

After lunch we came back to our site in RCC and chatted for awhile before Margie and Carolyn took off for Davenport. It was a great day in paradise I’m tellin’ ya!

Well, so much for “catching up”

‘Til next time…..

Ramblin’

2011-02-10T13:34:00.001-05:00

Since the last post there have been no earth shattering events yet I’ll share a few of the past days highlights. Last Sunday, we had a visit from friends Bill and Linda who drove up from Auburndale to spend a few hours with us before the Super Bowl. Linda and Barbie are best buddies after meeting as teachers at Mann Middle School in Brandon years ago.

Linda is still educating those youngsters while Barbie enjoys retirement. Bill and Linda are seriously looking at rvs as they are ready to trade their Class B. They seem to have settled on a Class A. They showed us plans of a new Thor Hurricane they are considering. Linda described our new Alpine 5er as more like an apartment than an rv. After we chatted for awhile we took them to Marguerita Grill, one of our favorite eateries in Homosassa.

Marguerita Grill sits right on the Halls River which flows into the Homosassa River a couple hundred yards from the restaurant. The Marguerita Grill's atmosphere is fun and lively. The restaurant is decorated with a variety of patriotic pictures and decorations. Its waterfront location allows for boat docking and a porch with waterfront seating. On Friday and Saturday nights at 9 P.M. there is September 11^th memorial film, followed by the waving of American flags and singing of a patriotic song. This salute can be quite moving and emotional. While patrons don't have to agree with the owners political views, they will be asked to leave if they speak negatively about the United States. In fact, anything French is banned from the restaurant, French fries are dubbed American fries. The menu is mostly seafood but they have great burgers, gyros and steaks as well.

The house margaritas are something. Their small size is what we traditionally see but their regular size (see above) is quite a site. I’d say the lady at the next table was enjoying it! They also have a “fish bowl” version that would have to be shared by several folks. Linda, Bill, Barbie and I had a great meal and afterwards drove them by “The Shed” and “The Freezer.” We’ll make those stops on a later visit.

Monday it was cool outside, so we got some cores done around the Alpine. We hung the toilet paper holder we purchased to match the bathroom hardware and also installed a couple of hooks. For lupper (lunch/supper) Barbie prepared homemade chili, with cheese, onions and sour cream toppings, and garlic bread. Ummm great meal!

We’ve watched some tv in the evenings this week, like our favorites: Bones, NCIS, Human Target, Mike & Molly, Hawaii Five-O and Big Bang Theory. I also must confess getting hooked on an online golf game. It is free, very realistic graphics and you can play by yourself or others online in a variety of formats on some of the world’s most famous courses.

Tuesday we went out to eat at Chilis here in Crystal River and used some of the gift cards we still have that were given to me when I retired.

Wednesday Barbie cooked a beef stew in the crock pot all day then made some cornbread. Yummy, I’m here to tell ya.

I also installed a new vacuum breaker on the toilet in the rig. It had a pesky little leak and when we mentioned it to the dealership they said to bring it on in or since we have not yet bought our new truck, they gave me they part to install.

Well, I guess that about gets us caught up. Think I’ll go online and see if I can get into a golf match and play the famous St. Andrews course in Scotland. Aren’t computers amazing!

‘Til next time…….

FMCA Rally & Puppy Fix

2011-02-05T16:12:00.001-05:00

The past couple of days we’ve spent getting settled in the new Alpine 5er. All of the boxes we (Barbie predominantly) had packed in the motorhome and transferred to the 5er, are emptied, contents put in their places and the boxes disposed of. We’ve got a few more items out in our storage “utility trailer” to bring in but for the most part we are settled in. We went to Walmart to pick up a couple of items for the 5er. Interestingly, the bathroom in the new 5er had no toilet paper holder hung anywhere. So we picked that up along with a couple of hand towel holders. Again, there were NO towel holders anywhere. Of course, we noticed that up front and it actually allowed us to buy the style we wanted and mount them where we wanted them. Barbie also got some new king size sheets at Belks yesterday for the new bed. Over the course of the last few days we’ve also had the chance to test out the heat pump to take the chill off the other morning when in dipped into the upper 40’s. Then yesterday afternoon it was in the upper 70’s and muggy so we turned on the A/C briefly. Yeah, I know, eat your heart out our northern friends and those in Texas that have had the cold, ice and snow! As I write this, it is a cool, damp 60 degrees outside here at RCC so the windows are open and it is comfortable inside.

Thursday we drove down to Brooksville to spend a few hours down at the FMCA’s Southeast Area Rally being held at the Hernando County Airport until Sunday. As I said in the previous post, we have been regulars at the rally for the past 6 years and have worked the rally as volunteers in the past. We paid the $7 per person fee for the day pass. We primarily wanted to visit the vendors tent and check in with some friends that still volunteer during the rally. We didn’t need to walk through the coach display obviously, having just made our “jump” to the new Alpine 5er. We also passed on attending any of the seminars and it’s probably was a good thing because we surely would have gone thru the same hassle that Karen and Al went through. For an organization concerned about declining memberships they certainly need to change some policies I’d say. I do know that the philosophy changed for an upcoming rally as they have announced that the FMCA will welcome not only motorhome owners but also owners of other types of self-contained RVs when the group meets in Perry, Georgia, in March 2011 for FMCA's 85th Family Reunion & Motorhome Showcase, which will be held at the Georgia National Fairgrounds and Agricenter in Perry, Ga., from March 14 to 17, 2011. We made it through the vendors tent without dropping too many $$$. We did buy an RV Power Protection device like we had in our motorhome that will protect the rv from power surges, improper grounded systems and low power. It will not allow the problems into your rv where it could cause major damages. In the 6 years we had it in the motorhome it saved us on several occasions and more than paid for itself. We also picked up a couple of small canvas fabric “pouches” that can be velcroed to any type of surface. We also stopped at their booth and chatted briefly with folks from River Vista Mountain Village in Dillard, GA, where we own an rv site. It was good seeing Richard, Jim & Mary, and Steve & Judy. They seemed pleased they weren’t up there dealing with the snow, ice and cold temps. We also saw Roamin’ Rigs chapter members, Sandie, Pat, Jim, Wilma, and Ted, as well as former members Gary and Arlene. We then drove down the two runways where the vast majority of motorhomes are parked. It is always interesting to us to look at the rigs and some of the folks set-ups. These two folks cause you to do a double take as there are NO hook-ups at all on the runways. Maybe they just want to believe….?

I also marvel at some of the custom paint jobs… Click on them for a larger view.

We still managed to get out before the annual “parade” was to begin. My favorite part of these large rallies was to walk or ride around with my camera and check out the people-there are all kinds of folks for sure.

Ah, we have had fun at rallies. If you’ve never attended one you need to for sure.

Good friends, Pat and Sandie, who are working the rally drove up to RCC yesterday to see our new Alpine. They stayed and chatted for a couple of hours. We may not see them until spring as they will go work the Perry rally and then they work for a couple of months at Dollywood. They own an rv site in Franklin, NC, just about 20 miles north of us in Dillard. So we will see them up “north” in the spring at Dollywood, or Franklin, or Dillard.

Finally, as some of you know, we had dogs for many years but after our corgi, Korkey, died in 1996 we have resisted getting any more pets. With both of us working we didn’t think we could put the time in to train a new pet etc. Well, since we are both retired, we always take note of dogs pictures in the papers and announcements of animal adoptions everywhere we go and visit shelters, humane societies and the like. Barbie calls it “getting a puppy fix.’ Well, we got another puppy fix this morning at the Pet Supermarket store in Inverness. Each Saturday for a few hours an adoption organization brings some dogs there to be adopted. A few weeks ago “Matti” stole Barbie’s heart and today it was “Scooter’s” turn. Don’t know how many more “fixes” there will be before we rescue one of the dogs. Oh well, that’s what we’ve been up to.

‘Til next time……

RVers Luncheon in Lakeland

2011-02-01T20:46:00.001-05:00

Monday was one of those special days we are lucky to enjoy as rvers gathering together, sharing stories and good food. You see a group of nearly 30 rvers, some full-timers, some wannabee full-timers, some part-timers, many bloggers, and ALL rv enthusiasts gathered for a planned lunch. We came from Wauchula, Zephryhills, Crystal River, Davenport, Clermont, Sebring, Largo, Inverness and a couple of other central Florida locales. I again want to recognize and thank the planner of this event- Donna (AKA Froggi) McNicol. Many of us in attendance were familiar with one another’s blogs but had not met in person. This blog entry is missing pictures to capture the event only because the camera we DID remember to bring had NOT been charged. Yeah, I know –pretty lame huh? Soooo.. with that being said I’ve waited for most of those in attendance to make their posts, with pictures, so I can provide the links to see the various pictures taken by the persons with cameras (with charged batteries) by clicking their names: Froggi Donna, Margie W, Dee W, Donna H, and Sherry D. The Smokey Bones in Lakeland was a central location and certainly provided a menu where we all found something tasty to our liking. The conversation was non-stop, only stopping to insert food in our mouths. The two and a half hour gathering hardly seemed like enough time to chat with everyone – which we couldn’t. All the more reason to do it again-and we Boldts hope that will happen.

The 100 minute drive from Crystal River to Lakeland and back, and the lunch was a great “break” in our unpacking of boxes as we move in to our new Alpine 5er. Barbie had done a super job labeling the boxes as we packed up the Kountry Star motorhome so when we transferred them to the Alpine we knew what room to put them in. But, deciding which cabinets, drawers etc to put the items in took some careful deliberations. As of today we have most, not all, things in a place. We have a few items out in the “Prince”, our 12 foot utility trailer, we use for storage, to bring in the 5er. The new “Castle” is coming together. We’ll take another break tomorrow or Thursday to travel to Brooksville to the FMCA Southeast Area Rally as day guests to check out the vendors and see if we can run into a few of our motorhoming friends. It will be strange as we have attended, as registered rally-goers for the past 6 or so years, and enjoyed all the seminars, entertainment, coach displays and vendors with friends. We have even worked the rally in past years as the rally photographer and daily newsletter writer, making many new friends along the way.

‘Til next time……..

We Did It !

2011-01-30T23:03:00.001-05:00

It has been a busy last week since I last posted I know, but we HAVE been, and still are for that matter, really been quite busy. YES, we did it! We traded in our 2001 Kountry Star diesel pusher Class A motorhome and bought a 2010 Keystone Alpine fifth wheel. YES, Boldts RV Castle has changed its look. We had been giving this a lot of thought since we both retired going back to last summer. We finally decided that was the direction we wanted to go. A fifth wheel offers RVers a number of lifestyle alternatives. From touring, to long-term stays and spot-camping, fifth wheels, AKA 5ers, offer a great deal of versatility. In addition, because they are available in such a wide variety of sizes, fifth wheels are great for the weekend camper, or full time RVers looking for all of the comforts of home. The later of course is the stage of life we are at now. More on the new 5er and our thinking later.

We had visited the RV Supershow in Tampa a couple of weeks ago looking, and we visited a small show in Bushnell a few days later. Then we both spent hours on the computer researching companies, models, floorplans, owners forums and the like. We have learned so much about fifth wheels, the various floorplans , amenities, options etc. The major manufacturers of 5ers all seem to have online forums where owners and those interested discuss every and all issues pertaining to 5ers. I spent many hours reading those forums. They seem to bring out both extremes from owners –those that are happy with their purchases and those that are not. Technical questions are shared regularly and a wealth of knowledge is shared. I have been familiar with the various rvers forums that are online as I read them regularly but only from the motorhome owners perspective---‘til recently.

We finally narrowed our search and research down to a couple of companies and specific models. We looked at them both online and in person and after much thought and discussion settled on the Keystone Alpine 3500RE model. We found the model and ultimately deal we were seeking at Suncoast RV in Ocala, FL. There was the traditional, how should I say it, “negotiating” , that took place both in person and on the telephone over the course of a few days to lock the deal down. Long story short, we took delivery this past Friday morning, January 28, of the new Alpine “home”. Part of the deal was that they had to “deliver” it to our site here in Rock Crusher Canyon. And the reason for this was my Chevrolet 1500 (half ton) pick up truck that I’ve had for a couple of years is not nearly stout enough to tow this 40 foot “castle”. So now we’ll need to begin researching to find the appropriate new truck to tow the new “Castle” to our future stops in the weeks, months and years ahead. And now, introducing to you below, the new, and improved, “Boldts RV Castle”.

As you can see, there are 4 slide out rooms that really open the living space up. That is one reason, but probably THE major plus, for the move to the 5er. The “RE” in the 3500RE model stands for rear entertainment. If you look at the floor plan above the entire rear end is an entertainment area, complete with a 40 inch flat screen tv that “rises” from the cabinetry. This area also holds the radio tuner and dvd player in the cabinets that surround the tv area.

The kitchen area is Barbie’s favorite of all the models we looked at.

The bedroom has a king size bed, dresser at the foot of the bed and a cedar closet across the back, er front of the unit as you can see.

There is so much more to talk about and show in upcoming posts.

With all the excitement of the new “castle” comes with some mixed feelings. We won’t see nearly as much of our motorhome friends we’ve made over the years attending “Roamin’ Rigs” monthly rallies. We joined the FMCA club shortly after purchasing our first motorhome in 1997. FMCA is a club for motorhome owners only, so our membership is now void. We made so many friends through the Roamin’ Rigs-and lost some along the way. We so looked forward to the monthly rallies and the Southeast Area rallies and other rallies we attended. Even though the motorhome is history the friends we made during that time are friends forever and we hope to see them regularly down the road.

‘Til next time…..

Manatee Festival in Crystal River

2011-01-23T20:53:00.001-05:00

A busy week culminated with us attending the 24th Annual Manatee Festival here in chilly Crystal River yesterday. The festival was located in the heart of downtown Crystal River. This location is right off of US Hwy 19, about an hour and a half north of Tampa and two hours west of Orlando.The Florida Manatee Festival was a two-day event, held yesterday and today, was hosted by the Citrus County Chamber of Commerce, the City of Crystal River, and the Rotary Club of Crystal River. The festival included fine arts displays, craft displays, food, music, children’s activities and of course, manatee education. To enter the festival grounds cost $3 per person. The Fine Art show hosted exhibitors from around the United States, featuring items from watercolor artwork to breathtaking photography as well as sculptures, stained glass and unique one of a kind handmade jewelry. These are just a few samples of the variety provided by the Fine Artists. Cash prizes and ribbons were awarded to outstanding artists. Craft displays sponsored and hosted by the Rotary Club of Crystal River, included over 150 craft vendors displaying a tremendous variety of woodwork, jewelry, clothing, collectibles, country craft, crochet, children's toys, knitted work and much more!

Over 25 food booths included seafood vendors offering a variety of delectable seafood plates, kettle corn, cotton candy, elephant ears, hamburgers, hot dogs, sandwiches, tasty bakery treats and much much more kept festival attendees from going home hungry! A Beer and Wine Garden was there for we patrons 21 and over! Live entertainment was featured at the Garden throughout the day, both days, as well as large screen televisions for the sports lovers. There was alot of fun activities in the special children's area! Sack races, games, crafts and lots more were available for the kids. There was also a rock climbing wall, pony rides, bounce house, face painting and much more! I overheard a senior citizen say “I wonder if they thought about having an area for we old folks to play horseshoes, bocci ball, holey board or bean bag baseball.” He must have been an rver huh? Posters of the endangered manatee made by local students were on display throughout the festival grounds. Continuous movies were on display to provide Manatee Education information to all visitors as well as Manatee Education booths designated to enhance the awareness on the endangered manatees.

Boat tours were available and gave festival visitors the perfect opportunity to view manatees in their natural environment. A boat ride on the beautiful waters of Kings Bay, the place hundreds of manatees call home during the winter months was available at an additional cost. With parking at a premium a shuttle service from the Crystal River Mall dropped folks off right at the entrance to the festival for $1. It was a great way to spend a bright chilly day. If you enjoy arts and crafts shows and you are in the area next winter at this time, come check it out.

The other noteworthy activity we were involved with this week was a trip to Ocala to visit two rv dealers to look specifically at fifth wheels. We are seriously considering making the move from our diesel pusher motorhome to a more “homelike” fifth. Between the Tampa Supershow and our trip to Ocala we are fond of the following manufacturers and their products: Keystone Alpine, Heartland Bighorn, Forest River Cardinal and Jayco Eagle. If you have one of the above or have opinions, please make a comment at the end of this post. We would appreciate all input. We have been doing a lot of research and looking online. Since we plan on fulltiming or at least 95%-timing as Barbie says, we would like more living space and Barbie wants more kitchen space. Below are some pictures of some of the things we like in the Keystone Alpine.

Rear entertainment area

Large kitchen

Large shower

Lots of bedroom closet space

Well, it’s time to get back to the Steelers vs. Jets game.

‘Til next time…………………….

RV Shows & Football Games

2011-01-17T15:37:00.001-05:00

Yes, both of the key words in the title of this blog entry are plural. Since my last post we have been to two RV shows, the Tampa Supershow and a small winter show in Bushnell. And, of course, like many Americans we watched all four football playoff games over the weekend. So it has been a busy last few days…at least that is my best excuse for the 5 day break since my last enrty. So let’s get caught up……

Last Wednesday afternoon we left our “Castle” here in Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park (RCC) for our stix-n-brix home in Valrico which is just 10 miles from the Florida State Fairgrounds outside of Tampa and home of the Florida RV Supershow. The 100 minute drive was uneventful except for the number of rvers headed south on I-75 like us. A quick stop at Zaxbys was in order in Valrico since there was no food in the house. We really enjoy the “zalads” and chicken at Zaxbys Restaurants and unfortunately we do not have one in the Homosassa, Inverness or Crystal River areas …yet. We retired early so we could get up early Thursday morn and head to the RV Supershow.

Our plan was to get up early, stop at Dunkin’ Donuts for some coffee (their coffee is a favorite of ours) and a bagel and get to the fairgrounds shortly after opening at 9:00am. The beauty of retirement is timelines are extremely flexible—there is no hurrying and NO set schedules to follow. Good thing, because we arrived at the Supershow a little after 10:00. Our plan was to visit the vendors areas first before the crowds arrived and it became bumper-to-bumper up and down the aisles. When that happens I feel obligated to keep moving instead of stopping and “window shopping” or asking about products and services. On our first pass through the Expo Hall vendor area we stopped and chatted with Steve and Judy in the River Vista Mountain Village booth. River Vista in Dillard, Georgia, is where we own our 2nd rv site and was our “home” from last June until just before Thanksgiving. Steve showed me some photos of the eight inches or so of snow that had just fallen there last week. Again, the beauty of rving…can’t imagine sitting there and adding 8 inches of snow to this picture.

Now, we’ve been there and seen some flurries, like below in December of 2004, but not 8+ inches!

After chatting with Steve and Judy and getting caught up on River Vista happenings since we left, we went through the remainder of the hall and only purchased a book, 2011 The RVer’s Friend, the North American Diesel/Parking Directory. It lists all rv accessible diesel fuel and service locations including places with overnight parking available and dump sites. For $10 I couldn’t pass on it.

We no more moved outside to head to the other vendor building and we ran into fellow Roamin’ Rigs (FMCA Tampa Bay area chapter) members Jim and Wilma, who we hadn’t seen since last spring. They were working with an outside vendor. Needless to say that was a lengthy conversation but most enjoyable. We then moved towards the other vendor building which really contained many displays for rv campgrounds and resorts. Before we entered the building we met Tom and Sharon, our current President of the Roamin’ Rigs and his wife. Once we entered the building, we saw Keith from ELITE Resorts (the former owners of Rock Crusher) whom we met last year when he worked at RCC. It wasn’t soon after that we met friends Bruce, Carol and Florie from RCC who made the day trip down to the Supershow. They are our park “chefs” responsible for doing the cooking for all dinners, soup and salad nights and dessert evenings at Rock Crusher. And what a fabulous job they do. After moving thru that vendor building we met up with great friends Pat and Sandie, also Roamin’ Rigs members and neighbors in both the Valrico/Brandon area of Florida and the Dillard, GA/Franklin NC areas. Their Brandon home is about 6 miles from us in Valrico and their Franklin rv site is about 20 miles from our Dillard site. We also all were employees of the Hillsborough County (FL) School System during our careers. Wouldn’t you know as we were sitting chatting, another of our Roamin’ Rigs members, Doug, walks up. I’m telling ya it’s a small world.

We were to have met up with a group of fellow rv bloggers at the Floating Restaurant area in the Supershow around noon but we never made it unfortunately. After our visit with Pat, Sandie and Doug I looked at my watch and it was already 1:30pm. Time flies when you’re having fun huh? Well, we’ll certainly keep in touch with our blogger co-horts and meet them in person down the road somewhere.

By this time my back and legs were getting pretty tired as I continue to build up my strength and endurance following my summer back issues. Barbie went in several fifth wheels to check them out as we have been toying with moving in that direction as we spend more and more time on the road and tend to stay in places for more than just a few days at a time. Barbie found more than one 5’er she could call home. By the time she was through looking at rigs we decided it was time to head out. Well, wouldn’t you know we met up with more Roamin’ Rigs members. We chatted with friends Steve and Linda, also both fellow educators, and now fulltimers for the past few years. I actually taught math at the same school with Linda, and later I taught and coached football with Steve at the high school level. It was great talking with them in person and not just thru emails. As the four of us were chatting, Paula and Barry, also Roamin’ Rigs members walked up and we got caught up on their world travels over the past year or so. What a great full day it was at the Supershow. And, we made it thru without spending the “BIG” bucks!

Friday morn we traveled back north to Crystal River and spent the rest of the day relaxing except for a trip out for a pizza for dinner.

Saturday we went out to breakfast early then drove the 40 miles over to Bushnell where there was a small winter rv show across from Blueberry Hill RV Resort. We explored about a half a dozen fifth wheels before enjoying a leisurely drive back to RCC around Lake Panasoffkee and thru Inverness. I don’t know what was happening southbound on I-75 from Bushnell but traffic was not moving and it was backed up for miles. I’m glad we headed northbound. We made it back to the “Castle” just in time for the first of the two football games. Our “winter neighbors” here at RCC, Jim and Russ, from Michigan, arrived Saturday and after setting up their 5’er came over and visited for awhile. Sunday was much of the same, i.e. football games on tv, except we did break during the games to drive the golf cart down to the clubhouse for strawberry shortcake. As I said earlier, Bruce, Carol and Florie do a great job. They gave us a choice of cake or biscuit for the base and then ice cream, whipped cream or BOTH to go on the strawberries. It was great I’m tellin’ ya! After a little chatting with others it was back to the football. Being a longtime Steeler fan I am quite pleased they are still in it after a scare from the Ravens.

So I think that has me caught up. I apologize for the length of this post. That’s what I get for waiting 5 days. Thanks for hanging in there with me and following our blog.

‘Til next time……

On Our Way to the RV Supershow

2011-01-12T11:50:00.001-05:00

This afternoon we will leave Rock Crusher and the “Castle” to head down to our Stix-n-Bricks home in Valrico. We’ll stay there tonight so we can attend the Tampa RV Supershow tomorrow. The tickets are good for two days so if we don’t see all we want tomorrow, we can go back Friday morning before returning to Rock Crusher. We have been to the Tampa RV Supershow each year since 1985-that would be 25 times. We’ve exercised good restraint for the most part. This will be our 26th show, and although tempted every year by some rv, we only succumbed to buy twice-thank goodness! We purchased a 32 foot Mallard Sport travel trailer (our 2nd travel trailer) at the ‘90 show and then we bought our first motorhome, a 34 foot Thor Infinity in 1997 at the show.

The beauty about the Tampa Show is the size and variety of the rvs available to view…and purchase. It is definitely the most comprehensive show around. I honestly believe if it is made, it is on display at Tampa. Even though we’ve made it 23 other times without dropping the “big bucks”, there has always been some item(s) we couldn’t do without from the vendors booths.

There certainly will be many rv bloggers and their followers at the show as well. Tomorrow, there is to be an “unofficial” gathering of those who want to meet and chat at the “Floating Restaurant” just outside the main Expo Hall at noon. We look forward to putting the faces with the names of some of those bloggers we’ve followed on their adventures.

We’ll report back on our Supershow escapade over the weekend.

So……’til next time………..

It’s a WINNER !

2011-01-07T21:48:00.001-05:00

For those of you who have followed our blog at least from November, may remember reading my “Thanksgiving Eve 2010” blog entry and viewing the 16 pictures I posted from driving through the “Fantasy in Lights” holiday display at Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, Georgia. We stayed at Pine Mountain RV Resort during our 3-day stay in the area. The resort ran a photography contest and awarded two winners from photo entries submitted taken at the Fantasy in Lights display. Well, I was notified by telephone yesterday that I WAS one of the winners! It was announced on their Facebook site HERE today. Below was my “winner.”

I was pleased with most of the pictures I took that evening because 1) they were taken with a relatively new camera, Canon PowerShot SX30 IS, I had purchased just a month earlier, 2) it was drizzling most of the evening so some shots were taken thru the windshield, and 3) they were all taken from the front passenger’s seat of he car as Barbie drove through the display. What did I win you ask?

Here’s what the other winner, Ruth Copeland, and I will receive:

Two night stay at Pine Mountain, an RVC Outdoor Destination on a concrete RV site or in a Yurt (heating, wood floors, beds…really neat!)
Free winter pack including a firewood bundle, bag of ice, Wii rental, and coffee/hot chocolate in the morning for the whole family

So we’ll be headed back up to that area again in the not so distant future. We’re thinking about driving up in the car and staying in one of the Yurts. That would be a new experience for us.

That’s our excitement for the day….well, except for the fact that Barbie finally found (after a telephone and computer search) and purchased her “Wonder File” today. We had to drive up to Dunnellon to get it and it only cost $14.99. It’s been a great day for the Boldts---hope your day was great also.

‘Til next time…..

Trip to Cedar Key

2011-01-05T23:11:00.001-05:00

Since we’ve returned to Crystal River last month we have wanted to take a drive up to Cedar Key for a look/see. The last time we visited there was a few years ago. Since then the pier has been rebuilt and a few new eateries and watering holes have opened. Then when Howard and Linda, from RV-Dreams, a blog we follow daily of their rving adventures, wrote of their stay in the Cedar Key area recently, that did it. We planned to go today. There were two establishments we knew were must stops this trip: 1) Tony’s Seafood Restaurant and 2) Black Dog Bar & Tables. We were thrown a curve today as the weather forecast was calling for a cloudy day with a strong chance for showers. Nevertheless, we had planned for today so we went. The weather went south about the time we arrived in Cedar Key. It started drizzling then, about 2:00pm, and didn’t stop until about 6:30 and we were pulling back into Crystal River.

On the way in to Cedar Key, we first drove through a new campground, Cedar Key RV Resort. This resort is new since our last trip to Cedar Key and is six miles from Cedar Key. It not only rents sites for any time frame but also sells sites. The website is worth a visit. There are great photos of the resort as well as the Cedar Key area on their website. Since the rain was starting to come down we did not stop in the clubhouse or office for info. We’ll do that on our next trip to the area.

Our first stop was Tony’s Seafood Restaurant. We had discovered some time ago that Tony’s serves a “World Champion” clam chowder. Not just once, but a 2 time champion in 2009 and 2010. Both Barbie and I love New England style clam chowder so we knew this had to be a stop. Tony’s history is worth reading. Click on “Tony’s” for how the restaurant came to be and all about the chowder---except the recipe. Oh, YES, the clam chowder is truly outstanding. We even brought a quart “to go” with us. You can order it and have it shipped to you. It’s all on the website. Barbie had chowder and a tossed salad. I had chowder and some onion petals. Everything was terrific. We’ll go back for a full meal next trip.

After our “lupper”, late lunch-early supper, at Tony’s, we drove over a couple of streets to Dock Street, to Black Dog Bar & Tables. This place is one-of-a-kind. It is a wine, beer and cigar bar. They do not serve food (except for the peanuts in the shells served with the beers) but you can get that upstairs, next door, across the street or at one of the many eating establishments within 100 yards on Dock Street. Next month, BD&T will celebrate it’s first anniversary of opening. There is an enormous wine and beer list. And I’m not talking about all Anheuser-Busch and Miller Brewing Company beers. The place is right on the water and the outside deck would be a great place to have a cold one and smoke a fine cigar. There is a big screen tv, dart board, chess set-up and comfortable chairs besides the bar itself. Jay and Connie the owners made us feel like regulars, not first timers. They are most hospitable and a pleasure to talk with. We honestly were a bit disappointed when we first went in, no, not with the beer selections or anything like that. You see, Otis, as in “Black Dog”, had not come to work with Connie and Jay this afternoon.

Since we had inquired about Otis in our conversation with Connie, much to our delight, she asked a “regular”, who came in later, if he would go to their home and get Otis. So, after all, we did get to meet the adorable labradoodle who obviously runs this place. As other regulars began trickling in we ended up having a great conversation with with a gentleman who lived, went to school and worked in the Brandon area where we lived. He even knew or had for teachers some of our former colleagues. Small world, I’m telling ya. It was truly a great afternoon at Black Dog & Tables. We WILL be going back. Oh yeah, in case you are interested Barbie sampled “Well’s Banana Bread Beer”, and “Sea Dog Blue Paw Wild Blueberry Wheat Ale.” Huh, you say??? I’m telling ya they both smelled exactly as their titles. And, Barbie said they tasted that way as well. I, on the other hand, had an “Orange Blossom Pilsner” and a “Raging Bitch Belgian-Style India Pale Ale.” The Raging Bitch “jumps out of the glass and nips at your taste buds with its delicate hop bitterness. At 8.3% ABV, that would be alcohol by volume, this bitch is dangerously drinkable.” I wasn’t wild about the Raging Bitch. Orange Blossom Pilsner (OBP) claims right on the bottle that it is "Florida's Honey Beer," and you shouldn't let the fact that it is brewed in South Carolina turn you off to the idea that it is a product of Florida. From a review, “OBP, by its very name, is a pilsner, and the central taste is clean, light, and crisp. The smell is pleasant, and the appearance is a lovely straw color. I've found some pilsners to be a little watery or skunky, but neither of those issues bothered me here. What sets OBP apart from other pilsners, however, is the fact that it is brewed with 2.3 tsp of honey in every serving. Keep in mind, the beer is not sweet by any means, as all the sugar ferments into alcohol, and the fermented honey instead gives the beer a nice, dry finish.” That review said it all. I really did enjoy the OBP.

I guess you can tell, we really enjoyed BD&T. And so my friends……

“Til next time……

New Year – New Look

2011-01-01T23:45:00.001-05:00

We rang in 2011 last eve so I figured with the new year should come a new look with the blog. So I added a recent picture I took at Ho Hum RV Park in Carrabelle Beach last month. It’s interesting, a few moments ago as I was reading through my ever-lengthening list of rvers blogs I follow, I realized I wasn’t the only one with the idea. Some bloggers made some drastic changes to their templates and “look.” I’m not really comfortable with “big” changes in any part of my life, so I limited the change of our site to just adding a background photo to the blog title area as you can see. Oh yes, I did change the color of the font in that title area as well. I can change that picture regularly to give it a seasonal or regional look depending upon the time of the year or our location.

However you rang in the new year last eve, I hope you were with family and/or friends that shared an excitement and hope for what the new year has to offer. I don’t know if the rvers here at Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park 1) went out on the town to celebrate, 2) hunkered down in their own rvs for the evening, or what because our crowd at the clubhouse consisted of only about 30 people. It definitely was not a loud, rowdy, chicken dancin’ group like we’ve partied with at Lazydays in past years.

NO, we had no New Year’s Baby, nor did we have any table dancers at RCC last eve-thank goodness.

And RCC didn’t have the Roamin’ Rigs clowning or stacking empty drink cups either.

Ahhh memories of years past.

Getting back to last evening, we took a ride around the campground after shutting down the music and saw no one out and around and nearly all lights out. I believe the RCC rvers are either saving themselves for 2011 or they too have used up their New Year’s Eve craziness in past years. But, that is part of the beauty of RCC. The rvers are friendly and the campground is quiet and peaceful in our state park like atmosphere.

So here’s a toast to a GREAT 2011. ‘Til next time…….

Happy New Year

2010-12-31T10:39:00.001-05:00

Barbie and I want to wish ALL of our friends and family a Happy New Year. May the new year 2011 bring each of you good health, happiness and success. Be safe in your travels and keep a smile on your faces.

We’ll be ringing in the New Year DJing the dance here at Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park. We’re ready to “get down” with all of our friends, both old and new, here in the park. I’ll report back with pictures in the next day or so.

‘Til next time……..and next year…………..

Since Christmas Day

2010-12-28T22:17:00.001-05:00

Christmas Day was a laid back kind of day. We spent the day lounging around the motorhome, errr correction, I spent the day lounging around the motorhome but Barbie decided to go through the cabinets of the motorhome to reorganize and cull some items that we don’t use, therefore don’t need. The only excursion out was to the Rock Crusher Canyon community Christmas dinner at 2:00pm in the clubhouse. The park supplied the ham, scalloped potatoes and a “California blend” of steamed vegetables and tea and coffee. The blend consisted of broccoli, cauliflower and squash. Then every couple/guest was to bring a dish to share. There was a signup list that had been posted for about 10 days with different options to bring. This allowed for a variety and a sufficient number of dishes in each food group. There was a good crowd of about 75 folks in attendance. The food was plentiful and quite tasty. Wouldn’t you know we forgot to bring a camera, so I have no pictures of the event.

Sunday, the 26th, which would have been my father’s 89th birthday had he not passed away in 2003, was Christmas Day continued. Barbie finished her “holiday cleaning frenzy” and I watched football on the computer. Yes, on the computer, as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were blacked out on tv so I watched it on a live internet feed again. I did this regularly when we were out of state at the beginning of the season.

The cold weather the past couple of days has left my back and my left knee aching a bit. It’s hell getting old and having to deal with old injuries. Of course, give me the option of a little discomfort as compared to the other option….give me some soreness and stiffness any day. It was down to 23 degrees in Crystal River last night. Once again we simply left a trickle of water running in the kitchen sink and we had no problem with hoses freezing or lines cracking. We use that philosophy when the lows are projected to be between 20-32 degrees. Below 20 degrees, we’ll disconnect the hose, put it away and use the internal water supply. We’ll be tricklin’ again tonight.

Monday I set up my DJ equipment in the motorhome with Barbie’s help, to give it a test run before New Years Eve. I bought some new speakers in May that are a bit smaller in size than my original set but I hadn’t hooked them up to listen to them yet. I figured I’d test them out and if there was a problem with them I could take them back to the stix-n-bricks home in Valrico today and bring back the big ones I’ve used previously. The new speakers sound really good but I’m glad we did the test run as I recently downloaded a newer version of my VirtualDJ software which I use and it wouldn’t work initially. It wouldn’t recognize my music on I Tunes. That would present a major problem for Friday night, I’d say. To solve the problem I simply had to reconfigure the setup and all was well after a couple of tweaks. “JB the DJ” is ready for New Years Eve. All I really want to do is review the “must play” list and the other potentials and put them in a “folder” in the software. That way I don’t have to search through my 2500 song library to find what I need. I only would need to search the entire list if a request is not in my “short” list for the event.

Today we made the run down to Valrico and back. We took some items “culled” from the motorhome back to the house. Barbie did grab a couple more sweaters/sweatshirts to bring back for the cold weather. She also took the coffeemaker from the motorhome and switched it out with the one from Valrico. She likes it better. On the trip down we took the Suncoast Parkway down to State Road 54 then over to I-75 and down to Brandon. We normally run SR 98 to I-75 and then south to Brandon. There was hardly any traffic on the Parkway so the $3 for tolls was worth it. Coming back we road US 301 north through Zephyrhills to Dade City then went SR 52 to I-4. Instead of getting off at SR 50/98, we rode up to Bushnell to see how crowded it was at Blueberry Hill RV Resort, oh excuse me, Nascar Resort at Blueberry Hill as it is now known. There are plenty of sites open there as well---snowbirds caught in the blizzard up the I-95 corridor??? We then drove through Paradise Oaks Golf and RV Resort, also in Bushnell on CR 475 just north of SR 48. This is a fairly new park I believe and is quite impressive on our drive thru. We’ll definitely have to camp there someday. From there we meandered up SR 41 through Floral City and Inverness on the way back to Rock Crusher. We got back to the coach at 5:15pm, so it has been a full travel day. With all that said, I’ll leave you with pictures from the past.

Monkey Island, Homosassa, FL

‘Til next time……………………