Merry Christmas

Tonight Benno and I will be celebrating Christmas Eve as it is “Heiliger Abend” called in Germany and a tradition we grew up with. A festive or special dinner will be cooked on Christmas day and for that occasion I purchased a small Turkey breast. However, the Furrion oven in our travel trailer is not very spacious. I don’t know what the designer had been thinking what people will be cooking in it with a clearance of 3-1/2 inches from tray to top. So maybe Benno has to help me flattening the roast or slap it to make it fit and I know he brought some tools with him ;-) (maybe put it in a shop-vise and squeeze it) How does this sound? Well, my table top toaster oven has to come to the rescue thanks to Walmart where I purchased it. I may be posting a photo of the outcome, so wish me luck. 

The Furrion didn't hack it

Yay to the Oster toaster oven

Our garland above the slideout

Christmas Tree across our travel trailer

In the hope that all our family, friends and blog readers will have a joyful holiday time to spend with loved ones, we are wishing you a Merry Christmas!

First Week at the RV Park

We’ve been here a week now but to me, it seems already longer. After the initial shock of adjustment to the upper 20C/80F temperatures here, with a peak of 35C/95F on Friday afternoon, it has cooled down now to more seasonal temperatures like 23C/73F for today. Actually, yesterday afternoon it was cool enough for us to pour us a cup of hot candy cane flavoured coco. Both, the cups and coco a gift from Teresa, our neighbour friend at home. Thanks again it was delicious!

We were almost finished when I remembered to take a photo

Of course it wasn’t long until we had the urge to explore what kind of stores Okeechobee had in the offering. I found all the usual grocery stores and Benno was satisfied to know that Harbor Freight, TSC, ACE and Home Depot were in a short distance of each other. As for clothing, Bealls and Marshall are across from one another but at this time of year I am not keen to visit.

Our boat has a couple of deck plates that were leaking. The only replacements are sold here at a marine store in Ft. Lauderdale but the company doesn’t ship to Canada.  So you might guess it right, Benno took that as an opportunity to drive to the manufacturer downtown and get them. Now Ft. Lauderdale is not around the corner, but it’s a doable drive of about 100 miles/160km. However, we got caught in a horrendous rain storm on I-595 right approaching the city with heavy traffic. Benno said he cannot recall ever to have driven in such a storm. Not even the biblical downpour on the South American Orinoco River matched that, which we had experienced some years ago on the boat. Comparable to driving through a carwash and the windshield wipers on fast making no difference. We went through an underpass and I heard Benno muttering “I hope the truck floats like a boat”. We had a big plash and made it through ok and later the sunshine evaporated all evidence.

For all the sailor blog readers here, you know this place, don’t you? No question about it, after getting our deck plates and looking over the merchandise in that store, we visited West Marine’s flagship store, Boat Owners Warehouse and of course Sailorman, a famous second hand boat supply store, but we didn’t buy anything.

At the doggy park

On my walks with the dogs to the doggy park and around the paved roads I have noticed something I’ve never seen before. There are palm trees throughout the park, but some of the palms are totally enveloped by roots from another tree that seemed to have been planted on purpose next to the palm tree. I presume it’s the roots of Ficus trees, but I’m not sure and I find this totally interesting. Maybe someone with knowledge can enlighten me?

The palm tree trunk in the upper middle

The palm tree trunk to the upper right

A view from afar to see another palm tree encircled 

Oh yes, we've got coconuts too!

And, I spotted this little cutie that sits forlorn waiting for sure for some TLC here in the park. 

Thanks for dropping in again. More next time.

Florida

Yesterday we arrived at the Lakeport RV Park in Moore Haven Florida. It is in the vicinity of Lake Okeechobee. 

Back home we had enjoyed some pretty nice days for December that felt more like spring time. Even some shrubs started budding out and the daffodils in my garden had already shot out of the ground. However, cold arctic air was in the forecast which made us decide to leave a day ahead of our scheduled departure. Every year before we leave the house we turn off the water supply to the house, drain the hot water tank and the pipes. It’s a bit of a pain to do on the morning of the departure day, but it got done.

We had no issues at the border to the USA or driving on the roads other than that it was cold, around -7C/19F and sometimes a bit bumpy (potholes). Our first night we stayed at a Super Walmart parking lot in Franklin, Ohio. The temps dropped to -9C/15F and our furnace in the travel trailer ran nonstop all night long.

The temps stayed mostly that cold all the next travel day and night. However, for the following night we booked a spot at the KOA Holiday RV Resort in Sweetwater, Tennessee. Our electric heater was no match for those temps and we needed the furnace again which unfortunately stopped working sometime in the early morning hours when we ran out of propane. We (Benno in his pjs) then switched over to the other full tank. Because of the cold temperatures we had not put any water in our travel trailer tanks but carried some bottled water and we used windshield fluid to flush the toilet. The shower facilities at the KOA were neat and clean.

Day three on the road we made it to the Camping World store and parking lot right on the I-75 in Valdosta, Georgia, which is a few miles from the Florida border. It still hadn’t warmed up enough to do without the furnace to keep us warm, but it didn’t have to run nonstop.

The route we took was from Detroit, Michigan all the way down the I-75 to Florida junction I-75 and I-10. The I-10 east brought us to Jacksonville and there we used the I-95 south that brought us close to the road which lead to our Florida destination on Lake Okeechobee.

So finally, yesterday in the late afternoon, just when a heavy cloud emptied its contents above us, we arrived at our site and Benno had again the fun job of hooking everything up in the rain! Today it is 28C/82F sunny and breezy and as per weather forecast will be so for the next week or more. 

If you are wondering why we left so late in the year to come down for our winter vacation, the reason was that we got to meet Elyse, the youngest member to the family at my sister's house near Toronto. My nephew, his wife and their 5 month old daughter had flown in to Toronto from Edmonton, Alberta on December 4th to show her off to family and friends. She sure is a sweet and pretty little girl.

Tomorrow we take a trip into the city of Okeechobee to purchase a new shower head hose, because ours jumped off the hook in the shower stall on route and busted a fitting. 

Thanks for dropping in and I’ll let you know how things progress here in sunny Florida.

What a relief

 Do you sometimes think you might have forgotten something? Last week after we had gotten to bed and were ready to drift off, I mentioned that the night temperature was forecasted to drop to -3C/26F. We then both remembered that we had not shut off the water supply to the outside water and power post to avoid it freezing up. So if the neighbours wondered what I was doing outside in my pjs with a flashlight, I opened the faucet so the water could reverse into a bucket. That was after Benno had crawled down into the crawlspace under the house to shut off the water to the post. 

Btw, our furnace is installed in the crawlspace and it is heated, carpeted and cozy down there. 

So we are crossing things off the to do list as we are nearing our departure date for Florida. Furnace and humidifier filters for the furnace were on the list. Our local Canadian Tire store carries the size and brands we need. It’s a great store and I think most Canadians like shopping there. 9v batteries for the smoke detector in the travel trailer as well for the outside thermometer and windshield washer fluid also landed in the shopping cart. With that done and antifreeze fluid added to the water circuit, the travel trailer is ready for me to fill it up with all that we want to take with us. It looks like we will have some mild temps next week and I will do that chore then.

Early morning on November 21st

If you’ve been watching TV you might have seen that the northern parts of Ontario got dumped with a huge amount of snow and more is predicted. Down here we had a little dusting of snow on November 21st and it lasted only until noon. So we are still enjoying the looks of green grass and dry roads. We thought the shrink-wrap guys were done for the year as we had heard nothing further and we had given up waiting. It was disappointing for sure so on Monday Benno started to duck tape up all the hatches and openings on the boat that still need work to keep any snow or rain out. In the evening we got an email that the crew would come out on Tuesday (yesterday) morning to shrink-wrap the boat. And they did! 

Yay the the guys are here to wrap the boat

They know exactly what to do first and then

All teamwork

That is a lot of shrink-wrap

One of the guys is using the torch, the other pulls the plastic

The door gets installed

All done

Well, that is a relief so now we know the boat will stay dry during the winter and hopefully beyond.  Since my last blog post Benno ran wires and installed electrical outlets in the galley. Additionally the fridge and gas cooktop were permanently hooked up. He also finished making the face frame of the galley cabinets in his garage as it got too chilly outside to cut the wood. After the install and plugging of the screw holes I put a couple of coats of varnish on them. We are using for all the trim, doors and cabinet facing the tropical Sapele, a mahogany style looking wood. Next spring we can concentrate on the walls, doors and a drawer before ordering a counter top. I’m looking forward to that.

The glue in the framing needs drying

It does get dusty in there even with the vac

Thanks for dropping in again and until next time, have a great week