Moving On

We spent our time at Flamingo and had a great time and good weather. One day of rain and then sunny every other day. We have been relaxing and biking and hiking, but the trails are muddy since they have had an unusually wet winter here. Everything is much greener than in past years and water along the ground where it was always dry.
We have enjoyed the ranger programs each evening at the amphitheater and have learned about the stars and galaxies, about endangered species and about the birds of the Everglades.
Today we are packing camp and moving to the north end of Everglades park to spend a couple of nights at Long Pine campground. We need to get some laundry and groceries for the next week.
We may not have any signal for a couple of days so until Tuesday or Wednesday will be slightly out of touch. On those days we have to drive to a tower to get anything in our out on the airwaves.
Hope you are enjoying your winter!

Enjoying Florida

Well, it's not the warmest of winters in Florida, but day time temperatures in the 60's and 70's are much better than what they have in Maple City these days.
We are really enjoying being outdoors and have been walking and biking a lot everyday. Yesterday we had rain for a good portion of the day, but we still had fun playing cards and dominoes with Rick and Jan in their sprawling fifth-wheel camper!
On Tuesday we enjoyed a canoe tour with our friendly ranger Shauna, and today we listened to her program about pythons in the everglades. Interesting stuff! The pythons are about eighteen inches long when hatched, and reach six feet long by the end of their first year. They start reproducing at the age of four to five years old and lay twenty to forty eggs per nesting. No wonder the amateur snake keepers that buy them for pets get tired of them so quick and release them into the wild. They estimate there are close to a hundred thousand pythons living in Florida now!!
We have done some exploring and there is no public Wi-fi in the park here. I need to wait until we get into town before I can attach any pictures to the blog. Stay tuned.
We do have good phone signal here with our cell phone. If anyone needs to get in touch we get good phone coverage for texts or calls.
Stay warm out there kids!

We are in the Everglades

We are camped in Flamingo Campground in Everglades National Park. We met up with Rick and Jan Bolling and are exploring with them. This morning we are going on a guided canoe trip. Pictures will follow when I get a better Wi-Fi connection.
The weather is good as it warms up to seventy each day, and fifties at night. No snow!
Hope everyone is well.

Sunny Florida!

We made it to Ocala, Florida, on Monday and had nice weather for the first two days. Then on Tuesday night we got a big rain and the temperatures started dropping. Yesterday and today were in the fifties and quite cool (but no snow).
Yesterday we moved south from Silver Springs in Ocala to Disney at Orlando. We set up camp at Fort Wilderness and started exploring the area. I never realized Disney's complex covered so much area. This morning we drove to the east coast and picked Mike. Amy and the girls up from their cruise at Port Canaveral. We spent the day with them and delivered them to their hotel at Disney's Boardwalk resort. Tomorrow we will see Epcot with them.

Here are some pictures from the past couple of days...

We spent the day on Tuesday exploring Silver Springs. There is a system of aquifers that surface in the Ocala area create the crystal clear springs that draw visitors from far and wide.

The glass bottom boats tour this area and offer a view of the crystal clear waters that run at 72 degrees year round.

The Pioneer Hall at Fort Wilderness campground at Disney.

Downtown Disney was very entertaining on Wednesday night.

The Lego store at downtown Disney was awesome. They had every Lego kit imaginable plus bulk legos for those that wanted to create their own.

Live entertainment was great along the boardwalk at Downtown Disney

Nancy found a friend to hang out with.

The girls at Fort Wilderness campground.

The Boardwalk Resort where Mike and Amy were staying.

The gang at the Boardwalk's boardwalk.

I couldn't resist a picture of our Hurricane Hannah.

I didn't want to say it was cold here, but these are the lifeguards at the pool at one of Epcot's resorts. 

We took Natalie and Hannah to the Hoop de Doo Review while Mike and Amy got a little bit of free time on Thursday.

South of Macon, Georgia

We broke the fifty degree barrier yesterday just past Corbin, Kentucky. Most of the day was sunny and in the high fifties. We wound up just south of Macon after driving through the mountains in Kentucky and Tennessee. Today we are heading for Ocala Florida and will spend two nights getting the camper un-winterized and everything put in place. Temperature there forecast for seventy!

Saturday in Dayton, Ohio

We are on our way to the sun shine. We left Maple City yesterday and drove on decent roads to Houghton Lake where we met Bev and Gary and spent the night with them. The ice on the lake here is so thick that there are cars and trucks parked next to the fishing shanties! We were treated to a good Chinese dinner last night and this morning Bev fixed a great breakfast to send us off.
We drove on slushy roads (in the rain), to I-75 and the freeway was good until we were north of West Branch. Suddenly it turned to ice and I almost thought we were done for the day. I slowed down on to the shoulder and shifted into four wheel drive. That gave us enough stability to keep going on. After about twenty miles the temperature started to warm a few degrees and the rain lightened up and we were out of the ice.
The rest of the drive through Michigan was in light rain, but no more ice. The temperatures fluctuated between 33 and 39 degrees all day. Ohio's roads were dry, and we had a good drive to our hotel. We are now between Dayton and Cincinnati, and are staying at a Hampton Inn for the night. The weatherman is promising sunshine for tomorrow, and we are planning to drive to a campground south of Atlanta for Sunday night.
We never got to forty degrees, but we are now south of any snow. We are looking forward to warmer temperatures and sunshine tomorrow on our drive through the mountains of Kentucky and Tennessee. I'll keep you posted on our progress.
Hope everyone is well.

Getting ready to head south

It looks like the winter storms are finally giving us a break and are wreaking havoc with southern Michigan now. We have had much less snow since Christmas, but have received over 100 inches of the fluffy white stuff so far.
Today was a balmy 18 degrees and we took a hike down to Good Harbor beach. There was no one swimming, but we did see a couple of young ladies on snowshoes.
We are planning to pull up stakes and start our winter get away at the end of this week. Looking at Friday or Saturday for our departure. It looks like a good chance for decent traveling as long as the forecast does not change.

Good Harbor Beach on January 5, 2014. No one was swimming.

 Along Good Harbor Trail sown to the water's edge.

Hiking in the 18 degree weather.