Travels with Snowbirds 2018, January 26 to February 5, Thousand Trails Orlando/Clermont FL

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The one about settling in to Thousand Trails Orlando

Friday I could not check into Thousand Trails Orlando (gonna shorten that to TTO) until noon. It’s about a 20 minute drive from Fort Wilderness. I had a leisurely morning cooking breakfast, really cleaning inside and outside as I broke camp and picked Winston up at 11. The line at the kennel was out the door!!! They give everyone as much time as they need, and talk and talk, and you like that when it’s your turn, but not when your RV is parked in the exit ramp and could potentially be blocking others from exiting. I finally got Winston at 11:30, all fluffy and bandanaed from his bath and manicure and smelling good. I thought it odd that they told me he had not pooped yet for the day.

That long line put me on the entrance road to TTO at exactly noon. If you arrive early, they turn you around and tell you to leave the property. I was at 12:02 and there was no line!!!! I had been speaking with Ginnie and learned that there were 3 campsites near her and Kathy. The ranger led me to “Easy Street” and I got my favorite site in the park, right across the street from Ginnie and next to Kathy and around the corner from Kim. Happy Camper NanaKat. Kathy took Winston and put him in her doggie penned area while I set up and she said he pooped kind of runny. Hmmmmmmmm.

It was good catching up with the girls and settling in to my 2^nd favorite happy place. Only thing missing here is the ocean. The clackety clack of Winston’s claws on the linoleum is gone!!!! Yippie. Short lived joy.

Saturday, the girls were going to Lake Ridge Winery for a concert on the lawn. I did not go. Winston ate his breakfast and threw up and pooped in the rig. And again. And again. I put him outside, he was fine. I brought him inside, and he was sick. What a mess. Finally, late afternoon, he stabilized. I let him drink 7 sips of water every hour, and he held that down. While the girls were out, I crated him and borrowed Ginnie’s car and went to Walmart and bought some white rice (I had brown but was afraid to give that to him) and chicken breast tenders. I cooked them in a nonstick frying pan with no grease. He kept down the small amount I gave him and wanted more but I didn’t give in. Each feeding I increased the amount slightly. After 2 days he is back to being his feisty, sassy self and eating everything in sight. The girls went to a local theatre performance of “Menopause The Musical” and had a great time, the humor was very pertinent. I had declined going with them because I have seen it I think 4 times. Glad I didn’t buy a ticket; I stayed home with Winston.

Sunday it poured. I heard on TV that Clermont (that’s the town TTO really is in) hit a record, 3 inches of rain in some short amount of time. Kim, Kathy and I, the 3 K’s, went to see “The Post.” Quite good. Kathy and I should have remembered more about this important piece of history (Kim is too young), but we didn’t. It was a good refresher for us. Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep were excellent. Chili’s for dinner, and back to the campground in the pouring rain. It continued all night long and the amazing thing is, when it stopped, the streets were dry; the rain had all soaked in.

Monday we were going to go to Webster again, as Kathy missed the last trip, but it was still raining lightly, and no one wanted to go to be outside in the flea market fields in the rain.

I heard from Joanne, she is making progress on her Quest West despite having to stop at another Roadtrek RV dealer to repair the repair the last guy made wrong. She texted me from a fish restaurant along the Gulf. Eating shrimp. Dang.

Most of the rest of the week was pretty lazy. Lots of crocheting for me; I am going to have to hit a craft store to get more as I am almost done with my first baby afghan for my potential ‘great grand children’. I figured I would do one for each grandchild that they could give to their firstborn. I will do one for a boy, one for a girl, and the others all gender neutral. This will be a good project for me when I don’t have anything else to work on. It’s a good way to use up the yarn in my stash.

We ate dinner one night at New York Pizza, a pick up pizza counter on one side, and a restaurant with white tablecloths on the other side. Kim and I selected a special chicken dish, served with salad and garlic knots and a glass of wine. $15.99. It was yummy and enough for large leftovers. Ginnie had shrimp scampi, Kathy had another chicken dish. All had large leftovers.

Wednesday was Bingo night!!! Here’s the routine. Ginnie and I are the only two that play. We went over to the Rec hall at 4:30 and selected our seats for the evening. Ginnie has a boo-boo on her leg from losing a battle with a doggie fence and likes to sit on the end of the aisle so she can put her foot up on a chair. Then you buy your tickets and put them at your selected seat. It costs us $12-$14, depending on how many cards you want to play each game. You can spend a lot more than that if you want. Next you go into the Dining Hall and order spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. $7 for 2 large meatballs over spaghetti, small salad, Texas Toast. I didn’t need to do that, I brought my NY Pizza leftovers that I was going to heat in the microwave. WRONG. The microwave is gone. I ate it cold and it was still awesome. Kim joined us and declared dinner yummy. Couldn’t have been as yummy as mine.

Bingo was awful for me I never got closer than 4 numbers away. I was discouraged I made a mistake when buying, I should have bought more cards for the last game, that’s always the one with the biggest prize, but I only had one strip of 3 to play and was pissed at myself. After a short time I was down to needing only 2 numbers for that full card last game big prize of the night. I got one, and only needed #33. Then every number called filled another card until I was left with 2 cards needing 1 number each, 33 and 11, and 11 was called. That is a family lucky number and it did me well. I was the only winner, no need to share, and the prize was $200. Yippie!!! I started out my trip with $300 cash. I use cash for miscellaneous crap, a slush fund, but mostly charge everything. I was down to $80; my $200 win put me right back to where I was when I started, and I am a happy camper.

We had a sewerage problem. Boy was it stinky, and when the wind blew in the right direction it was downright nasty. Sewerage was leaking in a puddle surrounding the fresh water utility pole of the RV next to Ginnie, across the street from me and Kathy. We asked that camper if he notified management. I don’t know how he answered, but I do know he is upset because his wife was put in a nursing home and ‘he misses her and he can’t pay the bills and he misses her’, etc., you get the idea. Ginnie called. I called, and we were told ‘they are working on it.’ Four days nothing. On the fourth day I stopped every Ranger I saw and asked them to look at it and see the poopies and toilet paper in the dirt, and called the office again. Finally I saw Tammy, a long time worker and asked her to look at it and she was horrified. She called the head of maintenance who was around in a flash. Didn’t do anything but at least he came and saw. A few hours later a maintenance crew came and dug up the offending area and somehow the leak stopped. The next day a real plumber came and worked on the area for hours. When they left the maintenance crew came back, filled in the hole, and mixed lime I with all the affected dirt. Nasty. Just nasty. As much as we all love camping here, the infrastructure is decaying. They upgraded many of the sites converting 30 amp sites to both 30 and 50 amp electric which is a good thing, but the asphalt is gone from many of the campsites leaving dirt or sand, and the interior roadways are pothole filled. Many street lights are without bulbs.

Kathy moved on to the next leg of her winter trip, staying a few weeks in state parks where she just loves to sit and enjoy nature and take its pictures. She did manage to get up early and see the super moon and eclipse and is looking forward seeing to the HEAVY Space-X launch.

Funny story. My iphone rang with a number I didn’t recognize from 516 area code….Long Island. I didn’t answer it Next I got a facetime call from the same number. I answered it and it was my 90 year old Aunt Nora – widow of my father’s brother, John. She was so surprised when she saw my face on the phone. I reached out to her mid January to tell her about my step mother’s passing, and never heard back from her. Well, Christmas day while visiting at her kids house she somehow managed to break her collar bone without as much as a fall. Visit to the ER and a discharge to a rehab center where she would rest for a few days then get OT to learn how to dress herself using one arm. She never had a cell phone and one of her kids gave her an old iphone. That same cousin of mine got her messages off her home voice mail and she knew by my message that I was calling to let her know about Shirley’s passing. She has no idea what facetime is or how she did it, what it means, etc, etc. I spent 30 minutes looking at her ear as she put the phone up to it as she couldn’t figure out how to put speaker phone on. She made me show her the inside of my camper, asked how dark my eyebrows are, checked out the dog, got a view of the campground and other silly things. It was actually pretty good and pretty funny.

This campground is a good place to dog watch. I have seen breeds of dogs here I have never seen before, and many people comment on my funny looking poodle, and I have to explain that he is a Bedlington Terrier, not related to poodle at all. I have seen a miniature Schnoodle….Schnauzer/Poodle, a brown labradoodle, a Bouvier, Bernese Mountain Dog, Portuguese Water Dog, Beagles, lots of ShihTzu mixes, a few greyhounds, r, etc. It is a regular dog show here. One of Ginnie’s neighbors has 6 yes 6 yappy little brown things. No one needs 6 yappy little brown dogs at home, no less in an RV. Nasty.

Superbowl Sunday it rained again. Rain is good every now and then, it washes down all the dog pee from all those oWe had our annual party at my rig and gorged on shrimp, salsa, cheese, dip, crackers, chips, etc., tortellini pasta, ice cream cookies, sangria, gin, wine, etc., etc., etc. Kathy we missed you. It was a good game; I could watch that trick play over and over and over again. It kind of reminded me of the plays Coach Richard and Coach Gary taught our boys in little league many years ago and I loved them and I loved this play, too. My favorite commercial was the Dirty Dancing Beckham Jr/Manning thing and a red card/soccer one I saw pre game.

Kim, Ginnie and I took off to Mt Dora for the annual Art Show, about an hour away. I would have liked a Craft Show much better, as this art was a little out there for me. There were booths of photographers, jewelry makers, ceramic artists, sculpture, painting, etc. And all were very expensive. I saw one 4’x6’ stylized photograph for $3500. Way too much. Gorgeous hammered silver necklaces for $800. Beautiful, but very pricy. The streets were mobbed. We had a hot dog from a vendor and sat and enjoyed their music, a soloist who did a good job covering Willie Nelson and Rod Stewart hits. The streets of Mt. Dora are very hilly….go figure, a hilly place in Florida. It seemed as if we were constantly walking up hill, though.

My Wilmington girlies, Barb, and Martha, and one of Martha’s friends, Lesley, are coming to town for a week at Disney World. Kim and I will be joining them on Tuesday for a day at Epcot. This seems like a good place to end this segment.



Kat Out

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