Getting settled in Florida

We’re all settled in our winter home here in Melbourne Beach.  Suzie is a flight attendant with American Airlines.  She’s gone for 3 days 4 times per month so we take over with her 7 yr. old son,  Kai when she’s gone.  Suzie’s mother, Denise and father, Serge have a home on the Ocean about 3 miles north of here so it’s one big happy family.

 We’ve also met some great people on the pickleball courts.  They play indoors at the South Beach Community Centre  on Mon., Wed. & Fri. from 1:00 P.M. until 7:30 P.M. - drop in anytime-$2.00 to play.

On Saturday Kai helped me make the bed in the van

 and then we went off to buy him a new bike.  A very happy boy when we found the perfect bike.

Our cruising friends, George & Joanne, from the s/v Bristol Cream contacted us and we met them for dinner at a Denny’s near I-95, they left their boat in Marathon and were on their way to NC for Thanksgiving with the family.  Great to catch up with them and a bit bittersweet since we won’t be following them to George Town this season.

  Kai went with his sister, Meagan to grandmother, Denise’s, for dinner.  Suzy’s daughter, Meagan is here  from the University of Colorado for the Thanksgiving Holiday.

Our other cruising friends, Brian and Yvonne from the catamaran, Options III were anchored in Vero Beach so we drove down there one morning.  Brian picked us up at the dinghy dock and we felt like cruisers again going through the anchorage to their boat.  Yvonne greeted us with freshly baked cinnamon rolls, coffee and tea.  We all took off in the Sprinter to run errands and have a delicious lunch at the Olive Garden.  The van was loaded with filled propane tanks and groceries when we arrived at the dinghy dock.  Loaded it up and said our goodbyes.  Since they’ll be cruising in FL we hope to catch up with them again.

We’re keeping busy helping Suzie around the house, getting Kai to and from the bus stop, playing pickleball, bike riding, walking the beach.

On Wed. we drove to Wachula, FL (south of Lakeland) to Torrey Oaks RV Park where brother Richard has a motorhome and a Fifth Wheel trailer on his two lots.  It’s a beautiful park with  200 lots for motorhomes and Fifth Wheels.  They have an 18 hole golf course, swimming pool, 2 picklelball courts where they play 6 days a week at 9:00 A.M., community hall with exercise classes, get-togethers. bingo, pool.

Got settled in the motorhome and on Thurs., of course, we were on the pickleball courts at 9:00 A.M., then a swim in the pool and later went to the community hall for a delicious turkey dinner with all of the trimmings.   A nice bottle of wine too.  Thanks Richard for a great Thanksgiving.

Fri. more pickleball, then shopping and cooked some Alaska salmon for dinner.  The guys had to take the TV out of the entertainment unit in the 5th Wheel and got it working again.  Also installed some new LED light fixtures.

  Sat. pickleball again while Richard did some detail work on the van.  It’s our 39th anniversary so we celebrated by going to the community hall for delicious lunch of turkey soup and wraps.  In the afternoon, the guys dropped me off at church for 5:00 Mass and after Mass we went to a nice restaurant for a grouper dinner. Perfect day since I didn’t have to cook any meals.

Sunday we packed up the van and headed back to Melbourne Beach.  Serge and Denise stopped by for a glass of wine.  After watching episode 4 of “The Crown”-great new series on Net Flicks, we all went to the bed early.  BTW, did I mention the sun has been shining every day since we arrived and the temps are around 80.  

…more later

Deja Rue on the road

Saturday morning we closed up the house, packed up Deja Rue and headed south.  We took the tunnel and had no problems at customs.   The weather was beautiful and we had a great drive to Indianapolis, Indiana.  Pulled right into the driveway at Jill’s sister, Sherri and brother-in-law Jim’s house.  Great to see Al & Jill who are both recovering - Al from the broken hip he got after falling off his bike in Spain and Jill after her final surgery from breast cancer.  Sherri and Jim live in a 100+ yr. old house that is being renovated and they have remodelled a portion of it as a suite for Jill & Sherri’s mother.  So good to finally meet her.

After a delicious lunch and lots of talking Jim, Sherri and Al took us on a tour of downtown Indianapolis.  Very impressive City and we enjoyed seeing it and walking along the canal.

On our way back to the car we checked out the protest on the State Capitol steps.  Lots of unhappy people.

This was our first night of driveway camping and it worked out ok-thank goodness for Jim’s extension cord so we could run the heater.  We decided if the weather stayed cold we could have gotten along with a single bunk-lots of cuddling that night.

The next morning Al came out and rocked the van-time for breakfast.  Hated to leave them but hope to get together again soon-maybe in Colorado in the Spring.

Got underway and drove through Atlanta.  Didn’t take the by-pass and that was a big mistake.  Lots of traffic on Sunday afternoon and also lots of smoke from the wildfires in the area.  

Stopped at a Flying J truck stop and lined up with the other Sprinter vans in the parking lot.  Dinner at Dennys and then to bed.  Warmer weather so only needed our propane heater for a short time.

Enjoying being able to get up in the morning, make our coffee and tea, cereal and get back on the highway.

Next stop was in Gainesville at a Cracker Barrel.  They have nice designated parking spots for RV’s.

We then went on to Daytona Beach.  We lived there 35 yrs. ago and when we walked downtown we were surprised to see our favourite restaurant  - Stavros Pizza so we had lunch there. When we lived on our trimaran, Dejavu and later on our Catamaran, Mr. Christian we spent many nights there enjoying pizza and beer.  We went on to the Municipal Marina and walked around remembering when we lived there-Joe built a dock along the seawall for the trimaran and now they have several docks along the wall.

Next we drove over to Springwood Drive to see the house we lived in when Alison was born.  The house looked good and the neighborhood has grown but is well maintained.

We drove on to Titusville and stopped for the night at another Cracker Barrel.  

The next day we drove to Melbourne Beach and were greeted by Suzie who was recovering from a bad cold.  Her 7 yr. old son, Kai, came home from school.  He’s a very nice boy and we’ll soon learn his routine so we can take over when Suzie is away working as a flight attendant for American Arilines.

Went to Kai’s school this a.m. where his 2nd grade class did a play about the American Indians.  Great group of kids. Joe took his bike for a long ride and later we went for a nice walk on the beach. 

After school Joe & Kai went for a bike ride and I heard Kai crying loudly when they got back-the chain on his bike came off and he fell in the driveway.  A small cut on his thumb so after we cleaned it up, put a bandaid on it, he settled down.  Joe will be looking for a new bike for him.

 Suzie will fly tomorrow and be gone for 3 days. We hope to connect with our friends, Joanne and George who will be driving up from the Keys to New Orleans for Thanksgiving.  

We'll join Richard for Thanksgiving and spend a few days in his park.

All is good and we’re very comfortable in this beautiful home.

New way to travel

Now that we're without a cruising boat we decided it was time to try land travel.  On Sept. 30th we purchased a 2010 Sprinter Van and started converting it into a camper.

Since then it's been full speed ahead to get it ready to head south before the snow flies.  Getting cooler and dreary here & we're looking forward to heading south on Sat. Nov. 12th.

Joe spent hours looking at you tube videos to get some ideas on how to do this conversion and in between work and playing pickleball he attacked it full speed ahead.

Here are some photos of the process - hope you enjoy them.

 insulate inside with 1 " of spray foam and pink fibreglass all covered with 1/4 inch luan underlayment

making bed panel bulkhead and cabinet 

hole cut in door-that was scary

Now we have a nice big opening window with a screen and roller blind on the inside.  Picked this up at a  trailer salvage yard.

Having the berth raised leaves room for plenty of storage

Cut out the metal cargo wall to make a walkthrough to the  rear of the van.  Also had to remove the bench seat and installed a bucket seat (picked that up at the salvage yard)

Using 2 -5 gal. gerry jugs-one for fresh water and one for grey water.  Will be adding a 12V refrigerator later.

Very simple port-a-potty which also acts as a step for getting into the berth

Purchased a dresser and countertop from IKEA and with some adjusting  made a very useful storage area.  After driving around in the van and having all of the drawers fly open Joe added these locks.

Made a small sofa from one of the seats in our old van.