Wrapping Up March

March was our final month at our winter destination in Florida. It has been a great winter with many activities, family and friend meet ups, and as always the nice Florida weather. We are looking forward to some sightseeing on the way back and of course being back in our Blue Ridge Mountains. So let’s wrap up March with a high level summary.

Local & Park Activities

The local live theater company (Richey Suncoast Theater) put on a Little Women musical production. We bought some decent tickets down in the front rows and thought they did a great job. Pat has read the book several times and seen the movies as well.

I have continued to use the portable ham radio station to make contacts around the US just after dark when the 40 meter band seemed to be the best. It was an all Morse code (CW) winter. No microphone. My code speed is better and was very enjoyable.

We also took in a movie at the local theater, ate from the weekly food truck visits to the park, played pickelball, card games, and had my weekly meeting with the art painters. Plus attended a local church every Sunday. I met many people at all of activities and finally can remember most of the names. Who knows how many I will remember when we return again this next winter.

Our park, the Orchid Lake RV Resort is almost entirely run by volunteer groups. Maybe 30 or more groups that arrange and coordinate all the activities. The office just collects rents and arranges maintenance. It is a system that seems to work well, but requires a large volunteer effort. Pat and I volunteered to help at one of the park dinners.

The March main entertainment show was a Las Vegas singer/comedian. He was very good and could mimic any voice from Johnny Cash to Neil Diamond. Another park group makes quilts for veterans (Quilts of Valor) and held a large presentation of the quilts to each vet. Very nice. Thank you for your service veterans!

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I also made some good friends at the morning coffee hours. From four to eight guys would gather at the RV park to chat and have the occasional donut. We solved all the world and local problems and probably created a few new ones. Have a great summer guys!

Friends and Family Meets

Our friends from Ohio were down to Sarasota Florida for a week, so we drove down to have lunch and walk through the Jungle Gardens with Derrick, Becky and their three children. They run a large farm and other endeavors back in Ohio. A great family.

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Then we drove over to Lakeland Fl to have lunch with Calvin And Sue. They are the couple from Clermont Fl. who have met up with us in their RV at many places around the country such as Williamsburg, DC, Boston, Lancaster, Sante Fe, Taos, Colorado Springs, and Denver. I’m sure to have forgotten a few.

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Just before leaving for Up North it was one more trip to visit Pat’s brothers families down south of Tampa, (John, Cindy, and Ginny – Tom was out fishing). It was a great final weekend of game playing, some tasty meals, church on Sunday, then back up the toll roads to our base camp.

Wrap Up

That will about wrap up March, except for a couple of art exhibits that we attended. They will be covered in my next blog update. Many photos. Then we take off for Cedar Key, FL for three days.