Back Home to Storm Jonas!

The snow storm begins and keeps coming down for two days with at least 12 inches and 3 ft drifts. The Brute did a great sortie on Sunday in 4WD checking out the deserted neighborhood! Getting ready to take Nuage Volante to Ashland RV to have the Dometic AC and heat pump fixed under warranty.

Florida Trip mileage

Florida - Key West, Sarasota, Destin CanOpener, Jacksonville
December 25 to January 20, 2015
Total 3,560 miles - Cum: 8,179

Resting for a bacon sandwich....

On our way back from frigid Florida to freezing Virginia we pulled in to a NC rest area and happen to park next to a Smithfield truck with an important lunch suggestion - bacon sandwich!

Red Snapper on the menu!

Safe Harbor Market and Restaurant actually has deep sea fishing boats tied up to the dock and the fish in the market are plentiful, varied in species and fresh. Part of the delight is selecting your fish dish from the menu, being given a number, and within a few minutes the most copious portion of your chosen delight appears at your table! One of the best examples of sea to table delivery!

Brisk morning stroll

Low forties overnight and slow morning until our trip out of the Kathryn Abbey Hanna Park in Jacksonville Beach took us along the beach road where we stopped for a sun warming stroll down the beach for half an hour! Feeling quite reptilian letting the sun invigorate my body today!

Topsail Florida State Park

You can easily recognize that Florida has made a serious investment in its tourism infrastructure and spent a lot of money on developing excellent state parks throughout the length and breadth of its territory! Topsail has been well designed and laid out with complete services for RV's providing water, electricity, sewer and cable TV in a well spaced out layout with lakes, clubhouse, store and many other facilities including trails and circulating tram to the beach all for $40 a night ... perfect! The beach is perfect white sand as far as the eye can see and unspoiled environment reached by a 200ft elevated walkway over the dunes.

Airstream In cold weather!

Yes it's much much cooler in the northern Florida panhandle! We had a delightful sweaty 85F in Key West last week and tonight we have 30F in Destin! Got two heating systems running - the Airstream has a propane furnace which we pay for the propane and also we connected up an electric space heater with its own thermostat hanging in the middle of the van and plugged that into the campsite electric system so that's covered in our $40 night fee. Spent the last 24 hours figuring out many electrical problems and replaced main power cable to hook up, replaced breakers and added redundant systems to bypass the Airstream sophisticated built in electrical system so we can survive a cold night in comfort! Learning to adapt as failures occur all around.... AC and heat pump were already dead and will be fixed under warranty when we return to VA later in the month, fridge is oscillating up and down wildly but we have it tamed now by adding additional clip on fan to cool the evaporation coils.... then the power system developed all kinds of issues and we bought a 100 ft cable to borrow from neighbor power supply which just kept us going overnight last night except the rain and moisture kept tripping out GFI breakers. Must have stopped at 5 or more stores yesterday and today to find all the parts! Tonight (so far!) all systems are running perfectly!

All part of the rich life experience so you are better prepared for the next crisis ! A Honda generator might be on the horizon!

Airstream Can Opener 2016

Three interviews on local TV station WJHG about the CanOpener rallye at Topsail Hill State Preserve

Continually recording statistics

The Laramie has so many displays of many functions including multiple trip logs, fluid temperatures throughout the engine, transmission and exhaust systems, fuel and oil filter life, tire pressures, trailer electric brake settings, fuel economy, more info than you ever wanted to know!

Banyan tree in Key West

Beautiful Banyan tree on Duval Street in Key West frames the Main Street entrance and reigns over the entire front of this classic Keys house!

A useful reminder

Leaving Key West this morning the camp site has some useful reminders! Not sure about the prioritization!

Pontoon cruise in the Keys

Took an afternoon pontoon boat rental - 22ft and 60hp outboard - around Key West and north up the coast to the Boca Chica beach. Two hundred yards offshore there are many sandy underwater shoals which you can anchor on and swim in perfectly clear and warm water, and stand up in four feet of water. Boat anchored up and down are in the party mood with music and laughter!

Southernmost KOA camp

Unintentionally checking off the KOA sites at the furthest cardinal points here in "as far south as you can go" Key West, in September we stopped at Bar Harbor, Maine, the furthest east in the USA. Onwards north to Alaska and west to California!

Perfecting the Grill !

Much experimentation with our portable grills and we do love our FireSense earthenware grill - we load up with lump charcoal to get it going and then part way through the warm up we add mesquite wood blocks so that it becomes a wood fired grill... then at the highest heat with the embers glowing bright within an inch of the grid we place seasoned Grouper or Snapper until it's slightly browned and crisped on the exterior while the inside is moist and tender - about two minutes per side. Fish fillets are best prepped into 2 to 3 inch servings about an inch thick, salt and pepper and a light spray of olive oil. Great with fish tacos or as main entrée!

Planning for next year!

Touring all the RV sites in Key West we checked out Geiger Key and indeed we found an idyllic spot with its own Tiki hut on the waterfront which we reserved for a week in January 2017. Certainly beats our current mangrove site! Being in an open spot that has the prevalent SE breeze coming straight in is perfect! Note another Airstream almost like ours is on the site this week!