Sunday October 11th 2020

Today was a travel day. I’m on a Sunday travel schedule which isn’t the best for checking out of state parks. All of the weekend visitors rush to leave at the same time. I was third in line for the dump station. The guy in front on me probably wasn’t going to use his rig for a few weeks. He was trying to be absolutely certain his black tank was empty. He took a hose inside through a window to fill the black tank with water. Once would have been more than enough, but he did it three times. I must have waited half an hour. My next two travel days are also on Sundays. It will be the middle of November before I’m back to traveling on a weekday. Let’s hope I don’t have similar delays departing.

I left Lake Manatee state park a little after noon. Traffic heading south on Interstate 75 through Bradenton and Sarasota was heavy and the construction that started five years ago is still on-going. It’s just at a different intersection. Fort Meyers to the south wasn’t nearly as heavy. I even managed to buy gas without competition for the pump. A few very brief downpours made me thankful that I had installed new wiper blades on the RV.

I arrived at Collier-Seminole State Park on the Tamiami Trail southeast of Naples a little after 3PM. This is my first visit to this state park. The campground is located on man made high ground in the middle of a swamp. The roads are paved and the campsites are hard gravel where you need to park. If you get off the roads or the intended parking area on the site you’ll sink into the grass quickly. There are lots of ruts to prove it. I got backed in and situated without incident. Overall this travel day had far less drama than two weeks ago. I’ll be here for two weeks.

Saturday October 10th 2020

Today is my last day at Lake Manatee State Park. The two weeks have passed quickly. I wouldn’t mind staying longer, but there is a limit of two weeks at a time. I’ll be back in December. Tomorrow I’m moving about 150 miles south to another state park for the next two weeks.

My speculation about the decorated campsite down the road being for a wedding proved true today. On my morning walk through the day use area I spotted a crew setting up for a wedding. There were fifty or so white chairs lined up under the trees. The tables in the pavilion were covered in white table cloths and additional tables were lined up with serving stations.

On my mid day walk the residents of many of the campsites in my area were in fancy clothes. Clearly they weren’t going to be walking in the woods in suits and long dresses. When I walk by the day use area later in the day, a full blown wedding reception was in progress complete with music and dancing. I’ve seen weddings in campgrounds before, but it doesn’t happen often.

The wedding participants were lucky to dodge the weather. The day started out fine with lots of sunshine. Shortly after noon the sky darkened and a storm front moved through the area. It looked like it was going to last all afternoon, but after about an hour the sunshine returned. It remained dry for the rest of the day.

Friday October 9th 2020

The above normal temperatures continue. Combined with the high humidity the days continue to be uncomfortable. Today was the sunniest day of the past several. The clouds were a lot more scattered and no afternoon rain passed through this area.

Today was a resupply day. I ran out a couple of daily consumables, orange juice and bread yesterday. Of course, I bought a lot more than just those two items. Ever since the pandemic hit I’ve been keeping more stuff on hand. My overhead pantry cabinets are packed full of duplicates of things I like to eat and my refrigerator and freezer have more in them. In pre-pandemic days I planned on shopping every week and kept only a little more than I needed on hand. Now I’m keeping more on hand to keep my options open.

The Walmart Supercenter I visited today was well stocked and had spacious aisles for a change. I managed to find and buy “Clorox Clean-up Cleaner and Bleach” for the first time since the start of the pandemic. In the early days, I couldn’t find any spray bottles of cleaner. By the time I ran out in the summer, odd name brands were available. Today was the first time I found a recognizable brand on the shelves. On the other hand, I haven’t been able to find any cans of corn lately. Even in the early days, I usually found my favorite vegetable. The challenges of shopping continue.

The state park is filling up for the weekend. Similar to last week a few arrived on Wednesday, more on Thursday and the main influx was today. I’m curios what is going to happen at one of the sites down the road. After setting up their trailer, they decorated the campsite. They put tiki torches all around the site. Each torch has a big white bow with streaming ribbons attached. Under their awning they have a table setup with a white table cloth. It looks like they are getting ready for a wedding. I can’t imagine the rationale or logistics for having such an event in a state park campground.

In addition to the march around the grocery store, today’s exercise was a couple of walks around the park. The water level in Lake Manatee is now much higher on the bank than when I arrived twelve days ago. At that time I commented on it being unusually low. Now it seems unusually high. The Dam managers must be “playing” with the water levels.

Thursday October 8th 2020

I spent some time hiking in the Robinson Preserve today. The preserve is a large tract of coastal grasslands, marsh, and mangroves along Tampa Bay in Bradenton just west of where the Manatee River empties into the bay. There are walking and biking trails along with observation areas overlooking the ponds and bay. The preserve supports a diverse range of plant and bird life.

It was a very hot and humid day. Walking around the preserve was a real sweat producing exercise. I spent about three hours on the trails pausing now and then to take a few pictures of the terrain and birds. A sample of the pictures are included in here.

Wednesday October 7th 2020

It was another hot and humid day. Once again the temperature was near record highs in the area. Here it was in the low nineties with enough humidity to make it seem like it was near 100 degrees. The sun shined through the scattered clouds in this area, but the gulf coast was much cloudier once again.

I got a couple of short walks in around the park today. By mid afternoon the heat was starting to wear on me. I shut the windows and turned on the AC for the rest of the day. There are some things I’d like to do in the area, but they are outdoors. I know I’ll be back in this area again in December and next March, so I don’t need to force outdoor activities into hot days.

My next two stops on the Rambling Road Trip are further south in areas that I don’t return to regularly. That should be enough incentive to keep me going in the heat and humidity. I need to take the opportunity presented to see new things. This level of heat is more of a mental obstacle than a physical one.

Tuesday October 6th 2020

The weather is getting in the way. Yesterday (Monday) morning it was partly cloudy and clearing at my campsite. I decided to visit some of the area along the gulf coast. It is about 25 miles to the west. With each mile toward the coast the cloud cover increased. By the time I reached the coast it was fully cloudy, visibility was low and rain was threatening. All I really did was drive a loop route and return to my RV home. It was still partly cloudy inland.

I interpreted today’s forecast to be similar with a higher chance of rain. Ut couldn’t have been more different. The weather pattern was from southeast to northwest instead of southwest to northeast. The day started out with bright sunshine and a few fluffy clouds. It got very warm to go with the very high humidity. Some locations in the area set record high temperatures in the low nineties. It was very uncomfortable outside with very little air movement. The weather forecast during the morning news program called for strong thunderstorms starting around noon. One loud storm passed by to the west around 4PM. It dropped very little rain, but did cool things off a little.

The bottom line is I let the weather or the anticipation of the weather dictate my activity over the last couple of days. All of the things I want to do are outside activities, so some concern about the weather is necessary. Tomorrow I’m going to ignore the forecast and see what kind of trouble that gets me into.

The campground was really empty this morning after a couple more of the weekend residents departed. There were only three of us left in this loop of 30 sites. There may have been a couple more in the other loop of 30 sites. Late this afternoon two more RVs arrived. Just my luck, one of them is on the site beside me.

Monday October 5th 2020

Today marks five years living in my RV home on my Rambling Road Trip. On this day in 2015 I took delivery of my motorhome in Sherman Mississippi. I moved in with the limited supplies I drove to Mississippi with from my home in New Hampshire and haven’t departed for more than a few weeks since then. My first journey was the return trip to New Hampshire to transfer more necessities to the RV and work on preparing my sticks and bricks house for sale. I didn’t put the house on the market and sell it until August of 2016, so the RV became my only home in September of 2016.

In the five years I’ve lived in my RV home, I’ve traveled almost 40 thousand miles in the RV with another 50 thousand in the SUV once I’ve parked the motorhome. I’ve stayed in 32 of the 50 states for at least a few nights and done some touring. By no means have I seen more than a small percentage of the sights in each of those states. I anticipate many return trips in the years to come. I’ve also passed through another five states in my travels (West Virginia, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Ohio, and Illinois). I also spent several days in 2017 driving around Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. Overall I’ve touched 38 states on my Rambling Road Trip.

Florida, Nevada, Arizona and Massachusetts have hosted the most nights on my travels. Florida is my state of domicile and my primary winter location. Nevada and Arizona have also been escapes from the harsh temperatures of the north. Most of my stay in Massachusetts was while I prepared my house for travel and to visit friends and relatives. They are likely to remain the states with the most nights visited. In the original grand scheme of things, the mid west and the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains were supposed to get the focus of this year and next. The pandemic changed this years plans and next year I will probably stay in the east. Once travel without extra worry becomes easier, I’ll get to those states and Alaska eventually. Hawaii is out. The motorhome doesn’t float.

The motorhome has held up well, but there are a lot of things I have to address this winter. The CO/Propane detector is the most recent addition to the list. It’s five year expiration alarms were the first reminder of the anniversary of my purchase. I’ll work on the easy ones this winter and find a mobile RV technician or service center to take care of the others.

Sunday October 4th 2020

This was a dull day. It rained most of the night transitioning to showers as the morning came. The time between showers got longer as the day progressed. The one constant was the heavy cloud cover that kept it from becoming a bright and cheery day.

I managed to get a couple of walks to the beach and boat launch on the lake in between showers. I was surprised to see a couple of families in the day use area enjoying picnic lunches. They could have found a better day. Even the birds, squirrels and gopher tortoises weren’t out in the park today.

The rest of my day was occupied with the football games on TV and the NASCAR race from Talladega AL. The finish of the super speedway race was very exciting with major crashes on several of the last laps leading to a photo finish. The football game I really wanted to watch between the Patriots and the Chiefs didn’t happen. It may be played tomorrow night, if COVID testing doesn’t find anymore positive players on the teams.

The campground is back to its quiet non weekend state. All of the weekenders packed up this morning between rain showers and headed for home. The dogs that announced my presence every time I stepped outside have departed with there people. There are two or three empty sites between me and my nearest neighbor. I’m looking forward to the quiet weekdays before the crowds return for next weekend.

Saturday October 3rd 2020

Today’s weather was on a downward trajectory. It was cloudy and cool this morning and ended warm, humid and rainy. The rain began as an occasional light shower around 3PM and progressively got harder and more persistent.

My focus for the day was on catching up on a few maintenance tasks starting with installing the new Carbon Monoxide and Propane Gas detector I bought yesterday. It didn’t go smoothly. I thought I’d bought the exact same model as the original, but it turns out to be a different model. This one is smaller and doesn’t fill the entire cutout in the wall. At this point, I’m not sure what to do. Did I buy an inferior model or is it a newer version of the five year old unit? Can I still buy the model I’m replacing? What is the difference between the two other than size? So far, the internet hasn’t helped.

On a more positive maintenance task, I fixed my leaky sewer hose. My fifteen foot “stinky slinky” hose developed a leak right in the middle. My solution was to cut the hose at the leak and make two shorter hoses. All I needed to do was add a couple of new connectors. I had one and bought the other yesterday. My fifteen foot hose is now one seven foot hose and one eight foot hose. I now have more options to deploy only the right amount of hose starting at eight feet and going up to over forty five feet. Believe it or not, I’ve needed that much hose and more before.

The third planed task was working on my RV water pump. I got a bought a replacement pressure switch awhile back but haven’t installed it yet. Today’s rain kept me from getting that task done. I was just starting to dig into the outside water compartment when the rain started. It will have to wait for another day.

College football games on TV and a few home improvement shows filled out my day.

Friday October 2nd 2020

I drove up to the Camping World store on Interstate 4 east of Tampa today. They had the 32 inch wiper blades I needed to replace my old shredded set. I also found a replacement Carbon Monoxide and Propane gas detector for my RV home. My current detector reached the five year expiration date last week. It chirps to indicate it needs to be replaced until you reset it. Three days later it repeats the chirping. Eventually, the only way to stop it will be by disconnecting it from the twelve volt power. When I go home I replace the wiper blades. Tomorrow I’ll replace the CO/Propane detector.

The trip up to Tampa was a little more exciting than I needed. Traffic on Interstate 75 between here and Tampa was very heavy. Each of the three or four lanes of travel was full of cars. I was in a middle lane with cars on both sides. A squarish brown thing came bouncing down the highway between lanes in front of me and then into my lane. I had nowhere to go but right into and over it. I believe it was a sofa cushion or pillow. It hit the front of my SUV and went under the car. It looked like blue foam rubber in the rear view mirror. So far, I haven’t found any damage. I still need to crawl under the vehicle and look more closely. Everything happened quickly. Somehow I knew it wasn’t a very dense object by the way it was bouncing, but it still wasn’t a fun experience.

Back at Lake Manatee State Park this afternoon the park has filled up for the weekend. Tents, tent trailers and small travel trailers stated showing up Thursday afternoon. Tonight most of the sites are occupied by people exhibiting all the characteristics of weekenders not travelers. They have plenty of toys like kayaks and bikes and they gather around smoky campfires. The sleepy campground has turned into a hub of activity. Now if the four dachshunds at the next site would stop barking every time I step out of my RV, it would be a peaceful weekend.