Friday October 20th 2023

This was a travel day. For once the weather cooperated. It wasn’t hot, windy or rainy. There was perhaps too much glare inducing sun, but dashboard visibility issues are a small annoyance for an overall nice day.

The TV in my bedroom came on at 7:30AM as directed. This is my form of alarm clock. Other than about half an hour for coffee and breakfast, I worked steadily to get on the road. I was in the dumping station as the 11AM checkout time arrived. A few minute later I pulled out of the Ortona Lock South Campground for my 130 mile drive north into central Florida.

All of the journey was on state and US routes. Most of the roads were multi lane and there was only a few short stretches of construction. The first half of the trip was not difficult. Traffic was light until I started to pass through the bigger towns starting with Sebring. In the towns there were numerous traffic lights going through business districts with plenty of big box stores. Drivers don’t know how dangerous it is to jump in line in front of a big motorhome then slow down. There is a reason I keep a lot of space between me and the guy in front. I can’t stop as quickly as they can. There were a few instances of hard braking on my part. The inside of my RV home was a little the worse for the braking, but nothing broke.

Once I reached Lake Wales travel really slowed down. Not only did I have lots of traffic lights to deal with, lots of traffic was added in to the mix for the last 25 miles of my trip. It took multiple light cycles to get through some of the traffic signals. Clearly I was back in the busy congestion of central Florida.

I arrived at the Kissimmee South RV Resort in Davenport Florida about 2:30PM. This is the same park I spent a little over a month at last year at this time. I’ll be here for a month again this year. It isn’t a park I thought I’d make a return visit, but it isn’t bad, just not my preferred style of park. It is a long term 55+ RV community and a mobile home park. When booked for a month at a time it is a good value for what you get.

Just like last year, I’m not in the site I thought I was booking. You are required to select a site on the booking web page, but they clearly state it is not guarantied. The park staff seems to adjust to prioritize by size, duration of stay and returning residents. I’m not on the greatest site. It was hard to get backed in and a power line is preventing me from raising my satellite dish.

I had an audience for the whole backing up and setup activity. My new neighbors had all kinds of information they were anxious to provide, but none of it was related to assisting me with backing up. This was my day for people wanting to talk while I was trying to get something accomplished. I had a talkative neighbor while hooking up my car for towing this morning too.