Friday August 30th 2024

This is a road trip weekend, so the blog is getting a vacation.  I’ll be back with more content on Monday.

Thursday August 29th 2024

A few short duration storms hit this area today. Otherwise, it was the same kind of day as the last couple. There were scattered thunderstorms around the area from 11AM to 5PM. The temperature wasn’t extreme, but the humidity was well out of the comfort zone.

Today was another chores and errands day. The errands outside the RV resort had the odd assistance of less than normal traffic. Perhaps because of the approaching weekend, both yesterday and today have been quiet on the local roads. The stores, including Walmart, seemed to be less busy as well. I am not going to complain. It just seems odd.

I expected to see more RVs arriving in the campground for the long weekend today. When I took my evening walk it didn’t seem to be the case. They arrive tomorrow, but it may also be related to the over all low activity level I’ve experienced on the roads the last two days.

Wednesday August 28th 2024

The weather today was a repeat of Tuesday. The scattered thunderstorms provided a lot of entertainment in the form of thunder and lightening. Once again my immediate area was spared a downpour, but the storms passed very nearby. The temperature floated a few degrees above and below ninety. The humidity on the other hand remained oppressive all day.

My excitement for the day was a visit to Disney’s EPCOT for dinner. I was in the mood for some Fish and Chips. The Yorkshire County Fish is my go to place. Today the fish and chips were very good. It had been suffering the last couple of visits.

When I arrived at the EPCOT parking lot I was very surprised to find the entire back section of the empty. I’ve never seen the parking lot so empty. The park was not busy. I usually see wait times over an hour for Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen Ever After. Tonight they were both around thirty minutes. I took advantage of short waits. It has been a long time since I rode either ride.

The park was probably empty because the International Food and Wine Festival begins tomorrow. All of the kiosks are setup, the cash registers and menus are in place and for the most part they look ready for the start of the festival. I noticed one thing that wasn’t ready yet. The town square in the model train track at the Germany pavilion always gets decorated with banners similar to the ones around the park celebrating the festival. When I look tonight the banners weren’t up and the people figurines and set pieces were all clustered together at the side of the square. Somebody needs to finish that little job. I assume there are other possibly bigger tasks remaining for the overnight hours, but I didn’t spot them. I’ll be back next week for my first visit to the festival this year.

Tuesday August 27th 2024

Today wasn’t extremely hot. The temperature was about average at 92 Fahrenheit, but the humidity was high. The daily thundershowers were small intense storms, but they were widely spaced. I heard thunder and saw lightening on the horizon in all directions. While I was out driving, I turned away from the storms a couple of times. My luck held and I never got caught in one.

This was a chores and rest kind of day. I got caught up on a few things around my RV home in the morning. During the afternoon I was back on the shoe search trail. It wasn’t very productive. This is when I kept turning whenever I saw black clouds ahead. Such a random path doesn’t support getting to your destination very well. As a result, I never made it inside a shoe store. Just a random Target.

The storms were gone by the six o’clock hour. I took the short form walk around the park. There were still enough clouds that I didn’t want to chance another storm. The Sandhill Cranes were back in the park this evening. This seems to be the same pair I’ve seen several times in the last month. Sandhill cranes are one of the bird species that mate for life.

Monday August 26th 2024

After breakfast this morning I dug my air compressor out of its basement storage hiding place. It hides behind extra power cords and hoses. I needed one of those extra power cords to reach the drivers rear tire on my car. The pressure in the bad tire had only gone down another pound since yesterday afternoons display of warning messages on the dashboard. It only took a couple of minutes to top off the tire once I got the compressor out of the storage bin. Getting the compressor out and putting it away again is the longest and hardest part of the whole activity.

With an aired up tire, I headed for a tire store. There are several in one area a mile or so from my campsite. I ended up at the Firestone service center. An hour of time and fifty dollars in “change” got me a patched tire. I only have about ten thousand miles on these tires, so I didn’t want to buy new one. Getting tires repaired seemed to be a thing today. While I waited, two other people were in to get tires repaired.

Most of the afternoon was filled with thunderstorms. For a few I was out in traffic once again. Luckily, I was sitting in my RV home for the worst storm. The lightening show was impressive. After the storms, I walked down to the park retention ponds in search of the water birds. There weren’t any around this evening. Perhaps they fled before the storms to a new area.

Sunday August 25th 2024

Weekend days are no different than week days to me, but I did sleep in again today. The forecast called for rain in a similar fashion to yesterday. Today I got caught on the road when the storm arrived around 4PM.

I was in Kissimmee once again looking for the shoes I’ve searched for off and on all summer. It is getting to the point where the need is greater than the procrastination. I still didn’t make a purchase, but did find a few more places to shop. Unfortunately, I was a long way from home when the very heavy rain began. Complicating things was the heavy traffic I was also caught in. Visibility was not very good.

Adding to the tension driving home in the rain was a warning message on the dashboard. The diagnostic came on to indicate that the driver side rear tire was low on air pressure. It was 31 or 32 pounds when I last looked. The message center was reporting it to be 27 pounds in the middle of the rain storm. As I drove home it went down more to 26. Clearly I had damaged the tire in some way.

It was a slow leak, so I got home OK. After sitting in the car until the rain let up a little I made it inside my RV home. Once the rain ended I checked the tire and found the head of a screw, nail or something on the surface of the tire. Tomorrow morning I did out the compressor and fill the tire with air. There are a couple of tire sales places less than two miles away. Hopefully, they can put a plug in it. I really don’t want to buy a new tire. This one only has 10,000 miles on it.

This afternoon’s rain was heavy and long. The retention ponds at the RV resort have more water tonight. Only a couple of birds had returned. The others were probably still taking refuge from the rain.

Saturday August 24th 2024

I got a late start to the day. The weather forecast, when I got up, called for rain around 2PM. That meant any plans for outdoor activities had to fit in a very narrow window. I had to adjust accordingly. The rain turned out to be many small random storms. You had to be in the wrong place at the right time to get caught in a storm. I only got caught in one about 5PM.

This week has gone by very quickly. It is hard to believe it is Saturday. In a similar way, the summer has also passed quickly. The fact that labor day weekend is only a week away is also hard to believe. The population in this RV resort is also increasing as the holiday weekend approaches. I have a new neighbor on the site I thought might be out of service since they took the picnic table away at the end of June. The people that arrived yesterday are making do without a table. They seem to be using the available space for an additional car. I think the rule is to park on the concrete surface only, but they are cramming three cars into all the available space including the grass. As long as they don’t park on my site.

Yesterday’s rain also added enough water to the retention ponds that the water birds are back. The egrets and herons are busy plucking morsels of food out of the flooded grass area. I got a couple of nice pictures of the birds from distance on my walk this evening. The birds are easily spooked. It is hard to get very close to them.

Friday August 23rd 2024

I had an active day despite misinterpreting the weather forecast again. This morning the rain was forecast to start in the early afternoon and continue for a couple of hours. I planned to go grocery shopping during the rainy period and maybe to Disney’s Hollywood Studios in the evening. My plans held, but the weather didn’t.

The afternoon rain didn’t happen. I still went grocery shopping since I was in need of a few things. My grocery shopping habit has changed since I’ve been here long term. Rather than doing big grocery runs more than a week apart, I seem to be going more often and buying less. Today’s shopping was focused on getting fluids, pastries and some meats.

When I checked the online updated weather forecast after getting home from grocery shopping all of the rain was gone from the forecast. It looks like many other people thought going to Disney’s Hollywood Studios Friday evening. There were many people arriving at 4PM when I got to the gate. The wait times that were reasonable when I checked earlier in the afternoon were climbing rapidly. I walked around the park looking for reasonable wait times without any real success. Forty minutes for Toy Story Mania was the best I found.

After making the complete circuit of the park, I settled on watching the Frozen Ever After Singalong show. This is a fun retelling of the Frozen story with a lot of contemporary humor thrown in. It was a good show as usual. Once it was over and I returned to the outside sun, the western horizon was getting very dark. A quick recheck of the weather called for heavy rain for the seven, eight and nine o’clock hours.

My decision on where to eat was answered by the updated weather forecast. I ate at home. The drive home wasn’t fun. All of the traffic was compounded when the heavy rain began. Most of the time the traffic crawled slowly possible. In the one area that the traffic lessened, a sheriff car’s blue lights guarded an overturned SUV in the grassy gutter. Overall, it probably took three times the normal length of time to get home. A bit of an adventure for sure.

Thursday August 22nd 2024

The operative word for the day was HUMIDITY. I woke up to the sound of rain on the roof. It wasn’t heavy just persistent. The TV weather forecast called for rain most of the day. After the first period of rain ended, I stepped outside to do a couple of tasks. The air was so thick with humidity that you could cut it with a butter knife. Despite the forecast the off and on rain ended in the late afternoon. The sun even broke through for a while. Today’s high temperature was in the mid eighties.

During most of the rainy part of the day, I was running errands. That basically means shopping in the form of looking not buying. It was often necessary to sit in the car and wait for the rain to let up. For the most part I was successful staying dry.

I got in my afternoon walk around the RV resort once the rain let up. The humidity was so high that the simple act of hiking drenched my shirt with sweat. I was surprised to see a departure by an RV that I assumed was permanent. Overall, there are more new long term RVs arriving. You can tell by the pressure treated lumber that they buy shortly after arriving. The lumber gets turned into steps and decks around their RVs. I assume they need to sign a long term lease on the site before the park allows them to build the structures.

Today’s rain was light overall. There hasn’t been more than a few minutes of heavy rain over the last week or so. The retention ponds have gone down significantly as a result. Today I only saw one bird in all of the retention ponds. They’ve found better feeding grounds in better waters.

Wednesday August 21st 2024

The weather pattern that settled in yesterday continued today. A southwest wind is bringing humidity and thunderstorms to the area. The forecast for the day was very similar to Tuesday, but it wasn’t as dependable. The rain forecast for mid day didn’t arrive until mid to late afternoon. The real heavy rain fell during the dinner hour.

I was back to my old habit of letting the weather forecast control my day. During the early part of the day I worked on chores and errands. The plan was to head for Disney World after the rain. Heading to an outdoor theme park when the rain is pouring isn’t ideal. I choose to wait for another day. The better plan would have been to go in the morning when the clouds kept the temperature from climbing fast and it wasn’t raining.

The rain even got in the way of my evening walk around the RV resort. It looks like the park occupancy is increasing. Perhaps it is in the lead op to the Labor Day holiday weekend. Once I get a walk in, hopefully tomorrow, I’ll have a better idea.