Sunday March 30th 2025

The weather pattern is changing. The mostly dry days of winter with an occasional cold front moving across the state from northwest to southeast are getting replaced with summer weather. The humidity levels are rising and the daily weather pattern features rain and thunderstorms moving across the state. The wind direction getting determined by the natural differential in atmospheric pressure. Some days the rain moves from west to east and other day east to west. On really bad days it moves one way in the morning and the other in the afternoon. The visitor pattern is returning too.

My exercise walks this weekend have been around my base camp’s resort. They aren’t as long as some walks, but they include a rare element for Florida walks, hills. The resort has nine west east roads that go up a gentle hill. I usually only go up once, but when I’m looking for a little extra I can add a road or two. It doesn’t help that I usually do my walking during the warmer part of the day near evening. Most of the people that walk around here are out in the morning before the warmth of the day settles in.

The number of occupied units in the park is going down. Needless to say people don’t check out with me, but as I drive and walk around the park more golf carts and a few cars are getting covered. Some awnings and blinds are closed. In general there seem to be fewer people around.

Thursday March 27th 2025

I try to get in a mile or two of walking everyday. The issue is finding a good place to get in the exercise. Walking around this park gets old. I need variety and interesting things to take pictures. There are a couple of wildlife preserves nearby and Disney World. I use the theme parks as a place to get my walking exercise.

The blackout period associated with my Walt Disney World annual pass was over as of Monday. The next blackout period begins in the middle of April, so I need to get in my visits while I can. On Tuesday afternoon I went to EPCOT and today I went to Animal Kingdom. In both cases I only rode a ride or two. My main purpose was getting in some exercise, taking a few pictures and watching the antics of my fellow visitors. It is easy to get in two or three miles as measured by my Fitbit while walking in from the parking lot and making a loop or two around the park.

On Tuesday EPCOT was very busy. The Flower and Garden Festival continues to draw guests to the park. It was a good thing I didn’t need to ride any of the rides. Wait times were very long. Today at Animal Kingdom it wasn’t busy, but it was Sunny and warm. The nice weather sent the animals into the shade for a nap.

Sunday March 23rd 2025

I put in a lot of driving miles this weekend. It was largely aimless wandering with a few stops here and there, but one thing was constant; traffic. I have been commenting, maybe even complaining about traffic in these blog entries a lot recently. The real problem is the drivers.

There seems to be an absence of patience, preparation and common sense in the drivers on the road. I might exhibit these to other drivers as well, but I think I am not guilty of all of them. The lack of patience is demonstrated by continued weaving in and out of lanes of slow moving traffic in an attempt to gain a few more car positions. It doesn’t seem to work. They still break out of the traffic at about the same time I do after remaining in one lane for the entire slow down period.

Preparation and common sense go hand in hand. If you know that you’re going to have to turn right or take an exit soon, don’t stick in the left high speed lane. You need to get into the right lane long before the turn arrives. You need patience to travel a little slower for a mile or so. If you don’t and remain in the wrong lane, have the common sense not to slow down or stop in the middle of a high speed lane. Know that it is safer and more courteous to proceed forward to the next opportunity to reverse direction or otherwise correct for your poor navigation. This is similar to an airplane pilot doing a “go around” after a failed landing attempt.

While I’m on my soap box about drivers, what happened to using your directional signal before changing lanes. It would be nice to know what the other drivers intent is. This is particularly important in merge situations. It is very hard to know when they are giving up scooting by slow or stopped traffic in the lane that is ending and joining those of us that were prepared and patiently waited in the through lane.

End of soapbox blog post.

Thursday March 20th 2025

Note to self; Sea World Orlando is busy during spring break. It started with heavy traffic on the roads. Overall it took almost double the usual time to get from my base camp to Sea World. Next up was finding one of the few available parking spaces at the back of the lot. I think they opened a backup lot shortly after I arrived. The lines began at the entrance turn styles and continued throughout the park and the shows filled up fifteen or more minutes before start time. I had a good time, but didn’t get to do all the shows.

The dolphin show was great as usual. I allowed plenty of time to make sure I got in, but that didn’t work with the other two big shows. The timing didn’t work out well for the sea lion show or the Orca show unless I stayed well into the evening. Staying late would have presented more traffic problems getting home.

I took plenty of great pictures. Here are a few.

Sunday March 16th 2025

It is spring break time and traffic conditions seem to prove that out. The number of cars on the road is higher than it has been since Christmas time. There are also many RVs on the roads. Traffic backups are much longer than normal. I haven’t noticed the increase in visitors during the spring break periods in past years since I was moving at least every two weeks. This made comparisons over time more difficult. I was also not in this central Florida area during March. The theme parks are a magnet to families. This is a school vacation week for most of Florida and the neighboring states.

The other thing that I am surprised about is the apparent end of snowbird season. It doesn’t seem like it is time yet. In my head the end of March is when everyone starts to return north. When I was in Arizona during March a few years ago, people started leaving at the beginning of March, but I thought Florida was different. I guess not. As I walk around the park, I already see more and more vacant units. They have been buttoned up for the summer. The park owners association annual meeting is this coming week and the office transitions to summer hours at the end of March.

I escaped today’s traffic with a visit to a nearby wildlife preserve. There was only one car in the parking area, but I didn’t see anyone around. I took a walk along the trails and around one of the little ponds. It didn’t qualify as a hike, because it was far from strenuous. Still, it was a good visit with nature.

Thursday March 13th 2025

I’ve visited Disney twice this week. It is a great place to get in some exercise while seeing the pretty flower displays and the antics of crazy visitors. I need to get in my time this week, since next week is a blackout week for my annual pass. The months of March and April have a lot of blackout days for Spring Break and Easter vacation periods.

Crowds at the theme parks were up this week. I didn’t ride many attractions. The lines were just too long. On Tuesday I walked around EPCOT taking pictures of the flower and garden festival. Today I walked around the Magic Kingdom and had a supper of Lobster Roll, Clam Chowder and Fries at Columbia Harbor house. I followed it up with a Brownie Sunday at Anti Gravities. The crowds discouraged me from remaining for fireworks so I was home by 8:30PM.

Sunday March 9th 2025

I spent the weekend in search of wildlife. On Saturday I drove north to Clermont. The park on the shore of Lake Minneola usually has a lots of wildflowers in bloom and a few wadding birds along the lake. On this visit all I found was people partying. The park seems to be very popular for birthday and anniversary parties. All of the pavilions seemed to have the balloons and music of merriment as people celebrated. The only wildlife I found suitable for picture taking were a couple of squirrels.

Today, Sunday, I drove south to the Kissimmee River area east of Lake Wales. This area has had a lot of birds and even an alligator or two in past visits. Today I didn’t find much of interest. There were a few birds occupying the buoys in the river and what I think was an Osprey down river fishing by diving toward the water from about thirty feet in the air. It was unsuccessful as each dive ended well above the waters surface.

Traffic both days this weekend was heavy. It doesn’t help that most of my driving is in the afternoon and early evening. I try to get my chores around the base camp done in the morning before I venture out. Today’s task was of the yard work variety. I had to trim the Bougainvillea bush. It has beautiful purple flowers, but the stems have little thorns and it grows rapidly. This is the third time this “winter” I’ve had to trim it.

Thursday March 6th 2025

The Flower and Garden Festival began on Wednesday at Disney’s EPCOT. Having learned my lesson visiting the last festival on opening day, I had no plans to attend on Wednesday. The opening day crowds are just too much. The weather on Wednesday was also very windy and a little wet. I waited until today, Thursday, to go to the 2025 Flower and Garden Festival for the first time. It was a beautiful slightly cooler than normal day.

There were plenty of people at EPCOT today. It probably was as busy or more so than it was on the opening day. Large groups, strollers and Electric Convince Vehicles filled the walkways and often block the path forward. If people drove the way they navigate around a theme park, the roads would be lined with smashed cars and long backups. Dodging people to get a clear view of the flowers and the topiaries was quite a challenge. It was well worth it. The colorful displays and artistic topiaries were beautiful.

I took lots of pictures, but stopped taking pictures of the topiaries halfway around the World Showcase. I need to save some for later. The festival runs until the beginning of June.

Topiaries

Butterflies

Flower Blossoms

Sunday March 2nd 2025

The weather cooperated this weekend. It was great weather for a walk around the pond in the nearby wildlife management area. The last week of warmer weather following a few days of rain really brought out the wildflowers. I tried to take pictures of a lot of them, but the overcast lighting conditions made some of my attempts futile. Catching a picture of the illusive turtles was also difficult. They seemed to know I was approaching before I actually saw them. Most of the time I only heard the sound of a splash as it dived for the bottom. It was a refreshing afternoon walk.

I have also been able to get in a few additional walks around resort. This is the peak period for northern visitors to Florida as is clear by the heavy traffic on the area roads, but there are still a few residents that haven’t returned to the park this winter. The units still show signs of being in “storage” mode. There are also a number of homes up for sale, but most of those are still occupied.

It is interesting to observe the license plates on the cars in the resort. After Florida the most prevalent state of origin seems to be Michigan. There is even a notice about a meet up in Michigan this summer in the park newsletter. Ohio and Pennsylvania are also well represented in the park. A couple of plates from Nova Scotia are a surprise. I’m not sure I’ve seen any other travelers from that Canadian Provence on my Rambling Road Trip.

February was a busy month in the resort and March seems to be even busier, but the month of April is quiet. Many people will be returning north before Easter.