Thursday October 30th 2025

On Tuesday of this week I made my annual visit to Disney’s Fort Wilderness campground to see the Halloween decorations on display at most of the campsites. A few sites were occupied by people that were there only as spectators, but most likely they were just surprised by the holiday celebration they found. The collection of blow up figures, hand made items and absolutely amazing coordinated displays is over the top.

I parked at the Transportation and Ticket Center and made my way via monorail to the Magic Kingdom and then via boat to Fort Wilderness. It was still daylight when I arrived. Being able to walk around during daylight turned out to be a good thing. Sunday and Monday’s rain storms had left parts of the campground flooded. The roads were all high and dry, but some campsites were closed with pump hose lines crossing them and water filled puddles lined many of the campground loop roads. After dark trying to stay out of the golf carts way as I walked around the loops became an exercise in not falling off the edge of the road into the mud.

This year I only walked five of the loops leaving ten or twelve unvisited. There seemed to be a lot more fast moving golf carts circling to see the decorations. Even though I dressed in bright light colors, I feared for my safety a few times. I cleared out and headed for home a little after eight. To make up for my incomplete visit, I watched the a full tour of the decorations on one of my favorite YouTube channels on Wednesday night. The ResortTV1 YouTube channel did a 5 hour live stream from a golf cart touring all the loops in the park.

Sunday October 26th 2025

The weather has been a state of transition. It varies from sunny to rainy throughout the day with plenty of wind to go with it. I wouldn’t call it bad weather. It just isn’t predictable enough for extended outside activities. Tomorrow’s forecast is currently predictable in the negative direction of almost total rain.

This also seems to be the start of the new season in Florida. Not a weather based season, but a tourism based one. Judging primarily by this park the snowbirds are back. Most of the units now have cars in front of them. The change has been pretty obvious over the last week. I noticed new arrivals every day. Sometime it was just a car that I hadn’t seen before and other times it was large scale unpacking from vans or trailers. My immediate uphill neighbors arrived Saturday morning. I am now completely surrounded by occupied lots.

The winter schedule in this park begins this week. The first weekly community campfire is Monday night and the first regular association board meeting of the season is scheduled for Wednesday night. Last winter I had very little interaction with the park activities. I am going to try to be a little more engaged this year.

Thursday October 23rd 2025

Wednesday was this weeks sol visit to Disney World. It was one of my usual visits to EPCOT for exercise and food. I also road the Spaceship Earth ride for the first time since its refurbishment. For the most part it looks brighter and cleaner now, but doesn’t include any major changes.

The EPCOT crowd level was only moderate. Walking around the World Showcase was only partially blocked by all the people. My timing could have been better. I got stuck between China and Germany by a raised draw bridge. The fireworks barges were getting relocated from backstage to the center of the lagoon for the night time fireworks show. The bridge opening added fifteen to twenty minutes to the walking time around the water.

The most interesting and frustrating part of Wednesday’s visit to EPCOT was the strip home. I departed EPCOT before the evening rush hour had run its course. It took about an hour and a half to cover the usual half hour journey. Most of it was spent just trying to get to and on the Interstate 4 highway. The single file one lane backup was over a mile long and was complicated by all the impatient drivers that chose not to join the end of the line and try to force their way into th solid line at the last minute. Most of the perpetrator were in Florida tagged cars so I don’t think ignorance by tourism can be an excuse.

Around my base camp things continue to get more active. I see cars in front of previously empty trailers every day. The number of golf carts flying up and down the roads is also increasing daily. Regular winter activities return November 1st.

Sunday October 19th 2025

We seem to be living in a world of colliding holidays. Halloween decorations and candy started appearing in stores during August. The big home improvement stores had aisles of blowup ghouls, ghosts, vampires, witches as wells all shapes and sizes of pumpkins. In September, as the Halloween decorations got sold the space was filled with Christmas decorations.

Last week, during a visit to Lowes, one side of the main aisle had Halloween and the other side had Christmas decorations. The motion detectors on the Halloween zombie decorations would trigger when you got near setting off motion detectors in Santa Claus across the aisle. There is something very weird about Santa and the devils friend having a conversation in a home improvement store.

This weekend the Halloween blowups were all relegated to a little corner area. The rows were lined with Christmas trees and blowup Christmas figures. Many of the blowups had a distinct Disney flare. I don’t know if the Disney touch is local to this area, but there sure were a lot of Mickey Ears on Santa Claus. It will be interesting to see what kinds of decorations show up at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Campground for each of the holidays. I plan to walk through the campground before Halloween to check out the usually over the top display and again near Christmas.

On a similar theme of pushing the holidays. The Hallmark channel’s Christmas movie marathon has started. It makes great background TV. All the plots are so similar that you don’t need to watch the whole thing to know what’s going on. You can also tell time within a two hour window by how well the leads like each other. In the first part they don’t like each other. During the middle hour they like each other leading up to a major disagreement. The last hour is filled with rebuilding their relationship leading to the happy ending. Everything else that goes on in the movie is used to disguised the basic plot and add the directors improbable hope for an award wining film.

Thursday October 16th 2025

Today was an EPCOT exercise day, but events almost conspired for me to get my exercise in another way. While I was on my way to EPCOT this afternoon a warning I have never seen on this car appeared on the dash. I was in danger of running out of gas. My random driving pattern over the last few days left me unaware of my fuel level. The warning was fortuitous. There was about fifteen miles to EPCOT without any gas stations on the route. A change of route was necessary to get gas. The alternative, although unlikely was getting my exercise walking for gas. Needless to say I took another route, stopped for gas and got to EPCOT a little later than planned.

EPCOT was very busy this afternoon and evening. It is still fall break in some of the area school districts which may be one of the reason for the crowds. Another reason is the overflow from the Magic Kingdom. It is a special admission Halloween Party there so the extra people are at EPCOT. Whatever the reason lines were long and just walking was challenging. So many people are oblivious to the crowds and seem to go out of their way to make it difficult for others to navigate the walkways.

I made one loop of the World Showcase and grabbed some desert even though I hadn’t eaten supper yet. The vanilla soft serve ice cream cone made with real vanilla bean is hard to skip. I debated another loop or waiting for a ride, but decided on a return to base camp for supper instead.

Sunday October 12th 2025

Fall has arrived in Florida. The thermometer didn’t reach eighty on Saturday and the overnight temperatures are steadily in the sixties. Even though daily highs will still be in the eighties and occasionally in the nineties, once the overnights get below seventies outside activities become much more pleasurable.

This weekend had two hikes (read as walks) in the outdoors on the agenda. One day was in the wildlife preserve near my base camp and the other was in a park around Lake Mineola in Clermont. Both were refreshing light exercise. I was disappointed not to see any wading birds to take pictures of, but found a few wild flowers available for pictures.

The area also seems to have a different vibe in the air. Traffic patterns are changing. Perhaps there are more car on the road. The park surrounding my base camp continues to come out of summer hibernation. Most of the returning residents have Florida license plates indicating they call this home and somewhere else their temporary home. I suspect the ones that claim northern residences as primary will arrive later. Either way there is more life in the place.

Thurday October 9th 2025

The weather this week has been variable. It has been mostly overcast each day with a tendency to rain for a few minutes every hour or so. Not terrible weather, but it does discourage outside activities. I have allowed the weather to keep me from getting my exercise at the Disney parks each day this week until today.

It didn’t rain this morning. The hour by hour forecast for the afternoon showed a chance of rain it the afternoon and evening. Still, I decided to give it a try. My choice of parks for my exercise was the Magic Kingdom. It was only open to regular day guests until 6PM. The evening was dedicated to a separate admission Halloween party event. People with tickets to the party can get into the park at 4PM. Until that witching hour the park is not crowded on party days.

I arrived at the park around 2PM with a plan to stay until it got too crowded. The wait times were fairly short, but the crowds along main street were heavy. The daily parade had just finished. Getting to the end of main street involved a lot of browsing in the shops waiting for the crowd to thin. Eventually I got to tomorrow land, my usual starting place. I started with a ride on the People Mover. It was one of those rare rides with the lights on in Space Mountain. It is always interesting to see the ride’s actual track.

Second on my touring plan was a visit to the Carousel of Progress. This ride show has intrigued me since the first time I saw it at the New York Worlds Fair in the mid sixties. The ride has changed a lot since then, but I really don’t remember the New York version. It is rumored to be getting updated again when they add a Walt Disney Animatronic next year.

When I finished the Carousel of Progress it was after 4PM. The Halloween party guests were starting to arrive. In addition to the party wrist bands they wore, many were in costumes so it was easy to identify them. Their arrival also drove wait times up. It wasn’t looking like a fun two hours to come and then I noticed the black clouds on the horizon. The decision was made, I headed for the exit. The rain began as I arrived in the parking lot near my car. I didn’t gt too wet, but it rained as I battled traffic all the way home.

Sunday October 5th 2025

This weekend’s weather has been less than ideal. The weather pattern called for brief periods of heavy rain followed by enough heat to dry the roads before another brief period of heavy rain about an hour later. Overall it wasn’t bad weather just not real outdoor weather.

Wandering around the park here at my base camp a little more evidence of activity has started to materialize. The most obvious change is the increased number of golf carts on the roads. Throughout the summer most of the golf carts sat rapped in tarps in the various yards while their owners were enjoying cooler climates. Now they are out numbering the cars on the park roads.

The organized activities that had decreased to a bare minimum during the summer are starting up again. The weekly Friday morning coffee social gathering has returned. I just wish they would find a better time for it. A gathering that runs from 7:30AM to 9:30AM isn’t going to get my attention. I’m barely awake by the time it’s over. This park must have a lot of early to bed early to rise leadership.

Another sign of activity is around the pickle ball court. The pile if leaves in the court has been removed and an umbrella for shade has miraculously appeared. Last winter a tarp surrounded the court fence as a shield from the wind. I imagine they will wait for hurricane season to end before they put that back up.

There also seems to be more activity at the dumpsters. During the summer I rarely saw anyone else dropping off their trash. The last couple of times I dropped my trash there was a bit of a traffic jam. The storage lot where the dumpsters are located is also starting to fill up with small trailers and RVs.

The official winter season here is from November first to March thirty first.

Thursday October 2nd 2025

October has arrived and maybe fall weather will arrive soon. It is getting dark noticeably earlier. The weather is getting a little more fall like. The high temperature most days is in the mid eighties, but ninety plus days are still mixed in for good measure. Most overnight temperatures are still in the seventies. Once they start dropping, fall will be here to stay. The hurricane season continues as well. The passage of tropical system Imelda this week a few hundred miles off Florida’s east coast brought a lot of clouds and some rain.

All that said, we still get late in the day thunderstorms. I arrived at Disney’s EPCOT on Monday shortly after 5PM in a downpour. I parked my car and waited for nearly half an hour before the rain started to let up and I could leave my car without getting soaked. By the time I reached the entrance, blue sky was returning overhead. I wasn’t wet from the rain, but I was wet from the tram. The seats on the parking lot shuttle tram were far from dry. Even though I didn’t sit in a puddle of water, as the tram moved the water from elsewhere on the seat seemed to make a beeline for my butt. It is not fun walking around with a wet rear end.

I made a full loop of the World Showcase with a break for a dinner of Fish and Chips in the UK Pavilion. The park got progressively more crowded as I proceeded through the various countries. Toward the end of the loop rain was threatening again. I choose to take my wet rear end home before the rest of me got into a similar state.

Today I finally got around to trimming my bougainvillea. The last two pictures represent the before and after. It still may get a little more trimming tomorrow.