Well it's good to be back on this keyboard while writing from a much different location and of course the scenery is so much different. It's much warmer here but the humidity wasn't as close as I anticipated. It was 88 when we pulled into the driveway and its supposed to go down into the 60's for the lows which is very nice but when we left the cabin yesterday morning it was 55 which is almost unheard of for this time of the year.
We pulled out for Florida after a 3'ish wake up for a 4 AM departure. It took me an hour to finish up winterizing the cabin and loading up the last few items into the truck before we said our good-bye's to the cabin and locked it and the gate at the foot of the drive. We saw one of the biggest bucks I've ever seen on the back road. It had a huge rack of at least 10-12 points and it was so majestic as it pranced down the road in front of us for at least a couple hundred feet before finally jumping off into the brush. Wow was it ever an alfa male. The ride down the mountain was uneventful and we finally stopped in Rock Hill to gas up and walk for a few minutes. We still try to stop every hour and half and walk due to me having that blood clot a few years back in my left leg. Walking every so often really makes for a much better ride and we lose maybe an hour during the whole trip. The trip took around 12 hours or so as most of the states have 6 lanes now except for parts of S.Carolina and Florida on I-95.
We were in Florida before lunch and stopped at the welcome center on I-95 for our cup of grapefruit juice before taking the off roads towards Ocala. That roadway now is nearly all 4 lanes and it saves about 40-50 miles in distance than taking I-95 to I-4. When we hit the city limits of Tampa the traffic was unbelievable. Lucky for us most of the back up was eastbound with all of the 4 lanes just barely moving, yikes where did all of these folks come from? The updated interstate which took years to complete is now outdated once again with such volume. The large bridge we cross to get into our county was stacked up with traffic for miles, oh well welcome back to cars, concrete and condos.
The tomato plants I set out when we were here in September survived the heat and lack of rain and one plant had a green tomato set. The weeds and grasses were evident but not nearly the shape it was after being gone initially for 4 months. The plants I brought back seemed to be in good shape and I will set them out in the garden tomorrow. We picked up GG around 5:30 and headed over to Amy and Tyler's for a delicious supper of cube steak, smashed taters and gravy, carrots and corn. GG made an apple which was very tasty as well. I got on the scales before going to bed and it read 10 pounds too much so I'm cutting down on desserts and any seconds until I can lose this extra weight. Hopefully I will get back to playing pickle ball daily starting on Monday which should help a little but the big difference is my volume and desserts.
Well the grand kiddos were all smiles and hugs especially little Eliza Faye for her grandma. She is growing up so fast now and has the vocabulary of a 7 or 8 year old. They were so cute and Sam has started a growth spurt as well. Ava is just so athletic and tall for her age as well. Tyler had part of his garden in and had several extra collard seedlings about 6-8 inches tall that he grew form seeds so I dug some up for my garden. He also shared some heirloom kale seeds which I will get in the ground in the next couple of days. Well that was about it except after dropping GG off we stopped at Aldi's on the way home for some groceries. It wasn't long after I finished unpacking and a hot shower I was really for some horizontal lab around 10'ish. Nancy took pictures with her I-Pad for Facebook so I don't have any to share, LATER
Many thanks to all who remembered us in your thoughts and prayers for a safe trip. Please keep several especially Paw Paw in your prayers as he is back in the hospital at the VA in W.Va. He needs some blood transfusions as well as to get a few other issues corrected before going back to the rehab facility.
