Diving in a River, snorkeling in the Gulf

 Now for something completely different. Our USA Dive Club arrnaged a 'mini-trip' to the Crystal River area in N Florida over a weekend. Saturday was scuba diving in the Spring-fed Rainbow River - which stays a constant 72-3 degrees all year long. That's chilly for me, since I am a card-carrying member of the 80-80 club! That means I'll only go diving if both the water and the air are 80 degrees or more. But, what good are rules if not for making exceptions. I wore my shorty/heavier wetsuit over my regular thin wetsuit and, after the initial shock when jumping in the water, I was OK. 

Swimming thru the grass-covered bottom of the river was a trip. I would bury myself down in the long, swaying grasses and it felt like I was in an other-worldly dream sequence, flying thru a never ending field of streamers. See video here. 

We saw turtles, gars, and underwater caves. No manatees because it's the wrong time of year, and no alligators because they were hiding. The most interesting thing was where the spring water bubbles up through the sand. There was not just one spring head, the spring water boil up through the bottom of the river all along the way. See video here.

After the river dive, we went back to our camper to change, then met the group at a restaurant for lunch. After lunch, we went back to the camper and crashed, ready for another early morning the next day. 

Our campsite at a Harvest Host location. Electric hookup and good Wi-Fi, what more can you ask. Oh yea, built in alarm clock for 6am from the rooster.

Sunday was booked to go 'scalloping' in the Gulf

It was a Gorgeous day, and I loved snorkeling in the warm waters of the gulf. No wetsuit at all, just swimsuit and rash guard, mask, snorkel, and fins. I haven't done that in so long I'd forgotten how to dive down. It was fun getting practice. The scallops are really easy to get. They are just clam type shells hanging out in the grass, when you find one you just pick it up and put it in your bag. I only found one scallop, but that's better than nothing. The others, including our guides got enough for an appetizer at a local restaurant who cooks your catch. They were DEElicious.

One more stop before going home. Our friend Linda Payne was performing at The Villages - it's on our way home, so we contacted them to get tickets. How cool, Linda, her brother, and her sister have been singing together since they were kids and they have wonderful harmonies. 

By the time her concert was over, it was way to late to drive all the way home, so we pulled into the nearest Cracker Barrel for the night and crashed with visions of a good breakfast awaiting us.

It was  bit hot and took us several hours before we fell asleep when the temperature got below 80 a bit after midnight.

What a cool weekend!

Jim and Jimmy go diving

I'm a member of the 80/80 club based on the principle that I love to scuba dive, but only when the water temperature is at least 80, AND the air temperature is also 80.

Jim is not a member of said club. He'll go diving any time.

His longtime dive buddy, Jimmy, is also not a member. So when Jimmy comes down to visit us from New jersey, in January, they go diving. Here they are sometime in 1983-84 as part of the Mobby Lobster club in Long Beach Island, New Jersey. I think the club was supposed to be the Moby Lobster club, but someone made a typo! Check out those huge lobsters! The story that Jimmy tells is that he -Jimmy- caught every one of these lobsters! What a guy, letting his friends hold 'em.

Left to Right: Mike Robinson, Bob Gale, Jimmy Lyon, Bob Hires, Don Southwick, Jim Guld

The water temp is in the mid to low 70s this time of year. The air temp has varied from 55 to 80. And the weather has generally been gorgeous. In the 10 days he was here, they went diving 5 days, 2 dives each day. 3 times with South Florida Diving Headquarters and twice with ScubaTyme.

All totaled, they caught 16 lobster.

I ate 2! We invited Jo Ellen to join us for dinner as well. Jo Ellen was Jim's wife at the time that old photo was taken. Jim often retells the story of calling her to say, "I caught dinner. Get out the BIG pot!"
Now he cooks them on the grill.

Home in Fort Lauderdale

After our summer tour of about 4,000 miles, we are back in Florida, and back in our townhouse in Fort Lauderdale. We learned that our Air Conditioning had died while we were gone. That's OK, it's not hot here ...........
Right!
We called whoever we could find and paid whatever they asked to get that fixed ASAP!

We did Episode 94 of our Live "What Does This Button Do" Show in Air conditioned comfort, with blazing fiber-optic Internet, a big desk, and all our technology in one room where it can be set up and stay! Ahhhh.
Hmm, am I sounding like I'm getting tired of being on the road? Maybe a little. But leave me home for more that a few weeks and I'll sound tired of that too! I love them both!
We didn't have much time at home because we were scheduled to fly to California for Chris to attend the Google Top Contributor's conference (yes, waaay cool.) We had a lot of work to catch up on ... Chris wanted to get the first edition of her Google Photos book done before going to Google, but when we woke up Monday morning to a flat calm, perfect for kayak diving, day - we had no choice. We had to go.

And, of course, we had to visit Chris' mom. She may not know who we are, but she likes anyone who will take her for ice cream!

And, HEY! I did get the book done. It's not ready for prime time yet - but it's ready to give out to some folks at Google and get their feedback.

This is our view on our morning walk just about a mile around a circle by our townhouse. You gotta agree, this ain't a bad place to be!

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RVing - Best of Times, Worst of Times

Our Summer Tour is getting off to an auspicious start! Just 3 nights out and we've covered some of the best and the worst that RVing has to offer. We got a late start the first day and decided there would not be time to enjoy the Harvest Host winery we had planned for the first night. Jim just kept on driving. We made it to Daytona where there is an RV park that we're familiar with, but the office was closed and we didn't see any notices about after hours arrivals - so Jim kept on driving. We ended up at a Cracker Barrel in Ormond Beach for the night.

That was a Saturday night. We were scheduled to do our weekly webcast at 2pm on Sunday. This meant we would either need to do it from a parking lot running the generator, or put it in high gear to check in to our next destination after 1pm (their rules), plug in, set up equipment, keep our fingers crossed for good enough Internet connection, do a sound check, video check, and go live at 2.

Jim said, "No Problem" so we proceeded to Gamble Rogers state park on Sunday morning. They didn't release the site until about 1:15. Jim backed in and plugged in to power. We started the A/C units going - it's in the high 90s and got one slide extended. The second slide has to be manually maneuvered and takes us 10-15 minutes, so we left it in. Jim got the cameras, lights, and computers set up, I got my lesson plan notes together and got our Geek shirts out. We didn't want to put them on until the last minute because they would get all sweaty! Lights, camera, action, and we went live at 2:01. Everything went off without a hitch!
Big Sigh!
Here it is:


When we signed off - Jim was prepared with a little bottle of champagne to celebrate! And then we took a deep breath and took a look around at where we were.

WOW

One of the reasons we came here was to go to a winery called Flagler Beachfront Winery. Jim had heard about it long ago because it is owned by the same folks who own a very special Winery/Restaurant we went to in Ohio called Tarsitanos. In my blog post from that past visit, I said I'd be dreaming about the food there for a while to come. Well, the winery here doesn't have a full menu but the baguette and cheese plate was equally to-die-for! And I don't think I've ever had a wine I liked better than their Cabernet Sauvignon! We got a bottle to take home and a glass for the memory.

Flagler Beach right across the street from the winery

We went back to the RV and rested for a while, we were able to start a movie (Steve Jobs) from Amazon prime on our smart TV and it played just fine connected to our Verizon hotspot on my phone. But about halfway thru, I looked out the window and saw that beautiful golden glow of impending sunset. I paused the movie, grabbed the camera and told Jim we had to go outside!

OOOOhhhhh  AAAAAhhhhhh

It just doesn't get any better than this! See more pictures in our Google Photos album for July.

The next morning we were relaxed. Check-out time here is a very civilized 1pm. We had our coffee and read our emails and Facebook, and Jim said "How about a bike ride?" Sure! There's a nice sidewalk along A1A here. I really like bike riding in Florida ... it's flat! We rode as far as a county park and noticed this great workstation for bicyclists:

Self-contained Bicycle repair station

Read the QR code with your smartphone and get how to videos on bicycle repair!

By the time we got back, it was time to stow and go. The plan was just to drive until we felt like stopping, no plans for this night's stay. The following night we planned to be at a friend's B&B in North Carolina BigMill.com. A rest area, or another Cracker Barrel would be find for  this night.

About 5 o'clock we were hungry and decided to stop at a rest area to make some dinner. After dinner, Jim turned on the ignition, started to pull away, and the engine stalled - refusing to be revived. He raised the hood and looked to see if there was anything obvious. That's one very nice thing about the design of our motorhome - it's referred to as a Super-C. It's a class C with the cab over floor plan, but it's on a diesel medium-duty truck chassis (Kodiak chassis) with a front engine. You just lift the latches and raise the hood up and forward to gain access to the entire engine, unlike Class A motorhomes with the engine in the back that need a specialized RV service shop to work on it. Ours is a Chevrolet DuraMax 5500. It has a very good reputation and we can add our vote to its reliability.

This is a first in the 5 years we've owned this motorhome.

Anyway, Jim didn't see anything obvious. After letting it rest a bit, he tried again and it just wasn't going to start. So we called our Good Sam Emergency Road service and, after a bit of a hassle about an expired credit card allowing our membership to lapse just a few days ago, they made arrangements for us to get towed to a nearby truck repair shop. We slept in the RV in the shop's parking lot and they worked on it in the morning. It was a relatively simple problem with a clogged fuel filter, but it still took a few hours and $500 to diagnose and repair.

We're back on the road and very grateful that there are ways to get these kind of problems fixed. If that's the worst of times ... not so bad.

Even broken down and being towed ... Jim and I looked at our motorhome, then looked at each other and said, "Isn't that a nice looking rig?"

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A Great Start to 2016

We did nothing special for New Year's Eve. I think we were asleep by 11. But on New Year's Day we met old Fort Lauderdale friends for lunch at an outside patio bar and grill. What a gorgeous day! And good long time friends!

By January 5, we had to be over on the west coast of Florida because we had a seminar scheduled for the Greater Tampa Bay Computer User Group. We booked a week at our favorite campground - Thousand Trails, Peace River. That would put us in the right place for another seminar scheduled for the Sarasota Technology User Group, and a third that we were asked to present while we are at the Peace River campground.
We love this park. The natural beauty is stunning. We've stayed here for many months all totaled over the years, but it's been about 3 years since we've been here. Glad to see it is still as beautiful, and we took a spot right on the river.

The seminars for the computer user groups went well. We taught Google Photos for both groups.

And, using Google Photos, we made little movies of the events. Here's the one from the Sarasota group.

Then, we did an impromptu seminar for the folks at Peace River.

The Verizon signal is good enough here to do our Sunday show, so we'll stay till Monday, then head back to Fort Lauderdale for a few weeks. We will be back in the RV and headed to Riverside RV park for a Geek Week, the first week of February.

Verizon speeds at Peace River campground are excellent at 23Mbps down, and 8.2 Up. This will work to do our Sunday web show.

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Orlando and Disney

One of our goals in staying at the Thousand Trails Orlando park was to get some more use out of our Disney pass that we bought in the fall. We heard that the Flower and Garden Festival was on so I figured there would be some good photo ops.

 

 

This next picture was taken with Jim’s new Galaxy Note3 phone.  What a cool feature!  Picture in Picture.  It uses both the front and the rear cameras on the phone at the same time!

After visiting a few attractions at Epcot and getting our fill of delicious food at the International food stands around the World Showcase, we decided to take advantage of the park-hopping feature of our passes and head over to Animal Kingdom for the rest of the day.  We really enjoy the Safari ride there.

 

I had my camera on the action setting for these shots and snapped 3 or 4 of each animal.  Later, in looking at all the pictures that had been auto-backed up to my Google+ account, I saw that the “Auto-Awesome” feature had taken some of those animal sequences and turned them into animated .gifs!  How funny.

We ended the day with the roller coaster ride called Everest Expedition.  I’m not much of a roller coaster fan, but this one is fun.

More pictures on our March photo album.