We're getting ready to leave Paradise Island RV Park now. We've been here since July 2003. It's been a great experience to see what it's like to be settled in at a park, but it's time to get moving! This park is completely full now. The snowbirds come down from Canada every year. There are people here who know each other from many seasons of returning to this park. There is actually a 'No Vacancy' sign at the entrance! And, there are 232 sites here. Here's a photo taken from the roof of the office building: Here is our site at Paradise Island: Our foray into Wireless Internet for RV Parks was serendipitous here. It's the first RV park we approached with the question, "Are you interested in Wireless Internet?" They immediately said, Yes! Can you do it now? We moved in last July and Jim set up their office network and put a Wireless Access Point on their DSL connection. Everything worked great. All computers in the office now had Internet access, and 4 workstations were set up in the 'Guest Services' where people could plug in to ethernet, or they could sit anywhere in the room and use wireless. The wireless signal extended to the sites all around the office. We were in one of those sites, and it worked great for us. Jim's plan was to use inexpensive 'powerline' technology to extend the signal to other areas of the park. But, it didn't work :-( Powerline means using the electrical lines as your network cable. Jim could get it to work down one row of RVs north and south, but he couldn't find any electrical circuits that went east/west. Meanwhile, the managers of the park were at an RV show and met the folks from Coach Connect who said they had experience getting the signal to all corners of a park their size and they'd put it all in for free! Well, how can you beat that? So, we got to learn from Coach Connect. They installed mega antennas, 2 of them. Here's a photo of one: And, it works great! It really does reach 90% of all the sites in the park, even tho there are lots of trees. We were very impressed. Jim got to know the folks at Coach Connect and started handling some of their more difficult tech support calls. Then they asked us to visit another park in Florida that uses their services and help them out. Now, we're ready to go on the road and visit lots of RV parks. And, I expect, our primary focus will be selling Coach Connect. Just shows what can happen when you go with the flow! Since we will be leaving here soon, we wanted to impart as much knowledge as possible so they can keep their connections working. We put together a little seminar called Troubleshooting Wi-Fi. Jim presented it last night to an appreciative group of about 15 folks. Here's a photo:

Just fooling around here. Kayuba I love kayak diving.

On New Year's Day, we were parked at Easterlin County Park . I've been going to Easterlin Park since 1968. I was in high school then and we lived just a few blocks away on 38th street. 25 years later, after living in Canada, Berkely and several places in between, I ended up living on 33d street - just a little further away from Easterlin Park! It was my favorite place to take Odie for a walk - a beautiful park with a wild nature path. I always wanted to camp there, but never did. SO - in order to have an 'open-house' party on New Years, we parked the RV there for a couple nights. We wanted to show off 'Oh-Boy' in the best light, so we spent the afternoon cleaning and polishing. At midnight on New Year's eve, we climbed up on the roof - admired our blue-light satellite dish and contemplated our exciting life ahead. On New Years Day, several friends came to visit and we had a wonderful day!

Happy New Year! In our coach in Easterlin Park. It has been an exciting year. But nothing like the year to come.