Catching Up
The following notes are from the last few days, posted via Verizon Express Connect phone connection:
Yucky Business
It was "moving day," time to head further south in Florida to the Palm Beach area. So I get up early to take a shower, get ready to step into the shower stall..yuck...gray water 3" deep!! OK...so now I need to wake up Jim and give him this great news. You don't want to read the first few words he said.
The day before he had been "training" me on motorhome operations and I had drained the black and gray tanks. The gray tank seemed to not have much in it, but it was late in the day and we just sort of ignored that fact and completed the draining process..NOT! Apparently the gray tank valve didn't move and we were just getting out dribbles.
So we opened the gray valve (had to hook up all the sewer hoses again..bummer) and let the stuff dribble out over 3 hours so we could move on. The plan was to get to our new location, Lion Country Safari KOA in West Palm Beach, let the tank drain completely and then put in a new valve. We've had done that before and had a spare valve (thanks to my paranoid husband).
Guess what? We arrived and set up, pulled the gray valve and it gushed out and drained. As sometimes happens, the jostling of travel fixes things!
Today a new valve got installed thanks to the resident sanitary engineer and all is well!
Internet Withdrawal
We had requested a "satellite friendly" site at KOA and the first site we were assigned would have worked. However, the space to fit into between patio and pine tree was 8' wide. We are 8' wide and with slide extended we are 11'. So we had to juggle around to fit, back and forth, camper guys trying to help, me on the walkie talkie all giving Jim directions. We were trying to arrange space for the slideout, the patio awning, the satellite, the door and the storage doors. Bummer.. we could not get it all. People kept coming by to see how it was going and it was not good. We could get satellite I'm sure, but not have our slideout open or have a patio cover. The best we could do would have our door opening agaist a pine tree and surely we would have konked our heads as we emerged. Of course the KOA folks said this was the only site available for the week we had reserved!!!
The next site over looked good to us and we thought we could get the satellite to work. Finally the manager came by after a couple of workers plead our case, and we were moved to the next site which is physically way better...in fact great!!! It is large, well sited, with pine trees and lots of space...BUT no satellite/Internet connection. This is a major adjustment for us. This means no TV and no Internet. We are so used to having this stuff at our fingertips. Got a question? Go on the net and get an answer!
So we had to resort to our backup mode...cell phone access to the Internet (very limited time) XM radio which is not coming in real well, our NOA weather radio, lots of DVD movies and our vast library of music! Actually, to my mind...not a bad change of pace as long as we are connected enough to find out what's going on in the world and as long as it doesn't go on forever. We don't watch much on TV anyway except a couple of Fox news programs, CSPAN and Law & Order, so this is not a real big deal. But no Internet...BUMMER!!
So now we are really devouring books, biking more (great sport here) and having a great time as usual. If you can't go with the flow, this would not be the life for you.
In the Jungle
When I read the ads for Lion Country Safari KOA I thought it sounded intriguing that we'd wake up and go to sleep with the sounds of the jungle. When we heard the first lion roar in the afternoon I thought...WOW...this is great. Then the lions kept roaring and they are really loud. I guess it was feeding time. Every 5 minutes there was this great roar. Finally I started listening really carefully and thought, "I think I'm hearing the exact same roar." So I was wondering if this was really lions or was it prerecorded. Well when I heard them at 6:30am I thought ...NO...no one in their right mind from a customer service point of view would broadcast lions roaring at that time, especially since quiet hours are from 10pm to 8am. I asked at the campground office and was told that we are really hearing the animals over an amplified system. Wherever the animals congregate they have microphones so we can really hear the jungle!! It's great!! We're hearing lions, elephants, monkeys and wild birds. I didn't think I'd want to spend the bucks ($17.50 per person) to tour Lion Country as we've done that before, but I've got to see these roaring lions! Maybe pictures will follow.