Skidaway Island Camp site

Our camp site at Skidaway Island State Park was huge. The sandy area is the tent pad. This is a pull through site, #60.

Hung up some hammocks for talking and relaxing. It's the first time we have been able to use our hammock, it's not allowed at Florida State Parks to hang things in trees. We ended up with two areas, the hammocks were daytime hangouts since that area had shade during most of the day, and the fireside was used more at night. Chairs got moved back and forth as needed, especially the yellow rocking chair.

View of the vehicles from the hammock. The picnic table was a long one, longer than our tablecloth.

Set up a dishwashing station because the bathroom sink is tiny and the kitchen sink doesn't work. 

Fauna checking us out.

There was a oak stump that she was throwing at, but it's surprisingly hard to get the knives to stick.

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Locks for a birthday trip

Winter is a beautiful time in Florida, but it makes it really hard to get camping spots. Someone wanted to use the coach and his birthday was this weekend, so after searching all over the state we found a spot available at Phipps Park. Even the guy at check-in was impressed, since the place had been full for weeks and was booked full for the rest of the season. We've always been lucky with these last minute things. Anyway, it's right next to the St Lucie Locks, and there's a Army Corp of Engineers campground there too. Which are apparently even harder to get into, since there's only 9 rv sites, 3 tent sites and 8 boat campsites.

Behind us is a river

Ready to burn tonight!

Polished on the one side

The outside decals have all been removed, and cleaned, and slowly being polished(by hand!). This picture shows the difference between the side, which has been polished, and the roof, which hasn't. That's not a white roof! It's about the only change being made on this vehicle. Too many other things going on to work on anything major. Also, we got  a pirate tire cover, to commemorate its first gig.

Holiday camping with the family

My dad was in town, so we got him, his sister and her son and grandchildren to all go to Kissimmee Prairie Preserve state park for a weekend of camping. Here I thought I would let the elders have the coach beds, but they both chose to sleep in the tents. Our tent is the bigger one on the left. This is the equestrian loop, so there's only a composting toilet and no showers. They were not impressed until we told them to go to the main bathhouse. We used the bikes to get there. Nobody seemed to even want to set foot in our coach. But the sky was nice and clear, and we all spent time laying on the ground looking at the stars. We actually were in the road, the campsites had so much tree cover that we had to walk to the other side and laid tarps down. My cousin brought a bottle of wine, the kids had blankets and saw fireflies and so many stars.

This time of year is nice with the windows open.

Coach is full of wood for burning...

Pyroman - can't camp without a fire!

Kids in trees at night

Kids in trees in daytime

Sunset over the trees

My outdoor washing station had a visitor. I'm not sure how I'm even going to be able the wash that cutting board inside, I guess I'll have to use the tub.


We were able to go on the buggy ride, which gives you a tour of the preserve. The ground was wet, the buggy had some deep puddles to go through, but it was interesting. Especially considering there was a part of a Military Trail there, thinking about the poor men slogging through the wet marshes in the late 1800s. If you want to see a bit of old Florida, there's also land for sale nearby, reminding us of the old Florida swamp land sales. Still going on. Anyway, this park is also the only Florida habitat for the Crested Caracara bird, which normally is more in S and Central America. Definitely a cool bird.

Pair of Crested Caracara birds

Jonathan Dickenson State Park

JD - southern pine snake

We were only able to get wednesday and thursday nights at Fort Wilderness, so we moved on to Jonathan Dickenson State Park for Friday night. It's not our favorite, mainly because the trees shading the Pine Grove campground are all gone, but other parks were full. We rode our bikes to the lookout tower at night, and also went to the visitor center where we met JD out for a slither in the grass. He was recovering from an accident and it was the first time he had been outside in 6 weeks! Apparently someone dropped the cage top on his tail and broke something so they were being extra careful.

Outdoor kitchen

Pine Grove campground is no longer piney

Me driving curvy roads!

Use it while under construction...

Someone told us that many people buy one of these and gut it to fix it up and then for whatever reason, years may go by before it is usable again. So we cut out a plywood countertop and headed to Fort Wilderness for our somewhat annual Halloween camping trip. So not that things are hooked up in the kitchen or anything like that, but a countertop is good for putting stuff on. And Fort Wilderness is hard to get into, so we're technically at a tent site. John was a bit concerned, but it fit perfectly on the driveway. Our daughter said it's a lot like a rolling tent right now. We still have not gotten to the toilet, bathtub, shower , basically anything doing with the plumbing. Or the generator. Anyway, more fun, less work. We got lots of complements on our rig. The cast member at the checkin was quite impressed at how quickly John was able to back up to change lanes.

Tiki drinks at the Polynesian watching the fireworks at Magic Kingdom

Our site is positively minimalistic!

It's Halloween at Fort Wilderness. So many decorations!

Backside of our tent site. Could have brought our tent and more friends!

Monorails are cool!

View from Swiss Family Tree house!

Contemporary Resort at night

We are kind of minimalistic about the trip, we only go to the Magic Kingdom for the Not so Scary Halloween Party, and spend most of the time around the rest of the resort area. Bicycling, the pool, riding the monorail to the other resorts. Plus the Fort has so many decorated sites, there's contests for best decorated site, best decorated golf cart and so many other things to do. This was the one across the street from us.

Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park

Kissimmee Prairie Preserve State Park

 

One of our favorite state parks, not too far from home, but a completely different feel, with wide open spaces and dark skies. It's a favorite spot for local Astronomers, far enough away from city lights for sky watching. There is a special pad for setting up your astronomy gear and exterior bathroom lights are all red to keep from destroying your night vision and reduce light pollution. There's two loops, one for equestrians with horse paddocks in front. We're in the main loop right now. The campsites are pretty well shaded, but the rest of the place is prairie. Last night there was a big storm and the power was out for over 3 hours. So we don't have a generator, we haven't tried out the toilet yet, we think the tanks may have a crack. We can use the bathroom sink, but somewhere there is water dripping from one of the tanks, probably grey.

There is a big scratch on the passenger side.

Fridge Compartment - a mouse nibbled everywhere

Mud on the tires, the ground was wet coming into the park

Happy in bed

Cool beetle we found - Rainbow Scarab

Somewhat better pictures of the poems on the side windows.

Taking it Home

So, after two months of waiting for it, we are taking it home. On the way back we will do some camping to test it out.

Ready to leave the Coop