My goodness has this been a year of change. I’ve gone from employed making well north of $100k a year to retired and $3,500 a month in Social Security. We were home owners in Pocatello, Idaho and are now “homeless” nomads currently in Ormand Beach, Florida. Nina and I used to drive two cars and be pretty much independent from each other. Now, we’re essentially car-less, renting a car when we need one, living together 24×7 in less than 200 square feet of space. It’s a very rare time when we’re not with each other.

Life is very good!

In a week we’ll be in Mumbai, India for a couple of weeks, then driving cross-country to Arizona then back to Pocatello, Idaho in February. We’ll park the motor home, give a farewell speech in Church, and leave for a 23-month mission in the Honolulu Hawaii Mission (at least initially assigned to the Visitor’s Center).

The changes aren’t over. Life is very good!! Definitely looking forward to 2015 (as soon as I remember that it is 2015 and type / write it. It took three times to get it right in this post!).

The drive from Fort Myers to Ormand Beach on Monday was, for the most part, quite uneventful … that is, except for the transit through Orlando. A bowl game was being played later that evening in Orlando and the traffic was stop-and-go for about an hour as we drove on Interstate 4 through the town. I’m sure there was a way to go around, but the TomTom didn’t figure that out. Meanwhile, Oklahoma got absolutely creamed by Clemson in the bowl game, giving Oklahoma one of the worst (but not the most worst) loss in many, many years.

We’re in a very small campground in Ormand Beach, just north of Daytona Beach. The campsite met all of our criteria:

1. It had a spot available for the week that we were going to be here.
2. It had cable tv (particularly including ESPN so we can watch some football).
3. It had wifi.

The TV reception was very bad on Monday evening. This morning I talked asked the owner if there was an issue with the cable amplifiers. He immediately went over, opened a box on a telephone pole, and plugged in the amplifier that had become unplugged when they did some work on a sewer lift station. TV problem solved! We’ve got a lovely picture now and have enjoyed two bowl games this evening as Notre Dame and Georgia both won.

Today the weather was not beach weather. Cool (mid-70’s), very windy, and thick, low clouds with occasional drizzle. It’s a good thing we aren’t here to go to the beach as the highest priority. We did go to the beach, though, drove down the A1A highway, visited the Ponce de Leon Lighthouse, had lunch at TGI Friday’s (where the restaurant was empty and the service was beyond slow), and then went to the Museum of Arts and Science in Daytona Beach. The museum was excellent and I highly recommend it.

While we were at the Ponce de Leon Lighthouse. we saw a huge machine pick up a very large pleasure boat that they had just finished painting the hull and move it into position to be put back in the water. That was a very interesting process. I’d love to see the inside of some of these boats.

We’re having fun!

Some pictures from the day:

Today is our last day here in Fort Myers. The ten days has gone by in a whirlwind! Tomorrow we drive away to the northeast side of Florida in the Daytona Beach area (we’ll be at the Harris Village RV Park in Ormand Beach, Florida). We’ll be there for a week.

We went to Church today at the Bonita Springs Ward. This was a very nice (and small) ward. There were a number of visitors there along with us. We enjoyed the meetings as well as the drive back home along the beach roads.

We’ve spent a fair amount of time at the beaches … with the best times at the beaches on Sanibel and Captiva Islands. Yesterday afternoon we spent a couple of hours at the beach on Captiva where we experienced a magnificent sunset. I set up my ham radio equipment and played radio for about an hour. I did make one contact in New Jersey but otherwise wasn’t able to get through the pileups because I could only operate at low power from a battery I carted to the beach.

On Friday we drove up to Sarasota to the Ringling Estate (from the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus). We spent several hours on the Ringling estate and found we didn’t have nearly enough time. Anyone going should allow one day just for the art gallery! After that we drove up to Clearwater to meet with AJ and Skip Starkey, some dear friends from our days in Chardon. Skip and I served together as counselors under Bishop RIch McClellan. We moved to Utah and Skip became bishop of that ward for 7 1/2 years. We had a great time talking about what’s happened since then and reliving memories from back then. We got home just about 10 pm after a delightful day.

We’ve had a good time here in southwest Florida. Nina has been able to collect a number of sea shells, but probably hasn’t been able to spend nearly enough time at the beach of collecting shells. I’ve found that I really like the Florida area, although I think Sarasota is a better location overall. The big draw for Fort Myers is Sanibel and Captiva islands.

We haven’t had time to do some of the things we’d thought we would do, such as drive down to Key West and go to the Fort Lauderdale Temple. That just means we’ll have to come back!

I’ve put together a photo gallery from the past few days.

Below is a photo gallery from today … Christmas Day … in Fort Myers. We went over to Sanibel Island this morning and then to Fort Myers Beach in the afternoon. The morning went very well. The afternoon didn’t go as planned … not at all. The traffic was horrendous. Parking almost non-existent. Further, it seemed like everyone in southwest Florida goes to the beach on Christmas Day!

Spending Christmas on a beach has been Nina’s long-held wish that came to fruition today. Further, we’re on Sanibel Island, the epitome of seashells!

We’re definitely not alone in being on the beach. As somewhat evidenced by the photo, there are a couple-hundred people here as well. Some, like me, are sitting in chaIrs enjoying the breeze and the partly sunny skies. Most, however, are lined up along the water’s edge looking for the perfect (or at least passible) shell. As the tide receedes, more and more shells are exposed. Because of how the island is situated in the Gulf of Mexico and the very shallow waters extended a couple of miles out into the gulf from the shoreline, it is a mecca for seashells. Nina has collected a shoebox full of shells in the past week. This is our third trip to the Sanibel beaches specifically for seashells (the fourth trip overall) and each trip has yielded a lot of shells and each day the types of shells has been different than the previous day.

We’ll be on this beach for another half hour before going back to the motor home for lunch, seashell sorting, and recuperating. Then we’re headed to the beach at Fort Myers Island. That’s more of a beach-bum beach, not so much for sea shells, but for just hanging around on a beach. I plan to take my ham radio equipment with me and see if I can make a few Christmas Day contaacts. The water is too cold for swimming or even doing more than getting the ankles wet, but hey, we’re on the beach! I’ll probably post something from there later today.

We have found that we really like the lifestyle here in southwest Florida. The RV Park has great facilities. The price is excellent. The beaches are close, lots of great shopping, and very nice weather. It doesn’t have the sameness-everywhere feel of Arizona, and definitely doesn’t have the summer heat! It’s made the short-list of places to live when we get back from our mission.

Merry Christmas! Life is good!

For the third day in a row we’re on the beach as sunset approaches. It’s warmer tonight than it was last night and less breezy. Nina’s working on her seashell collection and will have close to a shoebox full by the time we leave!

Today was housecleaning and laundry day. The park has a nice laundromat and the three batches of clothes went through quickly. Further, there was an iron and ironing board set up, so we were able to iron my shirts so they’ll look a bit better when I wear them. The water must be a somewhat warmer as Nina is out almost up too her knees! The family just to my right are speaking German, and it’s fun to hear them talk about very mundane things.

When we go to Mumbai, we’ll have two very long airplane flights. I’ve tried to book seats on planes with 120v power to the seats. I’ll be calling Delta to verify and make sure they know that I’ll be using a CPAP machine and find out what kind of power will be available. My new CPAP machine is set up with an attached humidifier and a heated hose to the face mask. I can remove the humidifier, but the hose end won’t fit as the plug for the power to heat the hose is in the way. I have a battery pack, but running it with the humidifier and heated hose depletes the battery in just about an hour. I think if it’s just running the pressure part, the battery should last much longer. But, I needed a non-heated hose!

I spent over an hour calling various pharmacies and medical supply places and no one had CPAP supplies! One place, called “My Sleep Apnea”, kept going to a fax answering machine when I called, so Nina suggested that I just drive over there and see what might be available. That sounded like an idea, so I drove there to find that the place was shuttered and the the building for lease. Obviously, that wasn’t going to work!

As I drove out of their parking lot, I saw a very small “Medical Oxygen” sign over one of the doors of a longish building next door. I parked, went in, and sure enough they had CPAP supplies and accessories. $20 later I had the hose I need. The battery pack is being charged and I’ll use the machine tonight on the battery. Hopefully that works long enough to get a few hours of sleep, even if other power isn’t available on the airplane. It would be so very nice to be able to get eight hours of sleep over the course of the 30-hour total elapsed time from Atlanta, Georgia to Mumbai, India.

We’ve not yet made any hard plans for Christmas Eve other than going over to Sanibel and Captiva in the morning to see what shells might be washed up. Nina’s going to whack off the bottom part of the legs on a pair of her pants so she can wear her swim suit with the pants over and get much further out into the water. This sea shelling is serious stuff!

We’ll spend most of the day on Christmas Day here on the Fort Myer beaches. Friday we’ll go up to Sarasota to do some circus research. Saturday we’ll drive over to Fort Lauderdale and do a session at the temple. During the week (Tuesday through Thursday) the temple only offers sessions at 6:00 and 7:30 pm. On Fridays and Saturdays sessions during the day are available.

Where do we go on Monday? Maybe we can come to a decision tonight.

Life is great!

ps: BYU played Memphis in a bowl game yesterday somewhere here in Florida. BYU lost in double overtime. In Church on Sunday the Bishop announced that there were free tickets available to anyone interested in watching “the biggest pillow football fight in Florida”. There were no takers….

Sunset was at 5:40 pm. Last night’s sunset was a bit of a bummer as the clouds were so thick. Today was much nicer (although more humid!), so we parked ourselves on the beach about 5:30 pm to watch the sunset. I took more than 50 pictures, but a few are worth enough to put into a photo gallery:

We’re settled in at the Siesta Bay RV Park in Fort Myers, Florida just a couple of miles from the causeway to Sanibel and Captiva Islands. We arrived Friday afternoon, picked up a rental car, and got checked in. We did some shopping on Saturday and some wandering around in the car on Sanibel and Captiva Islands. We did go down to the beach for a little while and sat on the sand.

The water is actually quite chilly. Neither of us will be spending any time in the ocean any deeper than up to our ankles! The weather is very nice here. Today the high was about 81º with 63% humidity. I have been sweating! Definitely not used to this amount of humidity. I’m sure it won’t take too long to acclimate, though.

We went to Church at the Fort Myers Ward this morning and attended the full block. This was our eighth Sunday on the Roland and Nina Great American Road Trip and the most diverse Ward that we’ve attended. They had two speakers, a musical number by the Primary, and one by the Relief Society as their Christmas program. We’ll find a different Ward next Sunday to keep up the tradition of being somewhere new every Sunday.

After Church and lunch we drove down through the Fort Myers beaches and stopped at sunset on the beach to see what, if any, sunset might be visible. The clouds were heavy and thus we had a very dull and dark sunset. However, it was quite delightful to sit on the beach as it got dark. Nina did find a few seashells!