It was nearly 10 when we finally left the Big Oak RV Park this morning. There was one more load of laundry to do, dogs to feed and walk and the last long shower we would be able to take until next week. Only Navy showers for us for the next week or so. BRRRRRRRR!
The day was dreary and drizzly and cold in north Florida. Our temperature gauge read 40 degrees but it felt even colder than that. This is Florida???? YIKES!
Folks in the Southeast sure must love their waffles ‘cause there is a Waffle House restaurant about every 10 feet!
The other thing Mel & I have noticed is that once you cross the Mississippi going east, most people have no idea how to merge onto a freeway!!! They either come up and slow down, or stop, or pull out right in front of us going 40 miles an hour or less and expect the GW, which is doing 70, to stop on a dime and not run their crappy driving sorry asses over! We noticed the same thing on our last trip as well. It is mind boggling that they can’t seem to figure out that when they merge onto the freeway, they need to get UP to the same speed as the vehicles already on the road and then just slip in AND STEP ON THE DAMN GAS!!! How freaking hard is that???? I guess they just expect us the move the GW over into the far lane so they can move into our lane at their leisure. They never stop to think there might be a car on our left side preventing us from doing so. Evidently, they don’t teach merging in driving school. I guess they couldn’t if the teachers don’t know how to merge either! This phenomenon is not limited to the Southeast. We found it up north as well.
Once we turned the corner from I-10 onto I-75, the scenery started to look very familiar. If you exchanged the pines for firs and took away the billboards, I would have sworn we were back in Washington State. The drizzle continued for most of the drive which made it look even more like home and it wasn’t until we passed the magnificent horse farms of the Gainesville/Ocala area that the landscape began to look more like Florida is supposed to look. The lovely rolling green tree studded hills gave way to marshes, palm trees and traffic.
We arrived at the trial site in Palmetto about 3 this afternoon. The site was already filled with many motorhomes, trailers and 5th wheels. We managed to find a spot with 50 AMP service close to the rings, so that is where we parked. There were places on the other side of the fairgrounds with sewer hook ups but, with 4 dogs to run, we wanted to be closer to the rings so the dogs can stay in the Global Warmer and relax between runs.
Well, there will be no more blog entries until we are done trialing on Monday. We plan to stay here until the 2nd so we can watch the Rose Parade. I LOVE the Rose Parade and have watched it just about every year since I was a young girl (yes they even had TVs then!).
So Happy New Year to everyone!
Helen & The Girlz (Mel too)
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