New BackSplashes!

I finally finished putting up all my backsplashes! Using the Smart Tiles was fairly easy...just clean the area with a degreaser and peel and stick. Cutting and piecing around odd shapes was a bit frustrating, at least to me, but the tiles are flexible and forgiving of minor mishaps. I actually did four backsplashes, the kitchen, the half bath and two separate sinks in the master bath and only wasted one tile. Not bad for a beginner!

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

The Kitchen pattern is Idaho

The Half Bath pattern is Bellagio

Above is Jack's sink

The Master Bath pattern is Dune

Below is Gail's sink

In case you're wondering,we got them at Home Depot.

We are very happy with the results!

One Point Eight Million Dollars, Home Brews and Bean Soup...

We got so close to 1.8 Million dollars we could touch it...and did!

We had dinner the other night at McGuire's Irish Pub, a Pensacola Brewery, noted for some interesting quirks. According to the story, when Molly McGuire received a dollar bill as her first tip, she tacked it up behind the bar for good luck. Other patrons added to the collection and it soon became a McGuire's tradition. Restaurant patrons are encouraged to sign the dollar if they want to participate in the tradition; our waitress even provided a staple gun for our use. I signed the bill and Jack put it up. The ceilings and walls are covered in bills...and it's a large restaurant. Our waitress told us they have to count the bills each year and pay taxes on the money. At present there are about 1.8 million dollars on the walls and ceilings!

One must also be careful when using the restroom. At first glance, the sign on the door seems to indicate the men's room with the word "Men" - on closer inspection you can see the words "This way" in small text and a hand pointing to the adjacent door. The sign on the men's room door says "Women" with the same smaller text and pointing finger. I saw more than one woman walk through the door marked Women only to hurry right back out! Of course, that made me read the sign more carefully and avoid the same mistake.

They have a nice variety of home brewed beers as well as home brewed Root Beer. As a huge Root Beer fan, I had to try it...it was so good. Another strictly McGuire's menu item is Senate Bean Soup. It is touted as the same bean soup served in the U.S. Senate cafeteria. As long as you are ordering other items from the menu, the soup is 18 cents...the same price since 1977. We couldn't resist trying it. For 18 cents we got a hearty bowl of the best soup I've had in a long time!

The menu is varied everything from Burgers and Sandwiches to Shepherd's Pie, Corned Beef and Cabbage, and Sausages to Steaks, Chops and Ribs. I had the Shepherd's Pie and Jack had Brewer's Sausages. We shared a Lucky Chocolate Brownie a`la Mode. I don't know if it was lucky, but it was decadent!

 

After soup, dinner and dessert, we about had to be rolled out of there! It was a fun night and we'd definitely go back!

Red Bird and Blue Bear Visit the Aviation Museum...

Red Bird: Wow, look at all the planes! Wonder where we are.

Blue Bear: The sign says National Naval Aviation Museum, Pensacola, Florida.

Red Bird: They have navels in a museum? I have a navel, wonder if it could be in a museum...

Blue Bird: No, silly, Naval means things that are in the Navy! It's spelled differently than the navel that means bellybutton! And Aviation means things that fly. Besides, you don't have a belly button, you're a bird!

Red Bird: Do too have a belly button! The Navy has sailors...they sail on boats, duh, not planes.

Blue Bear: Well yeah, the Navy has boats but they also have planes and some of their boats are big aircraft carriers. They have huge decks that're like runways and planes can land and take off from the decks...only if you don't aim right or go too far, you'll fall in the ocean!

Red Bird: Wow, some of them have wings that fold and some of them have cool paintings on the side...like sharp teeth and Felix the Cat. I wonder if I can sit in any of the planes...or get on them?

This one looks mean...

Wow!  We're sitting in the cockpit!!!

There's the Felix the Cat one!

Hey, we're winging it...get it?

Be careful, quit wiggling around...you'll fall off

Wow, this one has no sides!

This one is bigger than a house...bigger than two houses!

Look...fake pilots from a long time ago

The wings are folded up.  That's crazy!
The wings fold so they can fit all the planes on the aircraft carriers when they're not flying.

Old Navy airplane seats.  Why couldn't I have my own seat?

There's Mr. Grandpa Jack! He's looking at a model of an aircraft carrier.
Hey! Let's turn this wheel and see what happens!

Space Lab

This was really cool!

               ...Blue Bear and Red Bird

Pensacola...Restaurants...and Home Improvements...

Moved to Pensacola the first of March for what we thought would be our shortest move so far...forty miles (going the long way via I-10). When we arrived at our park, we discovered they had recorded my reservation wrong and had us down for one night rather than one month.They were very apologetic and were able to find a site for us, someone was leaving the next morning and we could take that site. We spent the first night in an overnight pull-thru and moved to our long-term site the next morning. So...our shortest move was several hundred yards!

We are at Pensacola RV Park. Small, family owned, right off I-10, but far enough away so there is no traffic noise. As you turn onto the gravel road into the park, you will see a sign cautioning you to watch out for chickens! The roads and sites are gravel and level and there are only a few amenities, full hook-ups with 30/50 amp, laundry, dog run, WiFi and cable TV, but that is all we need. The people who run it are friendly and helpful. Our site is right across from the office, so we get to watch all the comings and goings. It can be noisy sometimes, but it's kind of fun to see who is checking in and who is checking out!

When we were in Charlotte, NC, we went to a Sonny's Real Pit BBQ and Jack fell in love! They are a regional chain here in the Southeast and we've been on the look out for them ever since. Well...there is one right around the corner from the RV park. Jack likes the sliced brisket and I like the sliced pork...with baked beans, coleslaw and garlic bread. We tried another regional place called the Cock of the Walk just because of the name. It is mostly seafood, which I love and Jack's allergic to, but he can always find a burger or steak on the menu. The food was okay, but nothing to write home about...especially since home is on the coast where we can get great seafood! We haven't found a good breakfast place yet...but there's still time!

I put up my new Smart Tiles backsplash in the half bath and one in the master bath. Just have the kitchen left to do. They weren't too hard to do, though the master bath got a bit frustrating when I had to piece around the curved window. I'll post pictures of all three when I get the kitchen done, but just let me say...they look great!

The Florida Panhandle and Time On Our Hands...

Wow, I haven't posted on here in a while. Can't really say we've been busy, more the opposite...we've been relaxing.

We arrived in Navarre, Florida the first of February and settled in for a month at St. Rosa Sound RV Resort. For the most part I liked the campground - nice flat sites with cement pads and patios, clean and well-kept, with gorgeous views as it is situated right in the Intracoastal Waterway. The downside is traffic noise, it is right on the main road...but I knew that going in. Jack wasn't quite as enamored as I. In addition to the traffic noise, he didn't like that there is no grass - the landscaping is all done in wood chips, which was fine to me but not, according to Jack, to the dogs! We have different preferences and, for me, being on the water trumps all. :)

One thing we did agree on is that, despite having grocery stores and the like nearby, there was really nothing to do in the area...not even decent shopping! We either had to go to Fort Walton Beach, about 15 miles to the east, and it doesn't have much more than Navarre does, or to Pensacola, a city of 50,000 about 25 miles to the west with a number of offerings.

Of course not finding a lot to do can leave you with time on your hands, and time on your hands can lead to all kinds of things, with me it usually leads to shopping...

We love our fifth wheel, but not so crazy about the furniture that came with it...a sofa with an air bed and two recliners. The recliners are hard with no lumbar support and seem to make Jack's bad back worse (he has two bulging discs that are becoming more painful, but that's another story). The sofa is equally hard and uncomfortable and we seem to have no need for the air bed. We live in our fifth wheel 24/7, it's our home and should be comfortable, right? We started out "just looking" and, no surprise, ended up buying. We found a small-scaled, but very comfortable, rocker-recliner and a cushy recliner love seat at the Lazy Boy in Pensacola. Jack loves a recliner, especially one that also rocks. I am more of a "curl up on the couch girl" but a couch won't fit through a twenty-eight inch door and a recliner love seat with a removable back will. Our love seat and two recliners will arrive late March or early April! Pictures will follow.

Ordering the new furniture seemed to get my nesting instinct going and I started looking around to see what else we could do to make our home comfy and cozy. Well, we found something called Smart Tiles designed for a light weight, do-it-yourself backsplash. Couldn't decide which one we liked best, so bought one for the kitchen, one for the bathroom, one for the other bathroom...! Thinking I might try doing one room today. I'll post photos when they're done.

When our month at St. Rosa came to an end we still had four or five weeks to wait for our furniture, so next post...moving to Pensacola!

Cedar Key...

When we left the Orlando area it was a beautiful 70 degrees and we found the same good weather when we arrived at Cedar Key, Florida. Of course the next day was cold and rainy! Cedar Key is a small fishing village on the Gulf, population 700, about an hour and a half north of Tampa. It ended up that we only had one day of decent weather out of the three we were there but, fortunately, the town's small enough to have seen most of it in a day. As you can see in the photos, it's quaint and cute!

The Pickled Pelican

We had dinner the first night at Tony's Seafood, renowned for it's World Champion Award Winning Clam Chowder and I can testify, the Chowder is delicious! We ate at The Pickled Pelican another night. They were out of many menu items, but the decor was funky cool and the shrimp I had were good.



As we walked through town, we noticed there were cats wandering everywhere. We we counted about a dozen in one block. They were under bushes, on walls, on benches - wondered if they were a feral colony but they looked well fed and some would approach to be petted.

We stayed at Cedar Key RV Resort, it is a fairly new campground about 6 miles from the town of Cedar Key. I loved it. The sites are wide and are scattered in such a way that they are not on top of each other and every site has a paved pad, patio and picnic table. There is a heated outdoor pool, but it was too chilly to try it. Oddly enough the washers and dryers are outside on a porch, but we have our own washer/dryer combo, so that wasn't an issue. I would definitely stay there again. Cedar Key is about 30 minutes from any inland town and has only one gas station that has diesel and the price is about twenty cents a gallon more than surrounding areas...but when you need fuel, you need fuel!

This guy was hanging around the pier hoping the fishermen would send something his way!


We think it would be a cool place to visit again...in better weather!

Owls, Cranes and The Mouse...

After our week in Daytona we moved on to the Orlando area. Actually, we stayed about thirty minutes south of Orlando in Haines City at Central Park of Haines City Campground.  While there was nothing wrong with the campground, it just wasn't the place for us.  The campground was clean and the sites fairly flat.  People were friendly, but there were lots of permanent campers, many old and run down. Not sure if I mean the RVs or the inhabitants ;)...and we're not exactly spring chickens ourselves!


We did enjoy some wild life and I don't mean parties!  There were a pair of Horned Owls living in the tree above our camper.  Everyone who walked by was craning his or her neck trying to spot the owls.  They were hard to see among the leaves, but easy to hear...and they serenaded Jack at night!  Sadly, they were never visible enough to photograph.

We also were treated to a pair of Cranes sauntering through our campsite. They were up close and personal and I was able to take a few photos of them.

Walt Disney World was not on our agenda as ticket prices of $95 for one day, one park, one person were just too rich for our budget.
We did spend an afternoon wandering around Downtown Disney. It bears no resemblance to the Lake Buena Vista Village that it replaced and that I visited years ago. It is huge, with lots of shops and places to eat and things to see. We walked our legs off, had a good time and I got my Disney fix!

 

It was a gorgeous, sunny day, the best weather we had all week.

The hot air balloon was beautiful, but they had to close it down due to the winds.

The Lego productions were just awesome!  Had to get a picture to send Jackson...the Lego King!

 Jack liked T-Rex!

We used some of our time to do some grocery shopping and a little housekeeping, including visits to Camping World and Costco.  I also found time to get a manicure...so it was a productive week!

Next stop...Cedar Key.

Daytona!

Gail: Two things that Jack has always wanted to do are visit Daytona International Speedway and drive out on Daytona Beach...and he got to check them both off his list this trip!

Jack: When you turn off I-95, the grandstands loom above the trees and buildings. Your heart races a bit knowing that this the real deal. As we got closer and began to see the speedway, it is everything I'd dreamed about. We parked and headed toward the museum, passing over the hand prints in the sidewalk of many past winners. There were statues of Bill France, his wife and Bill France Jr. but the one of Dale Earnhardt is the most awe inspiring.

Gail: At the Speedway, we took the 90 minute "All Access Tour". It took us around the track, along the infield, down pit road, into the NASCAR Sprint Cup garages, the Drivers' Meeting Room and Victory Lane. We saw the Daytona Rising Project, the Daytona Championship Car...damage, confetti and all...and sat in the VIP Suite along the backstretch.

Jack: The first stop on our speedway tour was outside of turns three and four. Looking over the edge was like looking straight down. I never realized what a 33 degree grade actually looked like. We passed that area again later from the inside apron and, yes, it almost hurts your neck looking up at the catch fence above. We stopped several times to see the backstretch VIP tower, driver's meeting room, inside the garages, a cup car vs. a Rolex 24 prototype, etc. We toured down pit road and out onto the front straight stopping at the start-finish line. Walking on the 18 degree banking was a thrill! Oh, we had our picture taken in Victory Lane (so cool!!). Our tour ended back inside the museum, viewing the 2012 winning Jimmy Johnson car number 48. It's in the exact condition it left Victory Lane last February. How cool is that!! Also saw the Harley J. Earl Trophy, which is absolutely awesome.

Jack, on the Tri-Oval, walking up the 18% grade by the Start/Finish Line. He managed it just fine; I stood back and took the photo...I know my limitations!

We had our picture taken on Victory Lane.

Championship Car -  notice the confetti

The Harley J. Earl Perpetual Trophy rests year round inside the Daytona 500 Experience and bears the name of every Daytona 500 Champion. No name appears more than Richard Petty with 7 victories.

Below: (left) Dale Earnhardt's and (right) Jeff Gordon's 

Plaques on the Daytona 500 Champion's Walk of Fame 

Gail: It was a bright, sunny, cool day, and so windy that I lost a favorite earring, but it was an awesome day at the Speedway!!!

Jack: If you're ever in Florida, it's a must see/do experience, well worth the money. If you're a racing nut, it may even bring some goose bumps.

Gail:  A couple of days later, the temps were up and the wind was down so we drove over to Daytona Beach. Just as Jack was wondering if you could still drive on the beach, we came upon a road that lead right to the beach...so onto the sand we went. I'm not sure monster trucks like ours are meant to drive on soft sand but Jack put it into 4 wheel mode and drive we did! I got a few pics of the beach but, unfortunately none of us driving on it. 

Jack: Visiting Daytona Beach was really cool. After reading about it and seeing it in movies and TV shows, driving on the beach was absolutely awesome. The waves within 40 feet, the sun shining with a gentle breeze, people enjoying themselves all along the 2 miles of beach access. The only bad part was I couldn't stop and park. The dually was just too heavy and sunk into the sand whenever we got off the packed roadway. All in all, a great experience, one I always thought would never happen.

Scratch two items off my bucket list!!

   

On Daytona Beach. All in all, a very cool experience! Maybe one day we'll be back for a race...

While we were visiting Daytona we stayed at Nova Campground in Port Orange and had a very nice, although very shady, campsite.