Fabulous Florida

We’ve spent the last two weeks in Pensacola, Florida. We’ve started the process to officially move ourselves to this wonderful state and become Floridians. Of course, no matter where you live, I think when people ask where we are from, it will always be Minnesota. And as a dear friend once told me, you can’t ever escape our long OOOOOOs when we speak. LOOOOOOL!

Pensacola is such a large city compared to the much smaller towns we have visited this summer. We are back to 4 and 8 lane roads/freeways, lots of stop lights and a Waffle House on every corner. (We do love a waffle house!) While it’s a short 30 min drive to the gulf, it feels really LARGE and busy to us. Keeping in mind little Wyoming, MN, this feels like it’s just toooo busy for our lifestyle. I think that’s what keeps pulling us back to Biloxi, at least for right now. It’s a larger city, but it feels small and still has the best shrimp po’boy we have tasted.

I do love that we are seeing so many different types of trees and plants down here. The beautiful flowers that are still blooming, just blows my mind. Azaleas, Magnolias, even the flowers in the ditches that you we continually see, feel like it’s a never ending summer. My own plants that we have been traveling with, have not faired so well. I started with 5 and have managed to kill all but 1. Who knew a Christmas Cactus from my SIL would be the one plant I have been able to keep alive. That is one hardy plant. For the others, I think this is a sign that I should try something new and southern and make a trip to the garden center.

Then there’s the gulf. OMG!!!!! As much as we like Biloxi, when we stepped over the dunes along the gulf and got our first glimpse of that emerald blue and green water, it just took our breaths away. Sugar white sand and water that is clear, warm, and refreshing……STUNNING. If I close my eyes, I can still smell the salt in the air.

Of course, no area is perfect and unfortunately, the jelly fish have made their way to this little piece of heaven. It was easy to avoid the big ones, but those little suckers that you can’t even see, made it a literal pain to swim in the water. I always worried about a northern or snapping turtle getting me when at the cabin and would make sure Dave went in before me to scare them away. No dice this time. There was no scaring away what you can’t even see. The sting from the little ones feels more like a burn and it doesn’t last very long, but still. I sure wouldn’t want to get stung by one of the bigger ones. Good thing you can see them by the colored rings in the center and they are slow moving.

We started our year with 5 stickers on our travel map. It’s been an amazing summer and we’ve filled in quite a bit of area. Dave has been tracking our travel and by the time we reach St. Augustine, we will have made 18 stops and driven over 5,000 miles with Homer. I am stunned when I think just a few years ago, it was a struggle to take even a full week off, and reach South Dakota.

While we have missed actually seeing our kids, (sobbing right now), family, and friends, (Labor Day was a killer to hear about all the fun we missed), this opportunity has been one of the best things we have done in a long time. No worries about a big house and all that stuff we used to try and maintain. No rushing back to mow grass, pull weeds, clean, clean, clean, and clean, from our one week or weekends of travel each year. Meeting new people each and every stop, waking up to a different view every morning, experiencing so many different areas of the county, has been an amazing experience and as of right now, we just don’t see it ending any time soon. We HAVE discovered we need to do something other than sight seeing. Meandering is fun and while we love all the sights, we need a purpose. I definitely need a new contract to keep those brain cells firing and Dave does need to mow some grass or is thinking about volunteering at the veterans home in Biloxi. Since we’ll be stationary this winter, we are thinking this will work out for us both.

Our next stop is St. Augustine. We’ll be there 30 days and will complete moving all our Minnesota residency/domicile stuff to Florida. New license plates, new drivers license, insurance, etc. Having not done this previously, (you don’t do this when in the military other than address updates), I feel like I already have my next contract in the works. (Yes, I do have a plan and there are dependencies). If only I could get Dave to pay me my regular hourly rate……..

See you on the road,

Dave and Theresa