201 Days Elliott Museum

WOW, it is hard to believe we have been at Shelter Inn Place for 201 days. For most of that time we have limited our outings to grocery shopping with a couple trips to other stores. We have gone to the beach when it was not too hot. We did make a change in our routine this month when we decided we would be okay going out for a late lunch as long as we could sit outside and the places weren't crowded.

We are still in the Florida rainy season with either afternoon or morning showers, but almost never an all day rain. This past week on the first day of fall a "cold" front came through and lowered the humidity to a more comfortable level and dropped the temperatures from the mid 90's to the mid 80's. Other good weather news this week, there are NO storms brewing in the Atlantic, but hurricane season goes to the end of November.

We are still getting in our daily exercise and eating well. Nanc made some great shrimp tacos and I made margaritas. The meals at Shelter Inn Place continue to be healthy and delicious.

A big change in the local Lexington Lakes wildlife this month!!! We have a resident bobcat. This is a picture a neighbor captured. I have not seen it but Nanc has a couple times on her morning runs. 

Not a great picture but we also have a large family of raccoons living in the woods. Hopefully the fence will keep the alligators out;-)

The first time we ventured out other than shopping we visited the Elliott Museum. The original museum was built in 1961 by Harmon Elliott as a tribute to his father Sterling who was a prolific inventor. The current building, which opened in 2013, is described as A Work in Progress, with constantly changing exhibits. The biggest collection is the vintage vehicles.  

One of the most unusual exhibits is Wheels of Change. It is a three level rack system that holds over 50 cars. Cars can be retrieved with a robotic tray and brought down to this turntable to be displayed. This is the only one of its kind in the country. There was not a docent the day we were there to operate it for us but normally you can request that a car be brought down to enable you to get a better look. 

There are many one of a kind cars displayed here.

Part of the vehicle collection is in a gallery with facades of old downtown Stuart buildings on the walls.

If you are a car person the Elliott is a must see stop in Stuart.

Is it a boat? Is it a plane? Yes, it is both. It is a boat that was built from the fuel drop tank of a Grumman OV-1 Mohawk by retired Grumman employee Lawrence Regier. Lawrence was there the day we visited and was happy to tell us all about it. 

Many of Sterling Elliott's inventions dealt with improvements in bicycles and quadricycles. He also served as the president of the League of American Wheelmen.

Hugh Willoughby was the designer of the hydro-airplane pictured above. This is his pilot's license certificate from the National Aeronautic Association that was signed by Orville Wright. 

The General Store is a display of businesses from the late 1800's and early 1900's. There is an Apothecary Shop, Barber Shop, Ice Cream Soda Fountain, Post Office and more.

This hand-carved circus with 300+ figures was done by Bob Wyatt in the 1950's.

They have an exhibit of over 600 signed baseball cards and these game used bats. There are bats used by Josh Gibson, Ty Cobb, Rod Carew, Roberto Clemente and other old time players.

Some of the art on display.

The changing exhibit hall had a great collection of British motorcycles. The Elliott offers a very nice eclectic collection of art and history for a small town museum. 

Our first dining out experience since March. After visiting the Elliott we went to Dolphin Bar and Shrimp House for a late lunch. We sat outside and the tables were well spaced so we felt comfortable.

Pink sky in morning.

Another week and another dining out experience. This time was Kyle G's, a place we had never tried. Here we had a table overlooking the Atlantic. The food was great and once again we felt comfortable that they were following all the correct Covid protocols. We sure enjoyed eating out, but are unsure what the future holds as our governor has called off all Covid restrictions and declared the state is open for business. Places will not be getting our business if they eliminate social distancing and other safety procedures. 

We went to check out the waves from Hurricane Teddy that was several hundred miles off  coast. Teddy caused high surf warnings from here in Martin County all the way to Cape Cod. Unfortunately the beach at Blowing Rock where holes in the rocks send the waves high in the air was closed. 

We were sad to see all these turtle egg shells on the beach. The high surf destroyed over a hundred nests on Jupiter and Hutchinson Islands. The good news is there were over 700 nest so many more survived.

Nanc has run the Great Race in Pittsburgh many times over the years when we are in WashPA at the end of September. Because of the pandemic the race this year was virtual. You could run anywhere and send your time in. She did a great job with the fastest time for her age and finished 169 out of 361 female. GREAT JOB!!!!!!!

While most people are doing what should be done to slow the spread of Covid there are way too many people who are like this. It is hard to believe with the case and death numbers we have in this country. Total cases in the world 33,689,344; US cases 7,376,177. We have 21.9 % with only 4% of the world's population.

Total deaths in the world 1,008,617; US deaths 210,140 We have 20.8%. 

     These numbers are so sad.

VOTE VOTE VOTE

Beach, Hurricane and Voting

It is really hard to believe we have been at Shelter Inn Place for 169 days. We have the routine down pat getting up early before it is too hot and humid and doing our morning walk and run (Nanc). Next is breakfast and then two or three hours of reading the news on line. During this time we listen to music and avoid listening to any news. We have taken a couple day drives to explore the area. Heading ten miles west and we are in ranch and prairie country. Of course, heading east we are quickly on the Atlantic coast. Nanc continues to make sure that we have been eating healthy. 

It is the rainy season in Florida so almost every day we see huge clouds. The pattern seems to be if the wind is from the east the rain threat is in the morning and if it is from the west we get thundershowers and rain in the afternoon. Almost every evening when we are watching the local news the buzzer warning of severe weather in the viewing area goes off. These storm are usually smaller and localized somewhere in the viewing area that stretches 100 miles along the coast and inland to Lake Okeechobee. We have had a couple storms with what I call flash-bang thunder and lightning, very scary!

We did hit the beach again just to escape the boredom of staying home.

As you can see we had no trouble social distancing.

The day was full of sunshine but we watched as this big cloud got closer and closer. We decided to pack up just in time and the sky opened up with a heavy downpour. By the time we got home the sun was shining once again..

As I said in the last post, seeing the way things have been going in 2020 we would probably get a hurricane. Sure enough, at the beginning of the month we were in the "cone of uncertainty" for Hurricane Isaias. Since it was only a Cat 1 storm we decided to stay put. Here is what I learned about waiting for storms from a friend in Louisiana. "Waiting for a hurricane is like being stalked by a turtle." You get an early warning days before the storm, but you never know for sure how bad it will be until a few hours before landfall. In the above picture Isaias was raining and blowing just south of us.

The good news, we had accordion shutters installed last year so it only took about five minutes to shut each one. On Saturday I closed the three window shutters to have it done before it started to get windy and raining. As you can see it was still sunny.

The storm was expected to arrive Sunday night so I did not clear the patio or close that shutter until Sunday afternoon. The good news, Isaias stayed off shore about thirty miles from us and was "only" a tropical storm with winds about 50 mph. The bad news, it became a hurricane as it moved north and hit the Carolinas pretty hard. 

You can see why I like the accordion shutters. The original shutters required getting on a ladder and putting up one slat at a time. Also, we are supposed to remove the shutters within 10 days after the storm passes. It took me less time to do all four of our shutters than it took my neighbor to put up one panel. Our neighbors who have lived in Florida a long time said this was a good practice storm for us.

It is the rainy season and skies like this are very common. Usually the storms don't last very long, but they can bring a lot of rain, wind and lightening.

A heavy afternoon shower.....

...... followed by a beautiful sunset and.........

Nice rainbow.

This moth hatched on our patio door and stayed there drying its wings before taking flight.

Neat heron at Lexington Lakes.

When we became Florida residents in November we registered to vote at the same time. Voting here is is much easier than what we experienced our whole lives in PA. In March for the presidential only primary we voted early, an option we never had before. 

For the August 18th primary for local officials and our US House Representative the election was by party. For this election we opted for mail in voting. Thirty days before election day our ballots came in the mail giving us plenty of time to check out where each candidate stood on the issues important to us. 

We mailed our ballots on August 1st and were able to check on line to make sure they made it to the office. It was all very easy and we are looking forward to getting our vote in for the November election. 

STAY SAFE, STAY HEALTHY, WASH YOUR HANDS AND VOTE!!!!!!

13 years -- 134 Days

13 YEARS

Thirteen years is how long it has been since we left WashPA and started our adventure of living in a house on wheels. In that time we have traveled to every state in the US and most of the Canadian provinces and territories. We have also vacationed and cruised to nine countries in the Caribbean, Central America and Europe. For all that time we were in tourist mode. 134 days is how long we have stayed at Shelter Inn Place. Wow, what a change! That said, we are very happy that we are in a stix and brix rather than Opus as many of those tourist things we love doing are either closed or open with very limited access. 

The last year has been a roller coaster of high highs and low lows. We only travel 1894 miles while spending only 140 days in Opus at only nine different parks. Last July we were in WashPA for a our three month stay. We did all the usual things we have done there every year, doctors and dentist for the last time there and getting together with our many friends and family. A real highlight while there was our eleven day trip to Europe for a Rhine River Cruise. In the middle of October we headed south with a stop to see Nanc's sister Michelle and her husband Keith before going to the Outer Banks for three weeks. One of those weeks was a wonderful celebration with friends and family of our 50th anniversary. From there it was a five day sprint to our place in Stuart for six weeks. It was great seeing friends George and Nan who also just bought a place in Stuart. Joe and Kathy were in an RV park near Stuart and spent a few nights at our place. Mark and Renita, who were visiting their daughter in St. Pete, came over for a couple nights so we could show them around our new hometown. We also flew to Mexico for a relaxing week at Secrets Capri and to DC to spend Christmas with Michelle and Keith. Overall, the 2019 part of this year had more highs than lows.

On January 1st we headed to the Florida Keys for a month long stay. While it was great seeing so many friends that was where things started going downhill. On January 7 we got the call that Michelle had passed away from the cancer she had been battling for three years. We flew to DC to spend time with Keith and attend the celebration of her life which was much too short. We headed back to Stuart in February looking forward to having visitors from up north who were escaping the winter chill. Georgie came down for a week and John and Patrice, who were staying near Miami, came up for lunch. We then drove to Ocala for a celebration of life for Beth, an RV friend who had passed away at the Elks in December. Next Rick and Denise came for a visit and while they were here we got together with Marty and Missy who were spending their first winter of retirement in Florida. At the beginning of March Mike and Sherri came down for a few nights. Soon after they left our Aussie friends Brian and Karen stopped for a visit and fulltime RVers Dave and Kathy come by. We had a great time showing all our friends around our new place. This is how we expected it would be when we bought a place in Florida, being able to share our new home with so many friends and family. Little did we know things were going to take a BIG change with the arrival of Covid-19.      

134 Days

As I wrote in the last couple posts, our stay at Shelter Inn Place started on Friday, March 13. Little did we know what that would portend.  I also wrote about a few projects we did in the condo, but for the most part we have been staying home. One thing we missed was a vacation to Mexico in April with Rick and Denise. Also, our friend Mary Lou, who used to have a place in Jupiter, had to cancel her plan to visit. During this time we received more sad news. In March our friend Celine from Quebec lost her battle with cancer, in May we learned our friend Ollie from Abbeville had passed and just this month Diane, whom I worked with in Washington, died unexpectedly. So thus far, 2020 has had way too many lows. 

We have tried to make the best of a bad situation while still keeping our distance from people. We have learned and taken advantage of technology, communicating by text, phone and face time with family and friends. We did go for a walk on the beach one day. Unlike the pictures you see of crowded Florida beaches, we had no problem social distancing.

Walking away from the parking lot we pretty much had the beach to ourselves.

When we first saw this dark spot in the water we thought it was seaweed. On closer inspection we discovered it was a massive school of silver minnows. We were surprised that there were not more fish feeding on them. We did learn there were sharks spotted not far off shore, thus no swimmers either. 

One good thing about being stuck here we have been getting plenty of exercise. We are up and out early nearly every morning for a walk or run (Nanc). I have built up to where I did a marathon last week, 26.2 miles in seven days. Not a real marathon but very good for me. This picture is a Sahara sunrise from the sand that had blown across the Atlantic from Africa.

It's the rainy season down here so we often have interesting sunsets. 

We got together for an Independence Day celebration with our Lex Lakes happy hour group. Hector was all decked out for the holiday. He is another morning walker and has a different coordinated outfit and shoes every day.

Cookie and Mark, no masks, with their daughters Rachel (black dress) and Leah and Rachel's friend Derrick. The new members of the group wore their masks and social distanced.

The rest of the group Jim, Diane, Morgan, Nick, Claudia and Nanc. It has been great getting together with this fun bunch.

Did I say it is the rainy season. Our 4th of July picnic had to move into the garage when the clouds moved in.

It really came down hard and after about 10 minutes I asked, Morgan did you close your car window? Well, not only had she not closed the window, the sun roof was also open. It was very wet but there was no real damage.

I have done a couple projects. This kitchen cabinet needed more storage space.

We installed double sliding shelves giving us a lot more storage space. Something you need here as we have learned we need to be prepared if there is a hurricane and the power goes out. 

The new shelves have much more space. I was happy we were able to buy a standard unit that fit with just a small bit of modification.

Another happy hour and a happy birthday to Cookie. 

This is the sofa that was here when we moved in. It had seen better days and was not very comfortable. Since we have been spending a lot of time on it we decided we needed a new one. We went to Rooms To Go for their Independence Day sale and ordered a new one. 

It was delivered by these two gentlemen who were very efficient bringing it in, unpacking it and putting it in place, all in less than five minutes. As you can see, masks were mandated and they did a great job.

Happy wife happy life. Nanc toasting the new couch.

We don't have to venture far to see birds here at Lexington Lakes. A beautiful spoonbill.

Lastly, our plans for the future ????????????????????  While we have no idea what we will be doing in the future, with everything else that has happened in 2020 we expect we will be experiencing a hurricane in the next two or three months.

STAY SAFE, STAY HEALTHY, WASH YOUR HANDS AND WEAR THE DAMN MASK!!!