Squirrel in tree
Fish Dinner
Actually, I don't and Florida's been very good to us. Up until yesterday on this, the 3,471st day of our trip.
We made reservations at a well-known RV "resort" in Largo, north of St. Petersburg. Made it through a central reservations number. We finally arrived at the resort in early evening. We should have been there at least an hour earlier but we received no return call from the "resort" staff only to discover the office closed and no reservation slip waiting for us. We drove around this "resort" that's touted by Florida Tourism and other RV organizations. We couldn't find a single space that would accommodate our little 18-foot trailer.
The place was a mess. RVs stacked on top of one another. People working on cars. Crap strewn everywhere. The place looked to be a derelict. We called central reservations trying to get our money back; they didn't want to refund us. About this time we did get a call back from the resort manager. She apologized profusely for the mix-up but did say the RV office was closed on Sunday which did us absolutely no damn good. She was sorry for the inconvenience and said she'd do everything in her power to get us a full refund. We shall see.
At this point, we sat back and said, "what the hell do we do now?" RV parks in the region are packed to the gunnels. It's high season: the weather's almost perfect. It's spring break and baseball spring training is under way. A bad time at the last minute to find a space to land your beast. Fortunately, Paul's Marine buddy Willie came to the rescue. We parked the rig in front of his house in St. Pete. Had a snort or two, as we are sometimes wont to do, and then discovered it was his wife Gail's birthday so we took them to dinner, came back, had another snort or two as we are sometimes wont to do and slept snug as a bug in the rig. Snug, that is, until the garbage trucks started coming around at 5 in the morning on Monday.
We rolled out of bed. Gail prepared a fabulous breakfast. We called around and found a wonderful RV park in Tampa called "Bay Bayou". It's advertised as one of "Good Sam's" top 100 RV parks in America. We booked it for four nights and driving across Tampa bay bridge it started to rain. Rained as hard as it had in Texas and Louisiana. Paul was tensing up. We didn't know where we were going for sure. His back is still bothering him. Finally found the RV park and believe me, it lives up to its reputation. It comes highly recommended by us. Bay Bayou in Tampa.
We were assigned a back-in space which always makes me a little nervous because I'm the one who has to give Paul directions. And Paul says he can't even comb his hair in the mirror much less look in mirrors to precisely back a 21-foot-long (total length) trailer between trees, posts and concrete pad. He tried to be cool but did blow it couple of times. Back in, pull out. Back in, pull out. People were watching and that made him even more uptight. When he yelled at me the second time I started to tear up, stamp my feet and said "I hate Tampa!". I was pissed. But we finally managed to get down and locked to the applause of onlookers. Nothing fell off the trailer today but I was about ready to fall off this trip. And leave it all to Paul and Daisy. Let her help him. She'd bite his ass.
But the market's up 500 points. Tomorrow's another day full of the promise of sunshine. And now Paul has said he'd do a make it up to me with a nice fish dinner. "Long John Silver's" here we come!
By the way, Daisy has settled in quite nicely to the trip. She's gone from chasing deer to raccoons to ducks and about an hour ago at this park she slipped her leash and away she went after a squirrel. Squirrel went up the tree. Daisy hit the tree head-on. Shook her head and had no idea where the squirrel went. Paul picked her up. She was fine but her back leg scraped open a bag of poop in Paul's pocket. Daisy's poop. Not Paul's. But poop's poop. And after yelling at me Paul got what he deserved. So went day 9,227. It's still an adventure and it's still all about the dog.
We made reservations at a well-known RV "resort" in Largo, north of St. Petersburg. Made it through a central reservations number. We finally arrived at the resort in early evening. We should have been there at least an hour earlier but we received no return call from the "resort" staff only to discover the office closed and no reservation slip waiting for us. We drove around this "resort" that's touted by Florida Tourism and other RV organizations. We couldn't find a single space that would accommodate our little 18-foot trailer.
The place was a mess. RVs stacked on top of one another. People working on cars. Crap strewn everywhere. The place looked to be a derelict. We called central reservations trying to get our money back; they didn't want to refund us. About this time we did get a call back from the resort manager. She apologized profusely for the mix-up but did say the RV office was closed on Sunday which did us absolutely no damn good. She was sorry for the inconvenience and said she'd do everything in her power to get us a full refund. We shall see.
At this point, we sat back and said, "what the hell do we do now?" RV parks in the region are packed to the gunnels. It's high season: the weather's almost perfect. It's spring break and baseball spring training is under way. A bad time at the last minute to find a space to land your beast. Fortunately, Paul's Marine buddy Willie came to the rescue. We parked the rig in front of his house in St. Pete. Had a snort or two, as we are sometimes wont to do, and then discovered it was his wife Gail's birthday so we took them to dinner, came back, had another snort or two as we are sometimes wont to do and slept snug as a bug in the rig. Snug, that is, until the garbage trucks started coming around at 5 in the morning on Monday.
We rolled out of bed. Gail prepared a fabulous breakfast. We called around and found a wonderful RV park in Tampa called "Bay Bayou". It's advertised as one of "Good Sam's" top 100 RV parks in America. We booked it for four nights and driving across Tampa bay bridge it started to rain. Rained as hard as it had in Texas and Louisiana. Paul was tensing up. We didn't know where we were going for sure. His back is still bothering him. Finally found the RV park and believe me, it lives up to its reputation. It comes highly recommended by us. Bay Bayou in Tampa.
We were assigned a back-in space which always makes me a little nervous because I'm the one who has to give Paul directions. And Paul says he can't even comb his hair in the mirror much less look in mirrors to precisely back a 21-foot-long (total length) trailer between trees, posts and concrete pad. He tried to be cool but did blow it couple of times. Back in, pull out. Back in, pull out. People were watching and that made him even more uptight. When he yelled at me the second time I started to tear up, stamp my feet and said "I hate Tampa!". I was pissed. But we finally managed to get down and locked to the applause of onlookers. Nothing fell off the trailer today but I was about ready to fall off this trip. And leave it all to Paul and Daisy. Let her help him. She'd bite his ass.
But the market's up 500 points. Tomorrow's another day full of the promise of sunshine. And now Paul has said he'd do a make it up to me with a nice fish dinner. "Long John Silver's" here we come!
By the way, Daisy has settled in quite nicely to the trip. She's gone from chasing deer to raccoons to ducks and about an hour ago at this park she slipped her leash and away she went after a squirrel. Squirrel went up the tree. Daisy hit the tree head-on. Shook her head and had no idea where the squirrel went. Paul picked her up. She was fine but her back leg scraped open a bag of poop in Paul's pocket. Daisy's poop. Not Paul's. But poop's poop. And after yelling at me Paul got what he deserved. So went day 9,227. It's still an adventure and it's still all about the dog.
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Keep it clean, please. And nice. And complimentary.