Day 1 - This Is America

Ok don't panic.  I'm not going to be giving a daily diary type post for the next 13 or so days that Daphne and Stephen are here in Florida. 

Daphne will probably do that !!  

Or at least she will once I get her out of the pool and get her Eee set up on our wi-fi.

But as this is the first full day of their trip here, I thought I'd post something about it.

They arrived last night seconds before midnight and I was certainly shocked when I went to the park entrance to meet them.  They'd talked about getting a medium to large sized 4 door saloon so all of us could tour Florida in comfort.  What did I see them get out of ?

A bright red 2 door Ford Mustang !!


Fantastic sports car but not too practical for touring with 4 adults. Yes it seats 4 but the back seat passengers have as much of a view out their tiny windows as passengers on a plane. Less even.

They realised at the time that it wasn't the type of car they'd ordered but were told if they wanted to change it, they'd need to return to the rental desk and see 'the man' and as they'd just spent 90 minutes in line to get to 'the man', they quite rightly decided to put up with the car for now.

Touring on my own I'd have LOVED this car. Sighhhhhhhh

Anyway, this morning was a bit like a mini Christmas except that the goodies were all coming one way- to us - and none of them were wrapped.  I liked that.  We got a packet of jammie dodgers, a Terry's chocolate orange egg and a box of jaffa cakes.  Wooohooo.  We felt like WW2 prisoners getting a food parcel from the Red Cross. The difference being we're NOT passing the goodies on to the escape committee as for one thing, we don't want to escape from here and for another, there is no escape committee.  Oh and the war ended 63 years ago. Hurrah.

Be that as it may, the goodies were very well received and to pay them back for such generosity, we're letting them take us out to supper tonight.  I know, I know.  There is no limit to our thoughtfulnesss.

Then we went to a craft fair, or fayre, that was taking place in the park and after that I took them for a spin around Buttonwood Bay in the golf cart which, I think, went down pretty well. We saw one gator and lots of the birds I've photographed over the last few weeks.  Then we went into Sebring for lunch and a brief trip to WalMart and then it was back to the park where I found out that Leeds had won 4-1, so hurrah again.

We discussed what we'd do for the rest of their holiday and so far the plan is to chill for another day here (Sunday) and then leave for the West coast to see a bit of Tampa and Clearwater and all the wonderful beaches over there.  Then we'll return to the park.  Over Thanksgiving, we'll leave Debby and Dennis to enjoy the time with US friends and I'll go with Daphne and Stephen across to the East coast for our 2 day visit to the Kennedy Space Centre, the highlight of the trip.

The shuttle Endeavour is due to land on Saturday 29th at 2pm but even though we're so close, we've decided not to try and plan being at the KSC on that day. The weather might force a landing in California or elsewhere (although looking at the forecast, that seems unlikely) and in any case, the public has no special access to landings.  We'd see as much just parked along the road.

Then Daphne presented me with a bottle of HP sauce and some packets of Sainsburys own brand instant parsley sauce.  I'd asked for these and it was sweet of her to bring them.  What can I say.  I love the damn parsley sauce and although one CAN buy HP sauce here, it costs a fortune.

Just a few minutes ago, Daphne and Stephen went off to the pool on the golf cart as Daphne was champing at the bit to get wet. It's a British thing.  We need to get wet on a regular basis or we dry up and crumble into a pile of dust.

And that's about it so far.  The location for supper hasn't been decided upon yet but it looks like it may be The Outback as it does the best steaks in town.

Here endeth the Day 1 diary entry and normal blogging service will be resumed as soon as possible.......probably tomorrow.  But no promises.