31 January 2018 Our January Whirlwind

      For a long time, we've wondered where we'd want to live when it was time to move to land. We love the area of western TN and NC but we both have such thin Southern blood that our temperature comfort level has about a 4 degree range—from about 72-76 degrees so that rules out the mountains. 

     I've always said I didn't  want to live with a bunch of old people but I’m now eating my words. About a year ago, we heard of an active over 55 retirement community with the dumbest name—On Top of the World, Ocala, FL. We were in Wildwood, FL, having coach work done, were bored and decided to go see what this place was like. The gate guard wouldn’t let us through and directed us to the sales center. We were introduced to Mercedes, a sales counselor, who asked what we were looking for. Bill was sure he could escape the grip of a “sales person” so he said, “the smallest house with the largest garage.” She said, “I have it!” We were not even remotely close to thinking about moving to terra firma. She took us to the model, Arlington, and when Bill saw the 1100 square foot garage…well, the rest is history.

      Six months later we returned for a 2 night 3 day stay and were courted by On Top of the World with meals, tours, and connections with residents whose brains we picked. 

          We spent 2 months in Ocala to get the flavor of the area and to see if that is where we want to settle. We not only have found that Ocala fits us to a T but we bought a lot and will be building a house in a brand new still-being-developed Larkhill section of the Candler Hills area in On Top of the World where streets aren’t even in yet.

               Our friend, Wolfgang, Bill, and I surveying our piece of dirt

        There were so many who had their eye on Larkhill so our names were entered into a lottery pool and were drawn last Tuesday. We were the 4th of 20 to be drawn and we got our 2nd choice lot. We’ve spent two eight hour days with a designer in the Design Studio. Talk about painfully grueling!!!!! But we’re done!!! Bill did some tweaking of the garage, master closet, and laundry area. I tease him about his being anal and with a love of detail but he was incredible and outdid himself on every single iota of precision—things I’d have never thought about.

Our lot is sorta center left where the first pile of dark blue pipes are on north end.

      We’ll return in March and May for walk-throughs with a tentative closing date is 17 September. We’re super excited with some fear and trembling mixed in. 

          We’ve become so entwined and ingrained in the Candler community and have made so many wonderful, warm, and welcoming friends, that it’s really going to be difficult to extract our roots when we leave tomorrow. I’ve become part of a women’s Bible Study. Bill’s connected with several “old car guys” and 3 of them recently traveled to a Mecum car auction. 

A fabulous wood working shop for Bill.

          Remote control airplanes are huge and one of our friends has a whole fleet. There are endless educational and fitness opportunities. I’ve taken two art classes and both of us have attended several lectures/presentations on numerous and very interesting topics. 

      I’m so looking forward to having a pool walking distance from home.

The Lodge

The pool at the Lodge with zero entry in lap pool

The Lodge Pool

and a gym for a structured workout. I have the grace of an elephant but am eager to take ballet. 

      Almost every weekend at the Cultural Center, is the opportunity to see big name performers. We loved the Van-Dell’s last weekend. Frankie Avalon, the Letterman, and others will be here later this season.

      Our future neighbors are from all over. I had my fingers crossed for ethnic diversity and thankfully we aren't all a group of white Caucasians and I'm loving the differences. Diversity was one of my favorite things about our 3 months in Washington DC.

     We’re so excited about regaining some structure in our lives and having a sense of community. The social life here is non-stop--quite a departure from our solitary cruising lives. There’s something going on here ALL the time; EVERY evening and we're loving it. 

     We’ve loved our cruising life since we bought Kindred Spirit III, June 2006. After many trials and errors with Bristol and Epifanes, Bill’s finally perfected the art of varnishing and his ‘wet edge’. Our exterior teak is spectacular with the grain visible and a flawless glass-like finish. When it's not fun anymore, it's time to move to another adventure.

      The calendar of our birth years belies the way we feel which is decades younger than “the truth”. Bill’s teak maintenance is a tremendous amount of work. We want to settle on land while we can still enjoy the activities offered. So now you have our story of our impending new adventure.

     We spent a full day going to every single furniture store in Ocala and chose the best that we saw which wasn't really a bell ringer for us but was better than some of the other bedroom furniture. We're focusing on our bedroom now feeling that a place to rest our weary bodies after the move should be a priority.

     Let me guess your first question. Yes, we'll be swallowing the anchor and sadly putting Kindred Spirit III on the market this summer. We’ll return to her in May and spend some time on the Chesapeake and Long Island Sound. Selling her is the most difficult thing about this entire scen ario.It’ll be "Cryin’ Time" in Lauraville, for sure. 

     Our "loose" intentions were to investigate a lot in Candler this time next year but things seemed to develop so fast with everything falling into place---just a year sooner than what we'd thought. We're at peace with our decision and are confident we've made the right decision.

     This month, I took a fun ink and watercolor class from a fabulous instructor. I look forward to being under her tutelage in the future. Bill's had a couple of days with the boys. He was in Greenville, SC, for a week and the day after he returned, he and some of his old car buddies went to Kissimmee for a Mecum car auction. None of them came home with a garage-sized toy but think Bill's getting getting primed since he'll have this "dream garage". Even though it's 1100 square feet, he tells me a garage can never be too big.  He wanted to take some of our master closet for garage!!!  The nerve!!! One of these days I hope to have a wardrobe that exceeds shorts, tees, and jeans.

     Our ex-boating and now RV-ing friends, Dinata and Andy, drove up from Leesburg for a day's visit.  We showed them around our new future neighborhood and enjoyed lunch and a nice long visit. They're recently built in a retirement community a bit south of here.

       After leaving Ocala, we moved to Christmas, FL. I'd never heard of it but it's a cute little wide spot in the road and the campground has a rectangular pool that is actually swimmable. I've been in it every day since we arrived. This is the first time I've swum since May and the infected pacemaker site bump-in-the-road in June so it was wonderul to see if I still knew what to do. It was as if I never had that 8 month hiatus and I'm loving every single chilly stroke.

     Our dear dear friend, Bobbi, from Merritt Island came for a visit and she brought steamed shrimp that had just swum that morning. For lunch we drove to Titusville to the iconic restaurant, Crossroads. Bobbi is amazing and I drink in everything she says. She's a fount of knowledge and especially her past trawlering and motor coach travels.

     We're a short drive from Orlando so we spent another day at 2 "transitional" furniture stores and without a quibble, have found our bedroom suite. It needs to be ordered which'll take 3 months so that should work out perfectly.

     Monday we're moving on but are enjoying this area for a brief time.

Bill and Laura
Christmas RV Park, FL

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