Pre-ramble

We first went camping in a tent on our first wedding anniversary, but that's a story from the 70's so I'll save that for another post. Since then we have progressed through a number of tents, to a Colman Pop-up, a Dutchman 30ft trailer, an American Star 30ft 5th wheel to our present Carriage Cameo 38ft 5th wheel - always bigger and better.

After our daughter moved over to England 1999, John's sister invited us down to North Carolina for Christmas which sounded better than staying home on our own. The following year we thought it might be rather depressing to spend Christmas at home, so we pulled out our old pop-up camper and took off for the KOA at Sugar Loaf Key in the  Florida Keys. We decided to move the whole party with us, which included John's sister, her husband and their large puppy. It was a tight fit but we had a large screen room that attached to the pop-up and it was nice and warm, with no snow but plenty of mosquitoes. In 2001 we bought the Dutchman trailer and John's sister bought a fifth wheel. Again we all headed to the Keys for Christmas and this time my sister joined us from England. About 18 months later we upgraded to the American Star and we have made the Christmas pilgrimage to the Keys every year with our sisters often joining us. In 2009 John took an early retirement package, but we were already booked at our regular campground for the holidays. So we decided to spend a last Christmas in the Keys and look for another site for the rest of the winter. At first we thought we would stay in Daytona Beach, where we had spent Thanksgiving for a few years and where my sister usually flew into from England but when we arrived there in November we found it was already cold and we decided it would be even colder in January. So we took a day trip down to Port Charlotte and found Harbor Lakes, where we stayed from January 1st 2010 to April 2010.

In March we booked again for the winter, starting in November 2010 through to April 2011. Everyone who booked early had their names entered in a prize draw. When our name was the second name out of the hat John was able to choose a free month at Sunshine Key in the Florida Keys. That meant going down in October, which sounds wonderful till you remember all the autumn leaves falling back home. I think in the end it cost more  to have the leaves picked-up than the free month in the Keys saved us. It made us realize that the house was a liability if we wanted to spend more time in the trailer.

So when leaving Florida in 2011, we decided that now was the time to put the house up for sale and get on with the next chapter in our lives.