After the Hurricane Irma  9-12-17 Tuesday..
Been like forever since I blogged but I know a lot of my followers know we're living in SW Florida so I thought 'd drop a note to say we are ok .

MY VIEW

BEFORE, DURING, and AFTER

with excitable voices HURRICANE IRMA

9/9/17 Saturday BEFORE : The insanity starts when the weather guessers say “ Here it comes “ . The hype and excitable voices start on TV and radio and won't stop for weeks. Mind numbing forecasts and endless guessing. I listened to the governor and all the officials assure us that it's gonna happen, BUT... the weather guessers couldn't really say for sure East or West so they added some colorfull adjectives to the reports. AND the madness continued with exciteable voices. We prepared..batteries, water, emergency passes to get back on our island, BUT if Irma goes East we stay , BUT it might go West....hmmmm. So we have to make a decision. OR..spend thousands getting outa Dodge. We decided to stay. As time went on we decided to go to a shelter.

Our governor says stay safe, evacuate, go to a shelter...Well, alrighty now !!

So we left home early in the morning and headed to a shelter called Island Coast High School. The internet posting is lacking a lot of info like zip codes and phone numbers and mapping. We arrived to a line of cars and creeped our way to a cop that said they were full, turn around , go away.. OK NOW, he said he didn't have any info on other shelters, hmm, but I remembered our Governor said just call 211 for help in such a case. ( By the way-- I wanted to see if there were any shelters with room so I called 211 for 4 hours and it immediately went to a message “ Due to a large number of calls, please call back later . )

Luckily I have a friend, Amy, that offered her place to us so we headed there, at least it's more inland and safer than a surge area . We were there in about ½ hr, nice, newer building. It had steel storm shutters installed.

DURING: At our friends house which I will forevermore refer to as “ Fort Ferguson “ . Northwest Fort Meyers Near I-75 & Hwy 78, 25 miles inland from our house, we caught the Western edge of Irma's eye, The condo was built about 10 years ago, steel shutters installed, kinda like a vault. Could not hear the storm inside, good solid building. South facing porch out the front door enabled us to go outside and watch Irma and her 100MPH gusts. Unbelievable energy. SCARY..strange noises outside. Saw some trees come down nearby. Made me glad it wasn't any worse. We managed to have power til near 830 PM at the end of the blow hard time. The lights did go off & on a few times. Once the winds slowed to a reasonable speed of 30MPH we all took a deep breath and Thanked God for his mercy. WE SURVIVED.

AFTER : We woke up next morning after a fitful sleep at about 7AM. Our first outside observations showed us no flooding or bad damage. Car was ok ! About 830 AM my friend, Carl, called me to report no damage to our place on Matlacha Island and no surge damage. ( 9 foot or higher surges were predicted, DID NOT HAPPEN ) He said there was Electric Power. One of the few powered sites in Lee County Florida. We headed home at 9AM but had to delay for 1 hour while some good neighbors cleared a downed tree at the subdivision entrance,

we got out about 10 AM.

We were home before 11 AM after Heather dodged and weaved thru debris and manuevering powerless intersections. No cops directing traffic yet ! We saw a lot of landscaping blown around and some trees down but only a couple homes with structural damage. THANK GOD !!

We came home to almost normal conditions. AMAZING !!

APRIL 16TH 2017

HAPPY EASTER

I miss blogging every day. I still read some blogs. I was sorry to see The Old Fat Man ( Barney ) quit blogging so suddenly. Billy Bob is still doing an occasional blog. It takes time and devotion to blog on any kind of regular basis.

We still have our beloved motorhome for sale. Had a few interested folks but nothing became of them. Sold the storage/tool trailer a week ago. If you know anyone that wants to buy an older motorhome ( 28ft 1984 Titan ) send me an email . cmhl09@passportamerica.com (that's CMHLzero9) It's had a lot of great care as you all know.

After last December's wreck with our car and my hip repair I've just been healing and so far so good. I decided no more driving so Ms. Heather has become our chauffeur. The hardest part of that is I'm a terrible passenger but I WILL get used to it ( I hope ).Life on the island is great. This winter was a bit warmer than usual. It was a bit of a problem getting around while we were without a car for awhile but thanx to some friends we got to wherever we needed to. I feel humbled by the outpouring of love sent our way and all the help we received. We found another car and life is slowly getting back to normal. Now I still have to see a neurologist for some tests. I sure wish one of these 5 docs and 12 tests would pinpoint the syncope problems. One of my docs grins at that syncope word, I ask why, she sad that's a word doctors use when they are stumped ! To date my insurance has spent $400,000 ! ! ! WOW !!

We've been watching our snowbirds starting their homeward migration. The colors of the license plates on the island are getting back to Florida colors. Street and traffic congestion is improving. Same thing every year at this time. It's nice but the people will be missed.

I hope to write a short blog from time to time and I thank God for the opportunities he allowed us to enjoy with our travels around this great country of ours. Please be thankful for each day. 

REMEMBER, LIVE YOUR DREAMS AS TIME GOES BY QUICKLY !!

ROLLING EARTHQUAKE IS FOR SALE

3-8-17

I had an accident Dec 23^rd, 2016 while driving our car and hit a tree. It totaled the car. I ended up with a broken hip and fractured ankle and a concussion and a fractured neck. Lucky to be alive and thankful no one else was involved. I've made up my mind that I'm done driving so we've decided to sell the motorhome.

I reviewed, in my head, how many new parts have been installed in just a couple years. EGOD !! I know we'll never get our money back. I never fixed things thinking we'd be selling it in 2017.

If you have followed this blog you know the TLC this vintage 28ft,1984 Titan Motorhome has been given.

We put it in storage last year and I go there once a month and run it and the genny and take it for a decent ride.

The motor (454 Chevy) was changed out 2 years ago. Only 39K miles on it, great transmission.

The Genny was changed out 3 years ago.

New roof A/C 3 years ago. ( No engine A/C ) We run the genny to run the roof A/C while on the road.

New stove and water heater 4 years ago.

Tires in great shape, 2 front are new and spare never on ground.

New master cylinder and brakes.

Radiator was rebuilt 3 years ago.

The only thing I can think it needs is new batteries (chassis and motor).

If you want a turnkey older rig this is it ! Located near Cape Coral Florida.

Blogging has been fun .

Drop me a note. Charlie … cmhl09@passportamerica.com

THANX FOR ALL THE YEARS OF SUPPORT :)

1-14-17 Ya gotta love getting older !

I was reading some blogs today and realized I really miss writing ours. If you are/were a regular reader you know that we settled down about 1 1/2 years ago. We still have the motorhome in storage ! Decided 2 weeks ago to try and sell it. Recently my health took a downturn. Episodes of syncope. I passed out last May 26th, again July 16th and then Dec 23rd. I've been seeing a lot of doctors and having a lot of tests but no causes found yet. I was driving our car last episode and crashed into a tree. Broke my left hip, fractured right ankle and sore all over. I've decided no more driving for me. Thanks to a lot of great people around us we can function. I'm glad this didn't happen in the motorhome !!  To all of you that still blog, keep it up as I still love reading about the adventures !! Love you all !! Charlie & Heather.