Friday November 29, 2024 we left Blue Springs State Park and drove an hour to Magnolia Park in Apopka, Florida. This is an Orange County park and it was our first time staying here AND our first time staying in any Orange County park.
Magnolia Park is 56 acres of camping and recreational areas. The campground has 18 sites with water and 50 amp electric, as well as a dump station. The campground is small and the roads are narrow, but we were able to drive through with our 30-foot travel trailer and back in to our site with no issues. Sites are close together and not much foliage to separate them. If we return we picked out a couple of other sites we will try on our next visit.
Wildlife Drive
Saturday afternoon we met our friends, Kirk and Laura, for lunch and spent an enjoyable two hours catching up in person on the past 10 months since we had last seen them. And then Sunday morning, after walking Bella, we took a leisurely 11-mile drive on the Lake Apopka North Shore Wildlife Drive where we saw many varieties of feathered fowl and some HUGE alligators. Monday we spent the morning walking around Magnolia Park and part of Lake Apopka. The part of Lake Apopka we walked around was a BIT concerning because the dirt road runs between areas of water on each side and, if they were so inclined, alligators could quickly exit the water and chomp down on you or your beloved furry family member. I MAY have scared Cindy a time or two as we hiked.
Thursday, December 5, 2024 was Charlotte’s birthday. We had a ton of errands to run in Orlando before meeting them at the Cheesecake Factory in Winter Park for her birthday dinner. A fun time was had by all!
Sleepless in Seattle
Friday night Cindy flew to Seattle to spend the weekend with Jeremy, Wendy, Jade and Maxwell in Redmond, Washington. Jade had two performances of “Fiddler on the Roof” Saturday and Maxwell had a big soccer game on Sunday. Cindy had SUCH a good time watching her youngest granddaughter perform onstage in one of Cindy’s favorite movies, and then getting to watch her youngest grandson play his heart out in the rain and cold as goalie for his team.
While Cindy was in Redmond I was “batching it” in Nomad. On Saturday I watched “Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story” and for those, like me, who regard him as THE Superman of movies, it is a heartbreaking two-hour long look at his life, mostly after the accident that left him paralyzed from the neck down.
We’ll be returning to Metropolis, IL this April (before the Superman Celebration in June) so I’m sure we’ll re-watch “Superman The Movie” before that. AND we both love the movie “Somewhere in Time” so in August we’ll be visiting the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island, Michigan.
Sunday I resealed the kitchen sink on the kitchen island. I did the same a couple of years ago, but this time I doubled the amount of sealant because every time we travel it’s like a mini-earthquake in Nomad and things (including seals) can shake loose.
Then I watched “Road to Perdition” because I never watched it when it was first released in theaters back in 2002. It had just premiered on Prime on December 1st and I thought I’d take the opportunity to watch it for the first time. I knew Tom Hanks starred in it, but did not realize or remember that it also starred Paul Newman, Daniel Craig, and Cirian Hinds, as well as Tyler Hoechlin who played Hanks’ character’s 12-year old son.
Hoechlin portrayed Superman on CW’s “Supergirl” TV series and in the CW TV show “Superman and Lois” which just ended its run. I didn’t care for his role as The Man of Steel in “Supergirl” so I never watched “Superman and Lois” when it aired. His “look” did not say “Superman” to me (kinda like Tom Cruise trying to portray “Jack Reacher”) and thus I avoided watching the show. But his acting as the son of Hanks’ character was very good. It has me toying with the idea of finally watching “Superman and Lois”…maybe.
Dinner with My Adult Grandchildren
Monday evening I took Mikey and Charlotte to dinner at Mikey’s choice of restaurant; Cracker Barrel. It was fun having dinner with just my adult grandchildren. When I returned them home safely I got to enjoy seeing Ann, Charlotte and Seth make a Gingerbread House from a kit they got. Then I watched Monday Night RAW, which I haven’t seen in at least 6 years, so I had to depend on Ann and Charlotte to get me up to date and ID all the new players in the squared circle.
I left Ann’s at 10 pm to go park near the airport and wait for Cindy’s flight that was supposed to arrive at midnight. However the flight was an hour late departing from Seattle and then when it finally landed in Orlando they sat on the tarmac for another hour waiting to get to an open gate…at 2 am! I was glad I brought a book to read while I waited. We finally got back to Magnolia Park at 3:15 am and slept until 10 am (except for when I got up at 7 am to take Bella out to use the bathroom) and were pretty fuzzy the rest of the day.
We did, however, go out in the afternoon and visit a couple of other Orange County parks to look at their campgrounds. We’re supposed to stay at Hillsborough River State Park for two weeks in January, but it looks like that park won’t reopen by then. They had severe damage from Hurricane Milton and are still trying to get repairs made (they have NOT cancelled our reservation yet) but it’s looking more and more like they won’t be done in time for us, so we need to find alternative arrangements and that is hard in Florida during the Winter months.
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