Today we made the big move all of 72 miles to central Florida so the family could infest us…and they surely did. Oreo hid under the couch, Smokey loved the attention and Tigger howled. A good time was had by all. Mom’s son, DIL and grandchirren showed up soon after we got to the park.

The drive over was fairly uneventful. We rolled out of LOL up I-75 to the Brooksville exit. More often than not Interstates scare the bejeebies out of us; there’s thick traffic at 70+ mph and if anyone screws up we’re all dead. But we made it and headed east on SR 50 across the Green Swamp.

We saw pine trees. Cows. Pine trees. Cows. Cypress! Cows. Pine trees.  Repeat. But at least we could proceed at the stately speed of 60 mph and relax.

We eventually got into Clermont. In decades past Clermont was simply the intersection of US 27 and SR 50, a tiny town, and the only thing taller than one story was the Citrus Tower. The land as far as the eye could see was covered in orange trees.  A couple of freezes, high-rollin’ developers and today the land as far as the eye can see is covered in rooftops.

Found the Winn-Dixie complete with likker store and came out into impending doom and gloom. Mom went to get some Kentucky Fried Colonel while I put things away and she made it back just as the skies opened up. I didn’t want to drive in it so we sat there and puttered around on the net for a little while.

Eventually pulled out toward Lake Louisa SP, checked in and drove just about forever around to the campsites. Lake Louisa SP is a former grove…square miles of what was once one grove. Amazing.

The plan is to sit a couple of days in case any more family sees fit to visit, then head down Lakeland and Tampa to get some mechanical work done.

Finally arrived at Lake Como Resort in Land O’Lakes, Florida. It was home for about four years or so until we accidentally became fulltime RVers. I say accidentally because we went off on a monthlong trip and returned only to rent out the house.

We left Chassahowitzka in a cloud of no-see-ums with the air conditioner churning and headed down the Suncoast Parkway like geezers out on a Sunday drive…which is exactly who we are.

Next stop Wal-Mart.

It was so hot we had to leave the generator running to run the a/c so that cats wouldn’t get heat stroke. And Wal-Mart was absolutely amazing! Culture shock! The store was full of more people than the entire population of White County, Georgia! And they were all standing still blocking every aisle while all small children screamed!

I was so boggled I couldn’t pay enough attention to get what was on the list. Just couldn’t remember even one item. Took us two hours to get out of there!

Got to Como and found a suitable rv lot after a bit of finagling and it took me several hours to simply get things deployed and settle in; it was Wal-Mart itis! I even forgot to hook up Big Eye, the all-seeing satellite robot.