Fulltime Rving... A Life on the Road plus a potpourri of amusements, interests & perceptions.

Chronicles our adventures in a not so conventional lifestyle... Full-time Rving. Retired and sold the house in 2003, bought the Rv of our dreams, and travel doing what we want, when we want. Plus a lot of other topics thrown in to keep it interesting... or at least I hope so. Stories & photos of our adventures and our life on the road. Hope you enjoy reading it from time to time. UPDATE: RV - LATELY STATIONARY IN THE COUNTRYSIDE OF VIRGINIA... FROM THE VALLEY TO THE MOUNTAINS.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Reunited with an old friend…

Reunited with an old friend….

Sometimes in life you loose contact with old friends, and every once in a while your paths will cross… sometimes, again and again… as you go through life. That’s the case here. Every once in a while, me and Ben get reunited. It’s always great to see Ben, and I always seem to find him just when I could use his help the most. Ben is from Skillman - New Jersey, and has been acquainted with the Johnson & Johnson Company…. well… since forever. I haven’t seen Ben very much since I retired and travel a lot… but every once in a while our paths cross. My father knew Ben’s family for most of his life. Their family last name is “Gay”… though most of the family goes by many different names as the years have passed. Ben knows how to just make things seem better, give you that warm feeling, and in times of need, help take away the pain. Yep… it’s good to have a good friend like Ben around when you need him… my friend… Ben Gay… use only as directed! Keep out of reach of children. And after 3 days of real work… I need help! A few friends from the Bayer company help too. Feeling better soon.

They’re Watching You.

They’re watching you… and me. I’m not sure if they think we are a threat, or friendly, or food, or got a toy for them. But I’m sure that they can bite… so I think I’ll keep my distance and make good use of my telephoto lens. Yep… stay way back and zoon right in. and yes… they are all watching me.

very alertly watching…

making you feel it okay…

the whole time they’re thing… finger food

now this one looks safe enough…

I like green…

now that’s a nut cracker…

pretty in pink…

this one is just watching that minnow…

and he got the minnow…

and I got the shot!

Most of these shot were taken in south Florida last winter… while in Miami & the Keys

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Second Floor Please….

Second Floor Please….

It all started in 1955 in Disneyland California. While Walt was walking through the park, he noticed that while everything was being done to “Maintain the Magic”… that there was a Cast Member in Frontiersman costume walking through Tomorrowland. Not exactly maintaining the “Show”… and the imagine of the Future.

When planning Disney World in Florida this problem was addressed… simply put a system of tunnels under the Magic Kingdom… and costumed cast members can “pop up” just in the right place… and not having to have a Pirate walking down Main Street. The only problem was… due to the water table being only a few feet below ground… an underground tunnel system would not work. The only solution was to put the tunnel system on ground level… and Main Street, as well as most of the rest of the park would be on the second floor.

The guests would never notice this… but Main Street is really on the second floor… 14 feet above the normal ground level. The tunnel system looks something like the movie version of Norrad. Quite the useful and efficient system.

Tunnels are in purple…

See… this is how Mickey gets around so quick.

Office, control rooms, & costuming are there too.

Security stations & maintenance facilities…

Yep… an engineering marvel…

But there are no buttons to push…

no doors that close…

the second floor is… a walk on…

right through the main gate.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Video Games

Video Games… now there’s a wide open topic. Let’s narrow it down a bit… but not too much. For the long and short of it… here’s the short… for me…

wow… 1980’s … “PONG”.

(2 white bars and 1 white dot… nuff said).

Atari… Coleco-vision… Nintendo… Super Nintendo… Genesis… Playstation 1-2-3… the list is long and distinguished.

Now for the long of it… my favorite games… role play, action, adventure, and mystery.

Favorites: Tomb Raider Series, Draken, Baldurs Gate Series, Champions of Norrath Series, Pirates ( Black Kat), Primal, Sphinx, and Prince of Persia… to mention a few.

Everything set in something other than the real world today.

Lots of stuff… life in general has occupied my time. Of late… BlogSpot, Facebook, and Farmville. ughhhh…Farmville… addicting!

Also photography… over 15,000 pics in the last 12 months…. and all the stuff I do with photo’s… creations of collages, electronic scrapbooking, & special photo collage desktops.

So… it’s now time to get back into some of my favorite games… I have a new one from 12 months ago that I haven’t even opened yet. So… I’ll soon be getting back to play one of my favorites… Tomb Raider. One point to note… for some reason… unknown to my conscience thought… I seem to have games where the “role play” person mostly seems to be a female hero. Go figure. I don’t think about it much… but Shelly has pointed it out on occasions. So here’s to Tomb Raider.

Anniversary, Legend, & Underworld

great graphics…

action scenes…

exotic locations…

adventures…

dangers to overcome…

places to explore…

newest game… new adventures…

and it’s just like the Roger Rabbit Movie…

Jessica Rabbit… I can’t help it if she is drawn that way!

Happy Gaming….

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Jimmy fan from Forever…

Seems like I’ve been a Jimmy Buffett fan… well… almost forever. Songs & stories that took you to another place & time… a little less stressful and a lot more carefree.

Here’s a picture of Jimmy’s Seaplane.

“Hemisphere Dancer”

Yep… no doubt about it…

On the sea or on the land…

Hemisphere Dancer Logo

Take a ride or have a seat…

and r-e-l-a-x !

Than there’s always

Margaritaville.

Yep… another place & time.

The Rock…

Here’s an interesting story… just as it was told to me…. and the pictures are worth a 1,000 words.

There's a huge rock near a gravel pit on Hwy.25 in rural Iowa. For generations, kids have painted slogans, names, obscenities on this rock, thus changing its character many times. A few months back the rock received its latest paint job, since then it has been left completely undisturbed.
Now, it's quite an impressive sight! Be sure to scroll down and check out the multiple photos and all angles of the rock.
I thought the flag was draped over the rock but it's not. It's actually painted on the rock too.

Maybe it will become a Historic Rock for generations to come. Thought you might enjoy this.

So… Just how BIG is it?

So… Just how big is it ?

Disney World in Florida is a huge 30,000 acres.

Check out the cutaway map at the bottom right…

the size of WDW vs Orlando City Limits.

So I guess … size does matter…

The red square at the middle bottom of this map represents the size of Disneyland in California.

This may help you find where things are… and generally you need all the help you can get… unless you let Disney do the driving! No Worries!

WDW comprises the four Theme Parks, two water parks, 20 Disney Hotels, Fort Wilderness Campground, and the Downtown Disney Complex. Several Golf courses and a transportation system that includes over 200 buses, countless boats of all sizes, trams, and the busiest Monorail System in the World consisting of 11 monorail trains.

The two Monorail systems transport millions of passengers every year between the Magic Kingdom and the Disney Resort Hotels on the Seven Seas Lagoon… and the Transportation Center and Epcot.

WDW is also the biggest single site employer in the states… 65,000 cast members strong, and at includes Seasonal Cast members like ourselves numbering around 15,000. Seasonal Cast Members just work for part of the year… 3-4 months… consisting mainly of RVing Snowbirds that head south for the winter. Sun & Fun… and all the Disney Perks.

Disney World-Wide…

Walt Disney World Florida - 4 Theme Parks…

California Disneyland – 2 Theme Parks…

and parks in Paris, Hong Kong, and Tokyo.