Before we knew it, Friday, April 1st was almost upon us so it was time to start prepping for our departure. Mother Nature teased us by deviating from the very hot, humid weather we had during the previous week and giving us a few days of cooler, less humid and more comfortable temps. In fact it was almost chilly at night which gave us a chance to enjoy our new fire pit.

But of course, she couldn’t let it stay that way – the day before we were to leave when we had so much to do, she gave us another dose of hot, humid, sweaty, sticky and oh so uncomfortable temps. This time it was worse though, hitting the 90 degree mark with a dew point in the oppressive range. Oh yuck! When can we head north? Not soon enough in my opinion.

Thursday would be a very busy day – our newly purchased, hardly used fire pit table with four chairs, the cantilever umbrella, the market umbrella and the round table and chairs all had to be packed up (and in some cases disassembled), so it could be stored in the coach house/shed – and still leave room for the golf cart. Per HOA rules, nothing can be left outside over the summer due to the risk of hurricanes. It may not sound like a lot but it took us (mainly Rob with some assistance from me) the majority of the day getting all of it done. Gee, things were much easier when we just rented a site!

After a lot of sweat, everything was done just in time for a quick trip to Ritchey’s Produce to pick up a few more delicious farm fresh tomatoes and a stop at the Alva Diner to pick up a bucket of Broaster chicken for supper. It was before supper, around 5:30 p.m. when Rob decided to make a dumpster run in the golf cart while I stayed on the coach. Sounds pretty mundane, right?

Well, it wasn’t. After he was gone for about 7 to 8 minutes, my phone rang – it was Rob. Huh? Why was he calling? Did he stop to visit some friends? Did the golf cart break down? Nope. In an alarmed voice, he tells me there was an accident near site #269, telling me that he had called 911 and asking me to call the office so they could open the gate for the police/ambulance. At first, I thought he had been in an accident but whew, he wasn’t. The office was closed – it closes at 6 p.m. so there was no answer but the security guard was on duty and was there to open the gate for them.

When Rob returned, he explained what happened. As he was coming back from the dumpster he saw a car, probably going faster than the 15 mph speed limit coming towards him. He was surprised when instead of following the curve in the road, the car headed straight. Suddenly, bam, crash, followed by the sound of breaking glass! The car had slammed into a metal lamp post, sent it flying, then crashed into a Royal Palm tree on the side of the road. Yikes! How did that happen? At first, Rob thought the guy, an older gentleman probably in his late 60’s, early 70’s, must have been drunk. But no, apparently he had dozed off and lost control of the car. Luckily neither he or his wife were hurt. His Cadillac SRX wasn’t quite as lucky though – it was a mess. The entire front driver side was smashed in and radiator fluid was spewing all over the ground.

And even more lucky, Rob wasn’t involved, another 5 or 10 seconds, he might have been in the wrong place at the wrong time and might have been hit. Who would have thought that such a thing would happen on the quiet streets of an RV resort? Guess the driver should count his blessings that he didn’t doze off on the very busy FL-80 and that he didn’t hit anything or anybody in the resort!

The next morning Rob backed the golf cart into the shed, then we washed down the site pad to remove all the tire tracks, stopped in the office to say goodbye and we were off! More in our next installment!