Bailey

We walk to Hertz to pick up the rental.  We had it scheduled for 10a pick up.  Not a good start, only one guy working and our car isn’t ready.  He goes outside to wash it.  What’s the point of reserving?  Finally on our way with a Kia Forte                     

We get to Costco a bit before they open, huge lineup.  We follow what everyone is doing, grab a cart and wait in line.

It’s not till you get to the front of the line that they offer to wipe your cart.  Wouldn’t the damage already been done by then?  At the entrance, they have a sign, Out of Stock: toilet paper, hand sanitizer, wipes.

Inside we attempt to find aisles that aren’t too busy, it is so stressful people just don’t get it.  We get our items, pay – no protection for the check out people.  Now the lineup is at least twice as long.  Social distancing – not much in effect.

Back home, unpack the groceries and decide we’ll go to Dunedin, home of Blue Jay’s Spring Training Camp, training is cancelled, another casualty of COVID-19. We are not Blue Jay or even baseballs fans but Dunedin looks like a cute town.

Not this year 🙁                 

We are not Blue Jay or baseballs fans but Dunedin looks like a cute town.

It’s St. Patrick’s day and although Dunedin cancelled the events, these people obviously didn’t get the memo.  We did not walk on that side of Main St.

Tomorrow, St. Pete’s.

Allan calls our insurance who confirmed we are covered!  Best news 🙂  We are all relieved.

We are running out of supplies so we book a car rental for tomorrow.  We also hope to tour around, avoiding people.  Really want to go to St. Pete’s to see what should have been.

Today’s news:  “The White House on Monday issued new guidelines designed to slow the rapid spread of coronavirus, asking nearly every American to stay home from work or school for the next fifteen days. In almost every aspect of daily life, America is closed for business.

Wall Street took a beating on Monday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling about 3,000 points — its largest one-day point loss in history.

In many major cities, bars and restaurants have been told to close or only offer take out and delivery services.

President Trump on Monday admitted that the country “may be” headed into recession as businesses are forced to lay off millions of workers. Mr. Trump said the outbreak could last into the summer, perhaps as long as August.

More than 4,500 people have tested positive for COVID-19 in the U.S. and at least 88 have died. Globally, the death toll was just over 7,100 on Monday, with the weekend seeing an alarming spike in fatalities in three European nations grappling with aggressive outbreaks. While more than 181,000 people have caught the virus around the world, almost half have already recovered, and the vast majority of cases remain mild.”

New rule:  Don’t go anywhere without hand sanitizer (we only have 2 of the little ones, and they aren’t full) – hope to get some tomorrow and we now always wash our hands when we enter Bailey.

Trying to keep positive and keep laughing. 

Hopefully we’ll find more on the shelves tomorrow  Never did like pineapple on my pizza.

Certainly not what we had wished for but …

We dress in our race gear 🙂 Allan getting us set up     

We select the 2003 St. Petersburg race and away we go. Pace laps

Green flag! 

How ironic the Corona car spins out!

Even the skinny squirrel came to watch

And the win goes to my favourite driver of all time, Paul Tracy!!

Paul after win

All in all a fun lemonade day!

Covid-19 is beginning to be real.  Kyle, our son, called today and urged us to come home.  Our concern is that we are safe here; if we were to leave what could we encounter?  Closed state borders?  Snow storms?   We agree to check our extended health coverage – if it doesn’t cover Covid-19 we will begin our journey home.  Email our rep, Dan, who likely isn’t working till Monday. He does email but says as everything is changing so quickly it is best to call the insurance company directly on Monday.

Loving the weather! 

We decide to entertain ourselves with a walk around the park, first park we’ve been in that has a No Pet area;

and then walk around the neighbourhood and see this sign for a car wash.  🙂

Allan gets a photo of a gecko. 

Fast little guys and who knew some have them as pets “geckos are long-lived compared to some reptiles. On average you can expect your gecko to live six to 10 years, but many males live 10 to 20 years. At least one male is still breeding at 27½ years of age.”

Have to keep washing hands, not touch face, keep hydrated and LAUGH!

Although many people do not like Friday the 13th my Mom loved them and said they are lucky days.  Not his one 🙁

Just a weeks ago, we were “living the dream” and anxious for today as it was the beginning of our much awaited first IndyCar weekend of the season.

So much has changed and incredibly fast!  The coronavirus is no longer just in Wuhan China but spreading world wide. The stock market is dropping, toilet paper and  hand sanitizer are hot commodity. People panic buying and hording.

The memes are beginning

It would appear, had China reported this earlier we would not be in this situation.  

We find out today the practice, qualifying and race are cancelled.  It is the right thing to do but disappointing, none-the-less.  Public events or more than 250 people are all cancelled.

Announcements today, Trump declares national emergency

We decided, Sunday, race day, we will sit outside and use our outdoor TV to watch a YouTube of a previous year’s IndyCar race.

Today is get familiar with the park and area.  Living in a virtual bubble, rarely listening to the news we were not prepared for the magnitude of what we would encounter and learn.

We had to chuckle at this sign.  How popular is Rick that they now required a “Rick doesn’t live here anymore” sign.

We see our first Walmart Marketplace store, that sells only groceriesEnter the store to what will become the reality for, anyone’s guess to how long this will last.

On this day…

Today, is travel day to St. Petersburg  and the first IndyCar Race of the season, we leave at 945a, 63,577 km

Long bridge!

Made it!!

Arrive at our home for the next month     

Drive to Site

Oh no! No way we’ll fit in this site 

They find us a new spot, Lot 325, like it much better here. 

We spent the last few days doing not much of anything.  We did get mani/pedis at “Beautiful Nails” in Seffner.

This is the view from inside,  a little cramped.  Neighbours, Jerry, Lynn and Spud the puppy are from Brampton.  Across the street is Saskatchewan.

Because this park is also a dealer; there are many RVs on display – just open the door and walk in.  We saw some  super, nice RVs of all classes.

We came across a bare Freighliner chassis.  Bailey sits on one so Allan was happy to check it out.

Today is another Bailey bath day.  The last bath didn’t last long.  Bailey is filthy.

These are the pretty trees, not sure what they are but the drop the red pedals everywhere

End of day jiggle

Today’s adventure has us taking a Lyft to Ybor City, (pronounced EE-bore) aka Cuba Town, known for it’s Cuban cigar making and restaurants.What we didn’t expect is roosters & chickens run free.What’s with that?  Oh those stairs!

I take some interesting photos, don’t you think?We encounter smoke, from where? This cigar, smoke billows from the bottom. Although the sun is shining it is a bit nippy; we want to warm up so pop into The Big Easy.Roosters here too You encounter some strange restrooms.  This, not so clean, bathtub is the sink.

Ybor’s main street 

Wall art!Last camp we learned about alligators.  This one chickens/roosters; didn’t know they could climb trees.

Apparently  it isn’t a fun fact!

My favourite

So many choices for dinner.  We decide upon the town’s oldest restaurant built on an entire block Columbia Restaurant Allan ordered their signature 1905 Salad (The Columbia’s legendary
salad tossed tableside. Crisp iceberg lettuce* with julienne of baked ham, natural Swiss cheese, tomato, olives, grated Romano cheese, Lea &
Perrins® Worchester sauce and our famous garlic dressing) and Cuban Sandwich (The “Mixto,” as it was known in the beginning, was created in the 1890s for the cigar workers as they walked to and from work. The sandwiches underwent changes as immigrants from different countries
came to Ybor City. The Spanish brought the fine ham, the Sicilians the Genoa salami, the Cubans the mojo-marinated roast pork, the Germans
and Jews the Swiss cheese, pickle and mustard. Put it all together between sliced, freshly baked  Cuban bread). 

I was going to have that too but then the shrimp called me. Shrimp Supreme (large shrimp is wrapped in wafer thin bacon, marinated and fried with yellow rice.)

We walk around a bit more, before heading back stop off at TBBC for a flight.

Waiting for our Lyft, we see Tampa’s skyline Back at the resort we enjoy some live entertainment.  The bass player was entertaining, he twirled the bass-never saw that before.

It’s official!!  The gators won but maybe we’ll prevail here?Travel day to Seffner FL  It’s a 59 m drive but we’ll be stopping at our first Pubix Super Market and Walmart.  Leave at 930a 63,478k

It’s an eventful drive, we thought traffic maybe bad but no so that’s good.  There is a Walmart as well so do the necessities shopping there.   Groceries at the Pubix. 

Head out to LazyDayz RV Park.  This park attached to a dealer, so I didn’t know what to expect.   All good, sites are closer together than we’d like but…Bonus! Free breakfasts at the dealer’s cafeteria every morning  🙂

We check things out and find the hot tubThere is a restaurant/bar attached to the hot tub/pool area interestingly built around a bus Allan must drive everything!Love the counter top, not only has our name but checkered flags