We Finally Sold Our Motorhome!

 

It’s been 4 short months since I last posted on our blog. We have pretty much got settled into our new home here at Latitude Margaritaville Daytona Beach. It’s been fun hanging pictures, putting up curtains, and assembling patio furniture.

We stayed hunkered down this fall and winter, but finally got our COVID-19 immunizations in early-January and early-February. My sisters Cathy, Marcia and brother-in-law Mike also got vaccinated the same time we did over in Bradenton, Florida. It was a mini-family reunion as we had lunch after our shots.  

We put our motorhome on the market the end of January after some minor repair work (our side view mirror cameras weren’t working). 

There weren’t any bites except the RV buyer from La Mesa RV in mid-February. After another three weeks of no bites, we finally negotiated a deal with the La Mesa buyer. We dropped it off at La Mesa RV Center in Sanford, Florida. It was bittersweet, as we’ll miss our home on the road, but we’re also glad to be out from under the stress of expensive maintenance and repairs. It’s been quite a transition for us (and our cat Shasta) to move from our “house on wheels” for 7 ½ years to this house and get settled in. We absolutely love it here and enjoy meeting and socializing with our 55+ year old neighbors and community members from all over the country.  

Stay safe out there!

Steve & Julie Cornelius

The Next Chapter

We celebrated Julie’s Mom’s 90^th birthday on Sunday, October 25^th. Although we couldn’t see her in person, we celebrated with her with a Zoom meeting. It included Mom (Grammy), all three daughters, all four grandchildren, and one great grandson. It was fun to see everyone in Taiwan, Columbia, Utah, Colorado, Texas, New York and Florida.

Last Friday, October 30^th, Julie and I finally closed on our new home in Latitude Margaritaville Daytona Beach. We purchased the new home last December. They began construction in June and finished the house in late-October. We began moving out of our motorhome and into this 55+ retirement community right after closing. It’s been quite a transition for us (and our cat Shasta) to move from our “house on wheels” for the past 7 ½ years to this house. We took delivery of some furniture last Friday and Saturday that we ordered last summer, so we would have a place to sit and a bed to sleep on.

On Sunday, November 1^st, we drove the motorhome from Titusville and parked next to the house to unload the rest of our stuff, mostly into the garage. Then we took the motorhome to a storage place to park it for the time being.  

We love it here in Latitude Margaritaville. It’s a very active community with nice amenities (fitness center, paradise pool, tennis and pickleball courts, on-site bar & grill, and a new beach club on the Atlantic). Latitude Margaritaville is currently adding more previously planned amenities, since they have sold 1,000 homes since they opened in 2018. They’re adding a lap pool to the fitness center, a small theater, a work and play activities center, and more tennis and pickleball courts.

Stay safe out there!

Steve & Julie Cornelius

Back to Florida

We left Las Vegas on Friday, October 2^nd and headed towards San Antonio. We connected with I-10 in Phoenix and passed through Tucson, New Mexico, and Texas. Interstate 10 is 880-miles long across Texas.

We stopped in Castroville, Texas and met up with Julie’s sister Cindy and brother-in-law Terry. We hadn’t seen them since last January in Oceanside, CA at Camp Pendleton. They also full-time in their RV and travel around.

We made an appointment to see Julie & Cindy’s mom at her assisted living facility in San Antonio. It was good visiting with Bobbie and she enjoyed seeing us too. We all wore masks, social distanced, and sat outside for our visit. We felt really bad for Bobbie because her facility has been on lock-down since March to prevent any COVID-19 infections. Residents cannot leave the facility nor visit other residents, and have to eat their meals alone in their room. The good news is that there haven’t been any cases of COVID at her facility.

We left Castroville on October 10^th, spent two nights in Biloxi on the way, and arrived back in Titusville, Florida last Wednesday. We’re here at the RV park until November 1^st, when we unload our motorhome and put it in storage.

Last Wednesday we drove up to Daytona Beach to check on our house and deliver some New Mexico roasted chili peppers to new Facebook friends at Latitude Margaritaville. Bob and Maria used to live in Albuquerque and Julie connected with Maria. We really enjoyed meeting and visiting with them in person.

Our new house is coming along nicely. When we left Florida on August 1^st, our house was pre-drywall. Now it’s nearly finished and ready to move in. We drove up today, while most of the workers were off, and we could look around. We do a walk-through with the builder next Thursday and close a week later on Thursday, October 29^th. We start moving in on Friday, October 30^th. We just can’t wait.    

Stay safe out there!

Steve & Julie Cornelius

Hunkered Down in Las Vegas

 

 

We thoroughly enjoyed our two-weeks at Lake Powell. We left last Sunday and headed to Las Vegas with our friends Kris and Jan. Well, technically, we were in North Las Vegas, at the Nellis Air Force Base campground for a five-night stay.

This year’s stay in Las Vegas was like no other stay. No trips to a casino, no buffets, no shows, no trip to downtown or the strip. We just hunkered down in the campground.

We saw some old friends that we met three years ago here at Nellis, Craig and Peggy, from Seattle. They’re wintering here in Las Vegas and then Tucson. Last night we enjoyed some Steve-o-Ritas and catching up. Craig follows my blog, so we didn’t have much news for them.

The other day we were talking with Kris and Jan about what we miss with COVID and the global pandemic. We all really missed going out for breakfast. So this morning Kris and Jan fixed a breakfast of sausage patties and pancakes, while Julie prepared a green chili and grits casserole. Everything was very yummy!

We’re all Broncos fans so we watched Thursday Night Football with the Broncos and Jets. The Broncos beat the Jets, 37-28.    

We leave Las Vegas tomorrow morning and begin our trip back to Florida. Our new home construction is nearly finished and we’re scheduled to do our walk-through in two-weeks on October 16^th and closing the following week on October 22^nd.

Stay safe out there!

Steve & Julie Cornelius

Lake Powell 2020

 

 

We left Colorado Springs on Thursday, September 10^th and had a nice drive to South Fork for an overnight stay. We saw a few snow-covered peaks along the way. The next day we drove over Wolf Creek Pass on US-160. We were really surprised not to see any snow on the western side of the pass. The hills and valleys were all green.   

On Friday, we got to Cortez and the West View RV Resort around 2PM. The weather was warm and beautiful. We met Kris and Jan, our Albuquerque friends, and Marcia, Mike, and Stephanie, my sister, brother-in-law and niece for a two-night stay.

We all headed out on Sunday morning for the trek to Page, AZ and Lake Powell. We’ve been coming to Lake Powell the weekend after Labor Day since September 2001. About 10-years or so ago, it rained pretty much every day during the week we were there. The following year, we started staying for two-weeks to improve our chances for good weather.

Another sister Janet and her wife Nancy from Sacramento met us here on Sunday, September 12^th. We enjoyed that first week with Janet and Nancy staying with us at Lake Powell. That Monday evening, we all celebrated Janet’s and my birthday with Steve-O-Ritas and dinner. We had rented a pontoon boat from Aramark on Monday and Wednesday. The boats we rented were nothing like what the photo depicted. They were simply worn out.     

The second week of our stay at Lake Powell was busy with phone calls back to Florida to make arrangements to have our new furniture delivered. We learned last week that our new home walk-through is scheduled for Friday, October 16^th and our closing will be on Thursday, October 23^rd.

We’ve enjoyed our nightly get-togethers with Mike, Marcia, Stephanie and Kris and Jan. A few nights ago, I went old school and fixed Grasshoppers with vanilla ice cream as an after-dinner drink. It was Stephanie’s first-ever Grasshopper.

Last night, Mike, Kris and I wore our new Lake Powell tee-shirts for our traditional photo.  

Today, Julie and I drove over to the trail head of Hanging Garden Trail. We’ve been coming to the southern end of Lake Powell since 2009 and had never hiked this half-mile trail to see the Hanging Garden. It was a nice hike, even in the 90-degree heat.  

Stay safe out there!

Steve & Julie Cornelius