Wasting away in “Navarreville”

Been awhile since our last update. That’s mainly because we’ve had a pretty quiet and peaceful time here in Navarre, Florida. Our main activities have centered around two thing – doctor appointments and eating out. I guess it’s a sign of getting old when your schedule gets filled up with appointments. Here’s a partial list with most related to good news!

• Jill had a bad trigger finger that needed fixing
• We both had dentist appointments with Jill needing to get a little minor work done
• Jill had several eye appointments with a local specialist. Good news there was that he came up with an alternate treatment that didn’t involve injections into the eye (eek!)
• And best of all, Jill had her final x-ray and review of her broken femur and she got a complete clean bill of health! The bone is healed well and still growing around the rod in her leg and she does not need any more follow ups!

Lola also received some annual care by getting a full wash and wax plus sealant for the roof so she’ll stay shiny and leak-proof (hopefully) for another year.

We also worked to make up for all the months we had been away from the area and seafood! Restaurants we have visited included:

• Boshamps in Destin
• Shimp Basket in Navarre
• Pompano Joe’s in Miramar Beach
• Peg Leg Pete’s in Pensacola Beach
• Johnny Huston’s in Navarre
• Juana Pagoda’s in Navarre Beach
• The Fish House in Pensacola
• Ye Olde Brother’s Brewery in Navarre

Plus several visits to Culver’s across the street from our campground for great burgers! So, yep, we’ve eaten out a lot! More oysters and fish than we can count.

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We arrived just two weeks after Hurricane Sally came in just west of Pensacola. In the area of Navarre the most obvious evidence included lots of trash out at the road, many roofs covered in blue tarps and just about every pier on the sound destroyed. This included the 325 foot pier at our campground. The storm surge and wave action was so strong that it tore up all the boards and railings as well as dislodging many posts. The beach at the park was still OK although it had some erosion. The dog park lost all its fencing but they rebuilt it within a few weeks of our arrival. The park itself did not get any damage and our site was fine and ready to go.

Pensacola was hit pretty bad with lots of trees down and flooding. We have only ventured over to Pensacola once and that is mainly because the most direct route between Navarre and Pensacola is the “Three Mile Bridge” via Highway 98. This bridge was brand new, just being completed, when Sally came thru. The contractor that was building the bridge still had many construction barges around the bridge and did not move them. Three ran into and damaged sections of the bridge while other barges broke loose and ended up in people’s back yards and elsewhere around Pensacola Bay.

Over the next month, we experienced the “thrill” of living in Florida as our area was threatened by two more storms – Delta and Zeta. Delta came close enough to give us some strong winds overnight but nothing else. It is good to know you can pick up and move your house out of the way if things do get bad!

Since we are now official residents of Florida, we were here for the November elections and were able to participate in early in-person voting in our county of Okaloosa. The process was very smooth, they even handed out pens for each voter to keep (not just the “I Voted” stickers :-).

We’ve gone to Navarre Beach a few times but mostly relaxed at the campground since we have our own beach, pavilion, and our campsite with comfy chairs.

In early November, Dan’s mother Jean, came to Navarre to visit for a week. Now, before you wonder where we put her in the RV, not to worry. We found a nice little condo over on the beach for her so that everyone could be comfortable and no crowding occurred ;-).

It was a busy week for her with highlights including visits to the Turtle Conservancy and the Gulf Breeze Zoo, where mom got to feed the giraffes!

It’s been a little bit quiet as it pertains to our military neighbors. If you have been following our blog and previous visits to this area, you may recall that we are close to an Air Force Special Operations Base (Hurlburt Field) which operates and trains on the special C-130 heavy weapon airship as well as the Osprey rotating wing vertical landing warplane. From time to time, you can see and hear them on target practice to our northeast and also see the Ospreys practicing maneuvers over the sound to our south. On a few occasions, we have even had direct flyovers.

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Our kids and grand kids are doing well. As we write this, the girls are coming up on their 1st birthday!!! They are growing like weeks, have wonderful personalities and have just now started to walk (Savannah was first on Thanksgiving Day and Skylar should be right behind her!)

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As we write this latest update, it’s the day after Thanksgiving (Black Friday!!!!). It’s abnormally warm with a lot of humidity (lots of fog this morning) but a cold front is on it’s way, should drop down into the 30’s by Monday. Ah, life in northern Florida! We are thankful that we and our family have stayed healthy during this very trying year. We’ll stay here in Navarre thru the end of the year, with a trip to Atlanta over Christmas to visit family (we’ll leave Lola behind at the campground and rent a house north of Atlanta for us and the dogs). First part of 2021 we’ll spend in Florida but we’ll have updates on that schedule at a later time.

Thanks for following along, stay safe and healthy!

Dan & Jill