Brrrrrrrrr!!

Saturday the 6th

Man, it's hard to believe we're in Florida! Temps last night were in the low 30's and even with the sun out it only got to the mid 50's during the day. We had planned to go to the races at the Citrus County Fairgrounds but with the wing blowing at 20 mph and more we didn't think we could it enjoy it. So we pretty much just spent the day close to home. Turned out our walk over to Walmart to buy envelopes was the highlight!

Sunday the 7th

Woke up this morning and there was frost on the ground. After taking the dogs for their morning get out, feeding them their breakfast and turning on the coffee pot, I rode my bike over to the paper stand to buy a paper. Got there and realized I had put on my long pants - no money. Back to the coach where I grabbed a couple of quarters. Then rode back to the paper box. Got there and realized it was Sunday, needed more money. Once again I rode back home and got all my money, heheheh. Then it was back to the paper stand where I finally got my paper and rode back to the coach to relax.

That's when I realized the front furnace wasn't running. I checked the propane and we were perilously low, but the rear furnace was running so that probably wasn't the problem. So back outside I went, screwdriver in hand, to try to solve the problem. Once Th cover was off, I found a blinking red light on the control panel next to the on/off switch. Using my engineering brain I flipped the on/off switch a couple of times, tapped the gas solenoid a couple of times and went inside to see if that worked. No luck. That's when I knew it was serious.

So I dug out the furnace manual and searched for the troubleshooting section. Didn't exist. The wiring/electrical schematic was undecipherable. No help there. As a last resort, I went to the inside control panel and switched the controls between A/C and Heat a couple of times for the front furnace. Voila!! Success!! The front furnace came on! We had heat in both sections of the coach. Houdini magic does it again!

Back outside I went to replace the cover then it was back inside. Of course, all during this time I had my gloves off so by the time I was ready to settle down and relax my hands were frozen. It took over an hour to thaw them out. Where was my magic when I really needed it, heh, heh.

Around 11:30 AM we packed up the dogs, grabbed the hp and jumped in the car for the drive to Mt Dora. This weekend was the annual Arts Fair and we wanted to check it out. We got the dogs in the car and headed out on the 35 mile drive towards Orlando.

Mt Dora is a really pretty little lakeside town and hosts a nationally recognized Art festival with over 250 artists and 20 to 30 food and craft vendors. The Center for the Arts is in the heart of downtown Mt Dora and produces the festival (http://www.mountdoracenterforthearts.org/event_artfestival.html).

We arrived in town and found a great parking spot a block away from the entrance only to find out that no dogs were allowed.

While we were getting ready to walk down to the festival the sun came out and with a gentle breeze, most of the clouds disappeared as well. Even so, we still had jackets on. After taking the kids for a quick walk we left them in the car, parked in the shade, with the windows down and temps in the 50's we knew they'd be okay.

The festival was huge! It ran from one end of town to the other and covered three cross streets as well. We made it about a quarter of the way through and stopped for lunch. Then it was on with more walking, browsing and people watching. There was a huge crowd and it spilled over to the sidewalks behind the booths and into the stores on all the streets. We finally made it all the way through with only a few twinges that we should have got this or that particular item, but as Tina said, since we aren't decorating a house, making the purchases we'd like to didn't make any sense. So we just enjoyed the day.

On the way to Mt Dora we passed by a street side Barbecue place, really just a small trailer set up as a kitchen with a huge wood fired smoker grill outside. So as we drove home we decided to get some ribs for dinner while we watched the Super Bowl.

We got a slab of ribs, half a chicken, baked beans, potato salad and corn bread and made it back to the coach around 5:15 PM. After walking the dogs we settled in for the evening. Tina was rooting for the Bucs while I had picked the Saints. We had a really great dinner while we watched the game
All in all it was a pretty great day!!

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