I woke up several times during the night with a little rain puttering down on the camper roof.
When I actually got out of bed this morning, although still dark outside, Jim was simply sitting on the white sofa, looking across the little room to the fabric sofa. He had a look of, well, not sure how to describe his expression.
Jim said he got up at 2:00 a.m. to bring our shoes in from the outside carpet so they would not get wet. Then, when he got up at 5:00 a.m. he discovered the fabric sofa soaked, all the sheets and pillows we had stored underneath wet, and the carpet soaked as well. Bottom line, we had a leak.
If you remember, last week, Jim went to the 'camper store' and bought some sealer and a caulker gun and spent the better part of the day sealing and caulking. I'm just guessing, and this is just a guess, of course, that he missed a spot! :)
Jim's theory, and I'm sure it is a good one as Jim knows the ends and outs of this camper really well, as he needs to, is that the 'lock's we have in place, on the slider, when traveling down the road, may have jarred loose an area that he was not aware of.
In any event, Jim has been working on wet vacking the carpet and sofa. He actually fills the vac up with water and has to empty it - there is that much water - and start again. He has the little electric space heater going as well as a small fan, and the windows open, trying to get things dry again.
There was an outside chance that the little girls would have been here for a 'sleepover' last night. An occasion that would have been ruined with all of this water, so, ultimately things worked out.
The rain was not one of those sweet rains that I enjoy. Rather, raining buckets and buckets of water for a long time.
Right now, the sun is out, we can see patches of blue sky. The sweatpants and long sleeve shirt that I put on has been shed for a pair of shorts and a tanktop. Really warm and, of course, with all of this water, a great deal muggy.
Our trip to Fiesta Key, located at Mile Marker 70 on Hwy 1, yesterday was pleasant. As Jim went with me, he suggested we leave a little early and maybe take little detours down some of the side streets off of Highway 1 to the Marinas and some of the housing developments. That is always fun as the houses and yards are really different than what we are accustomed to, gravel yards, lots of funky yard decor, and most often, boats and boat parts or trailers all around the yards.
Once getting to Bill's camp site, Jim attempted to help Bill hookup his satellite dish. If this is hooked up, Bill can watch his channels from back in North Wilkesboro. Lots of time and thoughts for this task. Bill and Jim even rode down into the campground to talk with another individual that had gotten his satellite hooked up. They just could not figure it out. And, Jim was disappointed. Figuring out stuff like this is a lot of what makes Jim tick, he enjoys it and is disappointed when he can't master the task.
The clock was ticking and we needed to get Vickie and Cierra to the airport. Although Bill has his cable provided by the campground, we were more than disappointed we could not get him going with the satellite.
As always, when I am not driving, the drive down Hwy 1 through the Florida Keys is a great pass time. Most often you see the beautiful aqua water on both sides of the road with boats coming and going and lots of boats simply 'on the hook' (anchored out.)
After we dropped Vickie and Cierra off at the Key West Airport, Jim asked if I wanted to go by to see the Lee's. And, of course I did, but, I deferred to his judgment. Jim said "well, we can stop by, but we are not going to stay but about 20 minutes." I knew, as far as the little girls were concerned, a short visit like this would be confusing and just not worth it.
So, we stopped and got some Dion's Chicken, came back to the campground, watched some football and ate some chicken!
I also had me a good ole Reese's Cup for dessert - then, Jim remembered that they (Carolyn, the social girl, who seems to have been activated into duty, and Lazy Lakes) were going to have an ice cream social at 7:00 p.m. For $1.00 you can get a HUGE bowl of ice cream, so I did - chocolate ice cream with chocolate syrup. Yep, I did and I was about to blow up.
There was a good crowd at the clubhouse enjoying ice cream and we had fun talking with everyone. We sat with Marty and Donna. Donna filled me in on some of the campers that are no longer here, and Marty and Jim talked about the methods of fishing off the bridges.
Marty also told Jim he missed the 3:00 Marbles Game. Too bad, although others at the social said, no worries, there will be plenty more games.
Many, many folks here fish off the bridges (bridges that are beside the highway 1 bridges, so no danger from traffic) and Marty is an excellent fisherman. He has a boat here and goes out in his boat as often as he can, and when that is not possible, you can generally find him 'on the bridge.'
Back to the camper, a little Jets/Patriots Football. We were pullling for the Patriots - and then t.v. in the bedroom for me and t.v. in the den area for Jim.
Then, back to what we woke up to this morning.
Right now, we have put the slide back out, the sofa is folded out in the bed mode to help in the drying and we have about six sopping wet cleanup towels outside now to dry out a little. The carpet runner that was in front of the sofa is also out 'drying out.'
Hillary has called and asked Jim and I to join their family on a kayaking adventure. Yeah, sign me up!
We are about to leave here, deciding to close up the camper (all the windows are open right now to help the dryout process) and turn on the a.c. Jim will leave the fan running and we will walk away from this most unfortunate leak until later today.
Happy Monday to You All and may the messages of Dr. Martin Luther King surround you all with comfort and peace.
This little guy is my new best friend! There are a lot of birds around here and this little fellow is so small he gets lost in the rush. I have put some bread crumbs out for him. I bought him some birdseed at Publix the other day which doesn't seem to interest him. He is eating the bread. He has yellow under his tail feathers - I do not know what kind of bird he is? Does anyone?
Cierra, Bill and Vickie at Fiesta Key just before Cierra and Vickie left for the airport.
While travelling across the 7 mile bridge - which Jim measured and says it is actually about 6 1/2 miles - Jim pointed out this pretty little island. Most islands are mangrove masses, lots of greenery and mangrove roots. This pretty little island had a beach, a boat docked and there was a tent making us believe there were campers enjoying this solitude and beauty.
Although you cannot tell too much from this picture, this is our wet den area this morning. Jim has picked up everything from the floor, squishing water as he walked in front of the fabric sofa. The blue, on the floor, in the center back of the picture is the set of wet sheets that were stored under the sofa. The pillow shown is wet as well.
Not a very interesting picture, I agree. This is, hopefully, to show to you how much rain we had. This five gallon bucket sitting outside the door of the camper is full to the brim of rainwater.
After the rain, and before we draped the wet cleanup towels over all of these chairs and across the picnic table. Maybe you can see the street in the background fully covered in water.
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