We made it to Florida

March 28, 2009 – 10:00am

Hello! Wow, it’s been a journey! I have had terrible internet service at Hollywood Casino RV Park. I had terrible internet service at Pensacola (we were staying at a friend’s house, in their driveway), and we now have finally made it to Kissimmee, Florida with great internet service! I want to back up a little bit and tell you what you’ve missed out on the last few days!

When we were at the Hollywood Casino my mom cashed out on one of the slot machines (it’s wasn’t alot of money so don’t get too excited) and her ticket got stuck in the slot machine so a slot host. I guess that’s what they call them who came over to help her get her ticket out of the slot machine and we were talking to her for a little while while she tinkered with the slot machine getting my mom’s ticket out from the jam…..

The conversation we had with her turned to Las Vegas and she told us that she’s never been Vegas but she’s seen alot of deals for flights to go out there and she wants to go (I would say she was about 38 or 40 in age). So I asked her why doesn’t she go. She said that she’s scared to go. She used that word “scared”. She told me that she thinks Las Vegas is just like New York City and it’s not safe and people get mugged, robbed, and killed there all the time. There’s a reason I’m telling you this so stay with me for a second here. I just want to say that if anyone reading this is “scared” to go to Las Vegas, tell me! Please please tell me! Because I only need a 1/4 of an excuse for a reason to go back to Vegas and I’ll be more than happy to go to Vegas with you if you are “scared” and show you the sights and lights and realistically, how safe this awesome destination really is! Don’t get me on the topic of why I love Vegas, because I just won’t shut up (can you tell I miss Vegas already!)…..so we are moving on in subject and don’t be “scared” of Vegas!

Next up! We visited our friends Linda and Bob in Pensacola for a few days and we really enjoyed the visit! We all went out to dinner together and the next day we went to the new casino called “Wind Creek Casino and Resort” in Atmore, Alabama! Cool casino and definitely paying. I won $344 dollars there. Don’t ask me how because I can’t believe I was playing the slot machine at 5 dollars a time! That’s not like me at all, but it was paying!!!

And it rained, and rained, and rained alot in Pensacola. There was some kind of tropical storm on our tail along I-10 and the rain cloud was right above our head the whole ride across I-10.

On the way down from Pensacola to Kissimmee, we knew it was a long ride and thought it would be nice to stay at the Hard Rock Casino in Tampa over night. Well, I called ahead to the Hard Rock Casino while on Highway 19 South and was transferred to security to discuss RV parking options in their parking lot so we can visit their casino. The security man on the phone with me said that the only way to park an RV over night in their parking lot is if we rented a hotel room at their casino. I paused for a couple of seconds to try to find the common sense in this policy. So I said to him, “Well, why would I want to do that when we have an RV and want to visit the casino?” He said, “Well, that’s true.” So I said to him, “What’s our other option if we want to visit your casino and we have an RV and don’t need to rent a hotel room.” He said and I quote, “Park your RV down at the Flying J truck stop and take a taxi 4 miles to our casino.” Do you hear me Hard Rock Casino????? We can not park our RV in your parking lot so we can spend our money in your casino!! People have money in their pockets, money keeps your casino alive, try accommodate your customers, I swear at the end, you will win.

OH, I have another issue I want to vent about. Oh, you’re gonna love this one too. When we were at the Hollywood Casino we checked in with cash. We don’t use credit cards too often, we try to use cash for most of our purchases and RV park stay overs. We were told that we have to pay for the 2 nights in advance with a 25 dollar deposit and we would get back the 25 dollar deposit at the end of our 2 night stay when we check out. I’m not too sure why the deposit is necessary and I’ve never experienced this check in policy before but we pay for everything up front in cash. The RV park check-in office lady also printed out our Hollywood casino players card and we were told that if we use our player’s card in the slot machines at the Hollywood Casino, our comp points that we accumulate would take off money from our reservation site fee. So we used our players card and I spent quite a bit of money there racking up points on my players card. When we checked out the lady behind the desk told us that because we paid cash for our reservation and not used a credit card we couldn’t use any comp points from our player’s card to save money off our RV site. I like to save money, who doesn’t, but what I don’t like is a poor excuse. Enough about that…I’m moving on……

My third issue I am having is that not too many people are participating in my polls and I don’t know why. I had this discussion with Linda back in Pensacola and when I brought up my “issue” with people not participating in my polls she just started laughing. I asked her if she participated in my polls and she said no. I said I don’t understand people like to read about my trip but not take the two extra seconds to click a choice on the question that is posted. I’m interested in my blog readers – SOOOOOO, here we go again! I thank you people who voted and I’m going to post the results here and I’m going to post another question for you all. Here are the results!

How dependent are you on an automobile GPS device?
5 votes (24%) said that they are completely lost without a GPS (well, actually 4 votes because 1 vote is from me)
6 votes (29%) said that they use it sometimes if they are going to someplace new
4 votes (19%) said they would take a map over a GPS any day!
6 votes (29%) said that it would be nice to have a GPS and they have added it to their birthday list!
SO, I love these polls, you can tell can’t ya! Okay, new poll is up and running and I want to hear from you. Don’t be shy and don’t be “scared” hee hee

The pick up truck turned 9,500 miles today since we left at the end of November. We are back in Kissimmee once again! We are leaving here on Thursday, but let’s not think about that right now. Let’s have some fun! We’ve got so much to see and so much to do here in Florida!

We checked into this RV park late last night and the security gate personnel made the phone call to a park host, Lou from Indiana, that met us at the check-in lodge and checked us in and showed us our site at 9 o’clock at night. I hate checking in this late at night, but we’ve all had enough of dry camping for a while. We are staying here until Thursday and we will be visiting the area and I will be doing my Mickey Marathon number 2 (Disney Marathon number 1 is here! Going to Disney for the whole day from the minute it opens to when they kick me out finishing up the day at Downtown Disney exactly like I did when we started this trip in November! Can’t wait to tell you all about it! Have a great day and I’ll be back soon now that I have great internet service!