Today’s post brought to you by: Apple devices
Grateful for: whoever taught the Greeks how to cook
Trying hard to accept: I have to wait another 5 years to come live here
Of the 86,000 people who live at The Villages I don’t think any of them walk from A to B. Mainly I suspect because … usual story … there are no footpaths.
You’d think they’d encourage people to walk but I guess most people move dem bones on the golf courses or in one of the many, many exercise classes.
Ah, now let me tell you about the classes and other things on offer here. Nobody could ever act like a kid on school holidays and whinge “I’m bored.”
Today, for example, I could’ve gone to: any of 10 different art classes, any of 23 new release movies, every exercise class under the Florida sun including Bone Builders (osteoporosis be gone!), or air gun club, pool, bridge, learn-how-to-use-your-Apple-device (I really should go), book clubs, or Angel Snugs knitting for kids with cancer. And that’s just the ones I can remember. (Feels like The Generation Game conveyor belt.)
I was too late for first choice (yoga) and second choice (Pilates) and third choice (one-stroke painting) so aqua aerobics it was except that I wrongly thought I’d be able whack off half the estimated walking time and be there with 20 mins up my sleeve to chinwag with the locals, but alas had to admit defeat with 3 minutes left to walk 2 miles and call into the next pool I saw.
On my power stroll I saw 659 cars, 1,654 golf carts, 1 cyclist and 1 obviously-visiting-from-overseas pedestrian zipping across 4-lanes of traffic and traipsing along grass verges.
Everyone’s so friendly here. One woman even stopped, holding up a line of traffic, to offer me a ride. “Aren’t you freezing?” she asked.
It’s 20-something degrees!
Ben told me that Starbucks has opened its largest store in the world – 4 stories high – and guess where it is? Yip, Chicago. And guess who’s going? Yip, you and me Izabela. And guess what we’re NOT ordering: anything with the words Christmas, spice, eggnog or cream in its name.
This arvo I decided to walk to Walmart except that Google maps tried to kill me and send me straight onto a vacant lot with a train track running across it so I called by one the guard houses and asked John for advice. Seems the train track might’ve been the best option because John shook his head and said the other route would see me doing a kamikaze sprint across 6 lanes of very very fast moving cars and trucks.
Admitted defeat (again, eeek!) and walked 1.5 hr round trip to Publix supermarket past The Villages regional hospital – bigger than Wellington hospital -and every specialist medical facility you could ever want.
Two interesting things I found out from Ben which should make you lot in the antipodes very grateful you live there. Number 1: no such thing as the dole in the US. You only get a state-funded unemployment benefit if you lose your job. Never worked? No benefit.
Number 2. The level of your state-funded pension is based on your previous income. The higher your salary while you were working, the more money you get when you retire.
Oh, three actually. When you start a new job you get this many annual leave days: 0. After a year you get this many annual leave days: 5.
Here are a few squillion pictures. And good news – there’ll be more tomorrow. And the next day …
Typical street in the village we’re staying in. There are about 10 villages, each with its own manned guard house and collection of shops and golf courses and pools and other stuff I’m yet to discover. Jill-in-the-pool this morning was bemoaning how quickly The Villages is growing. More new homes = higher fees.
Guard house at our village.
Goes without saying there are more golf courses than you can swing a putter at.
This is “yes m’am” Jake the paramedic. There are 9 medical centres here. Told me he loves his job – probably partly because he never has to fight his way through blocked intersections to reach patients.
About to jump into 1 of 20 outdoor pools and meet Jan (Michigan summers; Florida winters), Laura and Jill.
If only I could’ve fitted this in my bag. I met Andy and Kathy, owners of Estate Sales Ltd, at the house next door. They get so much work at The Villages they don’t need to go anywhere else. Everything next door was for sale: half-used box of ground pepper (50c), travel-size shampoo nicked from hotel (25c), and right-up-my-street wooden bed frame – Cape Cod style – $150. If only I could’ve fitted THAT in my bag.
I know how much you love seeing what I ate so here’s tonight’s. Normally I have as much time for lamb as I do for the Labour Party but if I wasn’t so skinny-and-money-conscious I would’ve gone 2 rounds of this gyro. Think beyond the 2am kebabs of Courtenay Pl and imagine a highly seasoned with Christmas stuffing flavours, almost schnitzel-like, incredibly soft piece of deliciousness.
Flaming saganaki, Batman!! Normally I have as much time for cheese as I do for The Green party but I’d never say ochi to one of these.
I’m really enjoying going on this adventure with you and learning how alike and how different we are.
For instance we both appreciate some of the same things as far as why we lot in the antipodes should be very grateful we live here and not in the US (or many other countries but especially the USA).
We also both really notice the lack of footpaths in many parts of Florida. We both can see advantages to the wonderful variety of activities that are available in some of the retirement communities over there. I have a cousin who lives in one in Palm Springs Beach which must cost a fortune. It is not huge like where you are. It is one in a giant apartment building and it has a great gym and pool, 5 restaurants to choose from ( either lunch or dinner was included and you could pay for any others or cook for yourself), a movie theatre and numerous activities so boredom was not an option. Except for “it must cost a fortune”, which my cousin confirmed and said she loved but could never have chosen to move there before she was 87 and not planning to last a long time, I loved the time I was there.
However, it’s been a long time since I had some of those southern delicacies youreally like and when I go back to Alabama they are not anything that i eat or wish they had in Aotearoa/NZ. Also I have a lot of time for the Green Party. Not that that matters, when I go back to Alabama, I love meeting with my old high school and primary school friends, a few of whom I stay in fairly regular contact and we never talk politics.
I agree that in some instances the service here is not as friendly but I want to point out that wait staff in the US get paid less than minimum wage in many cases and they depend on tips to make a decent living so they are very motivated to give good service. You have not mentioned tipping people giving good service and maybe they do not expect it from foreigners but they certainly do from Americans (and even after 48 years here, I still sound like a tourist in this country and not over there. Once after having not been in the US for some years I came back and I forgot to tip someone who actually came after me to ask what they had done wrong. I told them they had been great but I had just forgotten what was expected in the US and apologized and gave them their tip. We have really appreciated the fact that here wait staff get paid enough that they are not dependent on tips to make a living. (they do not make a great living I know but it is much better than in the USA) I do sometimes tip here but it is usually at those places where all the tips are shared amongst all the staff at the end of the night. And I think that 3/4 of the time here the service is just as good as in the US. The 1/4 of the time that it isn’t, I often just find it funny and reckon the person is having a bad day. Generally speaking I have always found the people here to be nicer than those in the US so maybe in both countries they are nicer to and do not have the same expectations of foreigners!
You are a great travel writer, Gail, there must be some way you can turn your journeying and recording it into your future career.
Thanks Martha – interesting to read your experiences. I was so rusty on how to tip/pay a check I had to ask a woman sitting next to me at a diner in San Francisco how to do it.
If I’m ever in doubt about anything, I ask someone. Never know where the conversation will go, who I’ll meet or what I’ll learn.
Last visit 13 years ago I didn’t realise I was supposed to tip the hairdresser (at Aveda in Minneapolis – what a treat) so probably slurred NZ’s reputation!
If I could somehow make a living doing this I’d think all my dreams had come true!
I’ve just caught up on all of your blogs Gail and laughed out loud many times! You do a really interesting and entertaining blog. Can’t wait to read the next episode of your journey. It’s been a grey and blowy old weekend here in Houghton Bay, and all looks to be tickety boo at your place.
Thanks Sarah, glad to know my house is still standing! Wait till you read the next post … gulp.