January in Florida

 

New Jersey shirt at the Hispanic market in Florida!

January 2025

Disclaimer: Nothing you read on the blog is AI generated, it is all my recollection of our road trips. That probably explains some of the poor writing, well that and I’m writing this in December, some 11 months after the fact. No reasonable excuse, life is fast and I’m getting slower.

Bringing you up to speed: The 2025 blog begins in Florida because that’s where we ended the year 2024.

January 1 2025

On the first of January we left Easterlin County Park and drove to our January destination in Homestead. By noon we were all set up on our site in Southern Comfort RV Resort. We have stayed here many times during our snowbird sojourns, and it never changes. It is a misnomer to call it a resort, but it’s not a bad campground. This is our first time back here since before covid and the only things we noticed was the park is nowhere near as occupied as it always was in past winters. They still operate the Tiki bar in the center of the park and occasionally have a band perform there. Sometimes, they are not half bad!

Our move in January 1 to Southern Comfort RV Park

Our site at Southern Comfort

A park resident

 Oscar the friendly maintenance man no longer works here. Oscar was always on the move, always doing something, his replacement looks as if he is glued to the golf cart seat. 

The town of Homestead is undergoing a mind-boggling housing boom. They are building new homes, townhouses, apartments and condos everywhere. Back in 1992 Homestead was ground zero for Hurricane Andrew and it’s 165 mph winds devastated the town. I always felt like it never really recovered from that storm. It is now one of the fastest growing cities in Florida.

Everywhere you look there are new houses

On a related subject, while driving around one day we came upon a humongous warehouse being built. It looks to be at least 80 feet tall and a ½ mile long, I’m assuming it will be an Amazon facility. Homestead is the end of Florida’s mainland and the beginning of the Keys; I imagine the warehouse will serve the 100-mile island chain in addition to the mainland area south of Miami.

At a local restaurant

Biscayne Bay National Park

Biscayne Bay Boardwalk

So, we were at Southern Comfort RV for the whole month of January and what did we do? Not much, we’re more like refugees from the cold than tourists. This area is kind of like a bedroom community between the big attractions of Miami and the keys. There really isn’t that much to do in Homestead, being there is all about the weather, it’s warm and sunny almost all the time.   We tried to go to Planet Fitness every other day, we read books, played computer games, watched TV at night. I became fairly competent at cooking on the griddle and prepared many of our meals on it. Our main activity here is our after-dinner power walk up and down every street in the campground.

It helps to know some Spanish

If you can't find a hat here...........

the produce market

Not counting Walmart, Aldi’s and Planet Fitness there is only one place we went to more than once. The Hispanic market, a mostly outdoor bazaar where you can buy most anything in new or used condition.  The real name is the Redland Market Village, but I’ve never heard anyone call it that. It spans 27 acres and has a large general merchandise market, an expansive flea market for used bargains, a food court and an organic produce market. 

We didn’t take our bikes to Florida this year because we had read online about numerous thefts in the campground. Once there we heard the unsubstantiated gossip and one bonified theft story. We spoke with a couple who arrived with two new Ebikes. They rode them once, secured them with cable locks and went out for about an hour. When they returned, the bikes were gone, the thieves leaving the cut cables on the ground. They never did retrieve them. Note: While we were there we never heard of any theft or saw any unsavory characters in the park.