HOMES SWEET HOMES (January 2 - February 12, 2022)

   

B. Solomon   A. Dicer      
Mark Vice   

 

 Our six weeks stay at the WYNDHAM CYPRESS PALMS RESORT in Kissimmee, Florida will soon come to an end, and we will make our way to WYNDHAM OCEAN RIDGE in Edisto Beach, South Carolina.  While in Florida, the weather was a little cooler than expected but the average high temperature was 70 degrees.  The average high at home in Indiana for those days was 35 degrees.  I guess one could say that it was twice as warm in the sunshine state. Our time was spent enjoying the comfort of our two-bedroom condo, the swirling waters of the hot tub, and the warmer than Indiana temperatures.  This resort commands a strong community feeling and it always has felt like a welcoming location.

Presslers

     We took a three-day break from our stay to spend time at the Central Florida Holiness Campground where I spoke in their chapel.  It was nice to be able to share God's Word again and to reconnect with good friends, including Rosie and Bryan Solomon, Mark Vice, Mark Murphy, and Ted Lee.

     Our Florida respite ended with friends from Indiana, Darwin and Jean Pressler, spending the final four days with us.  We will share a ride to South Carolina with them where they will be our guests for another four or five days at Ocean Ridge.

REFLECTIONS

Edisto Dolphin

Whoever would have thought, when we bought a week's vacation at Fairfield Glade, Tennessee, that the time share lifestyle would be such a large part of our retirement journey.  It certainly wasn't on our minds when we first became involved with Fairfield/Wyndham in 1982.

Then, it was simply a way to have a nice vacation annually at a fixed price.  It was a way to force us to get away.  Those years, traveling as a family, were some of the best times of our lives.  

Cypress Palms Gator

Now, we are retired and for the last six years have made Wyndham properties our vacation homes away from home.  We spend about 40 weeks a year in timeshare resorts.  Some have said that we have spent considerable dollars across the years, and I agree that we have.  But never did we spend beyond our means, and I doubt that we have spent more than we would have for a retirement home somewhere.  The difference is that when I look out my "vacation home" window I might see a dolphin frolicking in the ocean, an alligator sunning in the warmth of the sun, or a deer sneaking along a tree line.  

As we enter our condos, we feel like we are home!  The appliances are the same, the bedding is the same, the coffee maker is the same, the dishware is the same, the blue glasses are the same, and it feels like home.  

Someday we won't be able to travel anymore, and we'll have to settle in somewhere.  The kids will take over maintenance fee payments or unload the points somehow.  Until then it's full speed ahead.  I have to book March 11-18, 2023, at Ocean Ridge tonight at 12:01 a.m.! 

Fairfield Glade Deer