[Aces4]

Originally Posted by ThirdOfFive

Why does it have to be either-or? Both realities have their attractions.

I admit to being nervous about moving here because of the "horrible heat" mantra I heard from so many others. But after nearly four years here now, full-time, I've come to the happy realization that I LOVE the heat of a Florida summer. More than a Florida winter, as a matter of fact. Summers are greener and thus far more attractive to the eye than winter here. I walk 5-6 miles a day and that doesn't stop when summer comes: I just walk a bit more slowly and try to remember my water bottle, but even if I forget I can count on people in golf carts stopping to offer me a ride or even (as has happened many times) a bottle of water! Besides the halfway point of my walk happens to be a Publix store: Spend a couple of bucks more or less on an ice-cold 20-ounce bottle of unsweetened iced tea and I'm all primed and ready for the stretch run. And golf--who doesn't like knowing that you can pretty much go to the course of your choice at any time after 12:00 noon and get on? Sure, it's hot--but fewer people and overall prettier courses are big advantages.

My experience with winter happens to be Minnesota where I lived year-round for 70-odd years, many of those years in or north of Duluth, and as Mark Twain once observed, the worst winter he ever spent was a summer in Duluth. Yeah, it's cold--I remember walking for a mile the morning the cold temp. record of -60 (not windchill, but actual temperature) was recorded. And you can count on snow on the ground usually for six months out of the year in the more northern reaches of the North Star State. (Not this year, but they deserved a break from Mama Nature). But Minnesotans have a pretty unique way of dealing with winter. Snowshoe baseball, for example. XC skiing. Ice fishing. Hockey. Water skips...for those unknowing, water skips are organized events held on frozen lakes where a long rectangular hole about 100 yards or so long is cut in the ice, and people try to ride a snowmobile on the open water from one end to the other. It can be done; the key being enough speed when you hit the water so that the machine planes out and doesn't sink. A fun part of such entertainment is usually at the end, when people try to set the record of "most people on a snowmobile driving over open water" (or some such). At one event I saw eleven people, admittedly pretty well oiled up on peppermint schnapps, try it. Unfortunately they sank about 10 yards short of the goal. But after the eleven plus their machine were fished out, festivities continued on as usual.

Overall I'll take summers here over winters there, mainly because my arthritis slackens dramatically in the heat of a Florida summer. But that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy both.

Duluth… ouch, no wonder you’re happy with your arthritis in The Villages.