As many of you may know, we relocated (courtesy of the United States Army) to the Sunshine State in March of this year. Yes, from the land of liquid sunshine to the land of perpetual sunshine......it has been quite a journey. Here is the short version:
Duane returned from a year in Iraq in early October of 2005. We enjoyed the holidays with family and then Duane promptly left for Camp Rudder, Eglin Air Force Base, Florida to begin his new duties as a Ranger Instructor in the Army's infamous Ranger School. The girls and I remained at Ft. Lewis, WA. so that I could finish teaching first semester and prepare a replacement. In mid February, Duane returned to help us move and clear post housing.......white glove inspection anyone??? Due to a variety of events out of our control, our move date was upped by about 2 weeks so one can only imagine the chaos....trust me, you wouldn't want to know first hand! We then began our trek across country....it sounds like a romantic road trip until you consider the 2 restrained toddlers and free roaming cat in the minivan packed with essentials and various things the movers "forgot"..........................
We left Ft. Lewis after a goodbye dinner with family and friends and headed south to Oregon for a final visit with Mom and Dad. From Oregon, we traveled to California where we stayed with Uncle Rick and Aunt Tess. We headed out in the morning for Las Vegas and a visit with Grandma, Uncle Errol, Aunt Glenna, Jeff, and Renee and a pre-debut Carter. We continued our trip by traveling across Nevada, Arizona, and most of New Mexico in one day. Lesson learned: 12 hours is 4 hours too many for two toddlers and a cat in a minivan..............We stopped at a hotel in a tiny town on the New Mexico border and set forth the next morning for Oklahoma. We stayed 2 days in Oklahoma and visited with Duane's parents, Danny and Roxann, and the entire Wells' Clan that calls Broken Bow (yes, that really is the name of the town.....) home. From Broken Bow we headed towards Louisiana and Alabama, stopping for the night in Mobile, AL, just 2 hours outside of our destination. Finally, with the sun shining and the promise of a day free of fast food and rest stops, we headed into the northern panhandle of Florida. About 45 minutes east of Pensacola, we hit the town of Fort Walton Beach and began looking for signs to 6th Ranger Training Battalion, our new home.
Duane had hinted that our new home was a little......remote. I suppose I was thinking "cozy" and perhaps even "slightly secluded." Nothing prepared me for the dirt road, absence of bridges over large amounts of water, and general absence of civilization that characterized our trip "home." I soon began to fear that Duane would point to a tent pitched in the midst of the woods and declare "Welcome Home." Thankfully, we soon came upon a clearing in the trees. Several buildings, all painted in the familiar Black and Gold of the famed Ranger Tab were visible. Just a few more feet and we turned left into a small neighborhood of 20 houses, each inhabited by a Ranger Instructor and his family. We quickly found our house, 10 Overlord Drive. Yes, that is the name of the street. I suppose that's what happens when you let a bunch of Rangers name the 3 streets in the neighborhood..............I was grateful to learn that there is a paved road that comes onto Camp. It is 17 miles long, not lighted, and a slow and cautious speed is recommended at night due to frequent sudden stops for deer, coyote, armadillo, fox, turkey, snakes, the Florida Brown Bear, and the Florida Panther. And yes, in my short time here I have run across all of the aforementioned woodland creatures.
Life on Camp Rudder and in Northern Florida has been an adjustment. The Camp is small and very secluded. We have found that most locals do not even know that people live back here. If they do, they tend to refer to us as "those Army people that live in the woods." Here in Air Force Country, we are sandwiched between Eglin Air Force Base and Hurlburt Field, the Air Force's Special Operations Command. We share space with Duke Field, another Air Force installation. Living on Camp is little like taking a step back in time. We leave our doors unlocked, the kids roam the neighborhood, if someone BBQ's, they invite the whole neighborhood, if you are going "to town" you stop to ask if anyone needs anything, and the kids eat at the house serving the best dinner that night. During the school year, all is quiet by 8am as kids need to be up early for school.
Northern Florida itself is beautiful. The beaches attract tourists from every continent and are absolutely breathtaking. And yet, it has the small town feel of a southern town. The panhandle of Florida is in a different time zone than the rest of the state and receives its' local news out of Mobile, AL. We are actually closer to Alabama in distance and in local culture than we are to the rest of Florida. This part of Florida, aside from the beautiful beaches, is very traditionally southern and we are learning to adjust to the slower pace and lack of health foods and coffee.............more on that later.
We will try to keep this blog updated and add pictures but please be patient, the only internet access available to us is dial up............Hopefully this will help us keep our families up to date on the often chaotic adjustment of our Northwestern Army family into this Southern Air Force Country................
Duane, Kelly, Kaitlyn, & Sam.antha
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