We finished up our cabin sole varnishing the day the Mate returned from her “vacation” and that evening cranked up Netflix to continue watching our latest western based murder mystery serial “Longmire”. Unfortunately, when I asked my phone to turn on it’s hotspot which allows us to stream video from the Internet to the TV, I got a message indicating this was no longer possible. This started a chain of events which gobbled up an incredible amount of time, it is a good thing we are retired, and not paid by the hour.
Evidently, when we updated our Samsung phone to the latest version of the operating system, the updated version effectively kills off the ability to use third party hotspot software, meaning you need to either pay Verizon more money each month for the feature or switch to one of their “newer” phone/data plans which includes a hotspot. Neither is an option for us. We are the few (less than 1% of Verizon customers) who are still hanging onto their truly unlimited data plan, as we are grandfathered in from 2011. We haven’t made a singular change to our plan since then as that would automatically exclude us from that unlimited benefit. You might say why not change, as Verizon has announced a new unlimited plan? You need to read the fine print. While you might get “unlimited” data, it is only the first 22gb that is guaranteed to get transmitted at 4G speeds, over that and you might (depending on how busy the cell tower is) get dropped to 3G speeds. The hotspot they give you in the plan is also “unlimited”, but at 4G speeds for the first 10gb then drops you to 3G speeds again.
Last month we used 65gb, not enough to get a nasty note from Verizon but more than enough to exceed their caps on high speed data if we were under any of their new plans. Since an hour of streaming video (Nexflix, Amazon) uses a gig of data you can see how fast it adds up. We still have the ability to teather (cable connect) our phone to our computer. This allow us to use the computer as a hotspot to send information to the TV but isn’t exactly convenient. We would have to boot the laptop, power up the wireless keyboard (the laptops dedicated keyboard died years ago), power up the mouse, connect the computer to the internet through the phone, run the software on the computer to generate the hotspot, then set the TV to receive the wireless signal. While certainly do-able and a few years ago would have seemed quite normal, it isn’t exactly convenient as we have only had to make a few menu picks on our phone to start streaming video as of a few weeks earlier. In the end we purchased a usb device (Screenbeam Mini 2) that simply plugs into our TV and allows anything on our phones screen to be seen on the TV. It is not as convenient as a dedicated hotspot on the phone but will get us by.
Of course in doing all this we started wondering why we had such a crummy cell phone signal at times. There is a massive cell tower only a few miles away and we thought that maybe we are behind too many buildings to get a good signal. Our cell antenna should be amplifying the signal. We have software on the phone that gives the signal strength in dBm, but the odd thing was that connecting to our cell antenna wasn’t showing an increase in signal strength. We thought it might be the antenna, they are cheap (less than $20) so we ordered a new one. That didn’t help. We sent an e-mail to the company asking if we sent it in could they repair it. The response was to call tech support who told us, no, they don’t repair them but will replace it if still in warranty. Of course the two year warranty ran out six months ago so the only option is to pay $180 for a new one. That isn’t going to happen as cell service is adequate for the most part in this neck of the woods. We won’t be venturing into the marshes of Georgia for some time.
The guts or our cell phone antenna amplifier. Since we had nothing to loose, I opened the case, voiding the now out of date warranty but wasn’t able to help the situation. It had more bits and pieces than I guessed. Maybe it is worth $180.
Solomon’s Castle is about an hours drive northeast of here. As this place was highly “recommended” we thought we should check it out. It is really an eccentric place carved out of the swamp by an artist/comic who has died in the last year. Around 20,000 people a year visit to view his home and artwork that he made from stuff other people were discarding.
Most of the interior is dedicated to rooms full of his artwork, the outside is covered in discarded aluminum sheets used in the newspaper printing process.
The metal in these animals came from discard oil drums. There is a corny story to go with each piece.
He built a 65′ “replica” of a Spanish galleon, the inside is a restaurant that is run by his kids. Actually the food was quite good and reasonably priced. The castle is closed in the summer as the land turns back into a swamp and the moat fills with water.
This is link to YouTube that describes the place in about two minutes:
There are quite a few other YouTube videos available as it seems as every TV station in the local area or magazine has done a piece on him and the place.
He has quite the antique car collection. Evidently he took his money out of the stock market in 2006 and bought about a dozen cars. They all had to be running and virtually perfect as he didn’t want to have to do any work on them.
We also spent a day at the Edison-Ford winter home in Fort Myers where Edison did a lot of research on rubber in the last years of his life.
View from the front of Edison’s house towards the Caloosahatchee River.
Some artifacts in the museum.
The base of a fig tree planted on the property. Edison originally looked at land in the St. Augustine area on the west coast of Florida but eventually purchased land in Fort Myers where it is warmer.
Adjacent to the property is a marina ($2/foot; quite reasonable) that has a Pincers (seafood) restaurant. Typical south Florida prices, so nothing out of the ordinary there but the food and scenery was good.
It was back to Cayo Costa aboard Mikes PDQ a few days ago with Mike and our Pilgrim friends from Destiny, Tim and Deb. Last time we were there we rafted up next to Mikes boat and the two boats kept pulling the stern anchor out of the sand on the beach. Since it gets crowded there we need to keep the stern from swinging around as we set the bow anchor in deep water. We were using Mikes small aluminum Fortress off the stern and it doesn’t have much holding power in dry sand. Since then Mike bought a corkscrew type “anchor”, basically for his dinghy but thought it might work somewhat on the PDQ and we bought a sand anchor that has a 4″ diameter helical screw welded to a handle. As might be expected, neither one (or both together) will hold very well in dry sand.
Our $27 sand spike anchor just isn’t up to the task. It might hold better in wet sand but doesn’t have the surface area in dry stuff.
Another option that I almost went with was a 6″ diameter auger bit that is normally used on post hole diggers from Harbor Freight. Those costs $50 and come in coarse and fine pitch versions. I was concerned that we couldn’t drive the thing in far enough with out a long lever arm on the top which would require a bit of welding. That might be a summer project for us.
The Mate soaking up the sun.
Here is something you don’t see everyday. These three kids are attempting to hitch hike a boat ride on the beach. Two boats just went by to the right of the picture. Evidently they were camping on the sand spit and were trying to get a boat to take them back to the Rangers station, in order to catch the ferry across Charlotte Harbor. The station is about 3/4 mile away by water but probably a four mile hike along the beach, which might entail wading out past the mangroves. They didn’t ask us but were pestering other boat owners on the beach. I have no idea how they thought the big boats coming in the channel could possibly pick them up unless they sent a dinghy in for them.
We also entertained the new owners of the Pilgrim 40 Vagabond a few days ago. They wanted to see another Pilgrim and get some “ideas”. Evidently they need to replace the generator, are going to add a stern thruster like ours and, and, and….
On another note, we see that the Erie Canal has changed hands, ownership has been transferred from the Turnpike Commission to the NY Power Authority. As such they have changed the opening day of the canal from May 1st to May 19th and operating hours will be from 0700 to 1700 for the entire season. Some locks and bridges will be operational later in the day. It is a good thing we are not planning on coming to Erie via the canal this spring as we are normally around Spencerport by the 19th of May, 270 miles into the canal from the Hudson.
Dave
Life aboard LIBERTY 