That is near my kid brother ( not a kid any longer!) he lives in Dania. We go to Las Olas Blvd -- if he is buying! $$$

I lived teen years in Wilton Manors..went to Fort Lauderdale High.

plantladylin said:LOL, Lauderdale sure isn't small and simple anymore ... traffic, traffic, traffic!

There are still some very nice, small cities in Florida but I don't know about being really small and simple. These are a few that come to mind on the west side ... no particular order. I've been to a couple of them and love the Apalachicola, Port St. Joe area on the gulf coast. The following cities are small to me but maybe not exactly what you are looking for.

Apalachicola: http://www.saltyflorida.com/ar...
Port St. Joe: https://www.visitgulf.com/port...
Destin: http://www.cityofdestin.com/
Dunedin: http://www.dunedingov.com/inde...
Inverness: http://www.inverness-fl.gov/
Defuniak Springs: http://www.visitflorida.com/en...
Safety Harbor: http://www.cityofsafetyharbor....
Bonita Springs: http://www.visitflorida.com/en...
The Villages (more of a retirement community): http://thevillagesflorida.com/
Brooksville: http://www.visitflorida.com/en...

There is one on here that IMHO I would not go near & that is The Villages. We know a couple who moved there & hated it & ended up moving back to Hobe Sound. Everyone of course has their personal opinion but they could not tolerate it. They had been there about a month or less when the Groundhog Day tornado struck in 2007. That's why they left. They researched after that tornado & found out it's about the worst place for tornadoes in FL.
http://www.homefacts.com/torna...

How interesting.

Funny story..we looked at area labeled retirement village here. Close to our home. Tall buildings..with really nice apts. we could not afford..they wanted $$$ just to buy in and $3K a month maintenance / rent on what you owned! Anyway...we were looking because I was mad when I saw the dope clinging to a ladder..50 feet up ...with his skinny white ( shaking) legs..crocs and white knee highs...in lashing wind and rain ---cleaning a gutter WITH A LONG HOE!

well we were there dinner hour..parking lot facing clubhouse..
All these walkers appeared out from the entrances of the buildings
All fancy dressed and heading to the restaurant on site with a full bar
It looked like COCOON!
DH hit the gas so hard I got whiplash!
It was a fearsome site.

I know retirement villages in Fla different..but this one was more like the last step before Soylent Green!

We have friends living in The Villages too. It's definitely all brand-new and not anything like "old Florida". If you play golf or like lots of organized activities it's like summer camp for seniors. A huge gated community with all sorts of rules about what you can and can't grow, can't park a truck in the driveway, can't paint your mailbox anything but white . . you get the drift.

I couldn't possibly live there, it gives me the creeps even just staying over night with them for a visit.

dyzzypyxxy said: We have friends living in The Villages too. It's definitely all brand-new and not anything like "old Florida". If you play golf or like lots of organized activities it's like summer camp for seniors. A huge gated community with all sorts of rules about what you can and can't grow, can't park a truck in the driveway, can't paint your mailbox anything but white . . you get the drift.

I couldn't possibly live there, it gives me the creeps even just staying over night with them for a visit.

Lord NO!!!!! I despise the ruled with an iron fist communities! Oh the horror!
Rosie, be careful. We DO have those same kind of "Cocoon" communities here in FL. Keep your eyes peeled when you're checking them out.

I will.
I am not very " rule able "

I went to war with neighborhood association president ( architectual queen) yeas ago in a community of cookie cutter houses where they got mad because I did not submit my request for a SQUARE birdbath...round and oval allowed..... "NOT SQUARE ..NOT SITTING ON GROUND" WITH NO PEDESTAL AND NOT WITHOUT APPROVAL from the witch who had an illegal fence!

I installed a round birdbath ON a pedestal alright.. ..a commode purchased from habitat for humanity! And I sent her a nice note saying when her fence comes down...the lid on my birdbath would also...that lid had my house numbers painted on it -- for the emergency ambulances dontchaknow!

plantladylin said:Jean, we are so grateful that this storm isn't what was predicted! We were prepared and hoping for the best. My husband says he thinks the winds we got were maybe right at hurricane force (around 75 mph) and with all the huge trees we have we are very thankful that the winds were not as high as they predicted we would have here in this area (130+ mph!)

Reports show the storm making a loop and heading back south towards the Bahamas by next Tuesday but it will be much weaker so if it does head back towards the Fla. coast it should only be a little rain.

I went out during a lull in the rain a few minutes ago to take pictures of our yard. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and clear so that's when we'll venture out to begin raking and picking up.

All in all not bad. So glad it was not much worse there.

MISSINGROSIE said:I will.
I am not very " rule able "

I went to war with neighborhood association president ( architectual queen) yeas ago in a community of cookie cutter houses where they got mad because I did not submit my request for a SQUARE birdbath...round and oval allowed..... "NOT SQUARE ..NOT SITTING ON GROUND" WITH NO PEDESTAL AND NOT WITHOUT APPROVAL from the witch who had an illegal fence!

I installed a round birdbath ON a pedestal alright.. ..a commode purchased from habitat for humanity! And I sent her a nice note saying when her fence comes down...the lid on my birdbath would also...that lid had my house numbers painted on it -- for the emergency ambulances dontchaknow!

I just got off the phone with a friend in our old neighborhood in Hobe Sound. Poor thing! She lost power last night @ 11 & sits without still. Here's the kicker...... she & her neighbor directly behind her are the ONLY 2 in the entire neighborhood w/o power. This means they are at the bottom of the list for power restoration as priority is the most customers w/o get restored first.

Yes, when they get these 1-5 customers without power they go on the absolute bottom of the list. Going top be a long wait for them.

No fun to be weeks without power!!

Just got back from a walk to the beach. So strange, the beach side looks untouched, tons of yard trash. It was the riverside that got some damage, as it seems oddly enough, it wasnt the head on winds that were the problem, but when the wind turned from coming off the ocean, to coming off the river,
that it did damage. Took the dock out, neighbors porch. Neighbors on the other sides sea doo came loose and beat it up. If he cared, he would have taken it down, he gets new ones all the time anyway. Cant get pictures off phone, will work on that. Nothing awesome. Fun to remember tho.
Power at our house, lots of generators running as we walked to beach.

gardenglory said:Just got back from a walk to the beach. So strange, the beach side looks untouched, tons of yard trash. It was the riverside that got some damage, as it seems oddly enough, it wasnt the head on winds that were the problem, but when the wind turned from coming off the ocean, to coming off the river,
that it did damage. Took the dock out, neighbors porch. Neighbors on the other sides sea doo came loose and beat it up. If he cared, he would have taken it down, he gets new ones all the time anyway. Cant get pictures off phone, will work on that. Nothing awesome. Fun to remember tho.
Power at our house, lots of generators running as we walked to beach.

They kept saying that storm surge was the big danger. Glad you are okay there.

I read 350000 with no power in the great scheme..not a lot..maybe the wait wont be long!
Posted 50 min ago


1. We have been very fortunate that Matthew's category 3 winds have
remained a short distance offshore of the Florida Coast thus far,
but this should not be a reason to let down our guard. Only a
small deviation to the left of the forecast track could bring these
winds onshore. The western eyewall of Matthew, which contains
hurricane-force winds, is expected to move over or very near the
coast of northeastern Florida and Georgia today.

2. Hurricane winds increase very rapidly with height, and occupants
of high-rise buildings in the Jacksonville area are at particular
risk of strong winds. Winds at the top of a 30-story building will
average one Saffir-Simpson category higher than the winds near the
surface.

3. The water hazards remain, even if the core of Matthew remains
offshore. These include the danger of life-threatening inundation
from storm surge, as well as inland flooding from heavy rains from
Florida to North Carolina.

4. The National Hurricane Center is issuing Potential Storm Surge
Flooding Maps, and Prototype Storm Surge Watch/Warning Graphics for
Matthew. It is important to remember that the Potential Storm Surge
Flooding Map does not represent a forecast of expected inundation,
but rather depicts a reasonable worst-case scenario -- the amount of
inundation that has a 10 percent chance of being ex

@flaflwrgrl Sorry to hear that about your friend.
@MISSINGROSIE I was born in Ft. Lauderdale but left at 2 weeks of age so I don't remember anything about it then, but when visiting an Aunt there 20 years ago, you couldn't PAY us to live there then, much less now. I'm so happy that my brother picked DeLand since we have become the caretakers of the property. We are also fortunate to be living just outside the city limits so we don't have to adhere to stupid rules -- we can have any shape birdbath we prefer, but we are only minutes from the nearest hospital and the new Publix!

Deland..I will look at that!

I do think Jacksonville is in trouble surge wise, up in that bend, it could be bad. Also, the st johns river, which will flood, runs thru downtown, I sure pray they dont get the bad side of storm.

@MISSINGROSIE Perhaps you wouldn't be interested in DeLand -- it is about 20 miles west of Daytona on the east coast, but it is a nice little college town (Stetson University).

MISSINGROSIE said:I will.
I am not very " rule able "

I went to war with neighborhood association president ( architectual queen) yeas ago in a community of cookie cutter houses where they got mad because I did not submit my request for a SQUARE birdbath...round and oval allowed..... "NOT SQUARE ..NOT SITTING ON GROUND" WITH NO PEDESTAL AND NOT WITHOUT APPROVAL from the witch who had an illegal fence!

I installed a round birdbath ON a pedestal alright.. ..a commode purchased from habitat for humanity! And I sent her a nice note saying when her fence comes down...the lid on my birdbath would also...that lid had my house numbers painted on it -- for the emergency ambulances dontchaknow!

Rosie, you are my kind of people ! ! ! !
Sam

We are looking at west side. I have been both and maybe it was the luck of each visit...but the east feels hotter to me..the west breezier. Maybe nutz but lived on the east for years and only visited the west ( but many times )

Deland is a wonderful little city, I love that place and tried and tried to talk my husband to moving there from Daytona Beach for years but he was spoiled being only 1 1/2 miles from the University where he's been teaching for many years. Now we moved 2 hours south to Sebastian and he commutes 2 days a week to teach his classes and a couple of weeks ago we were "wondering" if maybe we jumped too quickly with the move south. He said, "Maybe we should have looked for property in Deland."