# Florida: Graveyard of the Snowbirds?



## SifuPhil

​
I've been getting my usual 7-year itch lately, the one that compels me to up and move to a totally new place. I don't know why this happens to me - perhaps I have congenital wanderlust.

Whatever the reason, I've always enjoyed Florida when I went there on vacation and, even earlier, when I spent a single semester at Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne (on the Atlantic, about a half-hour north of Vero Beach). In looking at possible rentals throughout the state recently I came across the dreaded "Old People Come Here To Die" phrase.

I understand that Northerners come down in droves because they like the idea of not shoveling snow, and that many of them mistakenly think that Florida is just one big Disneyworld. What I DON'T understand is how true the OPCHTD phrase really is. 

Any thoughts on this one? Do we Yankees really act like elephants when our time is up, migrating to the Great Homo Sapiens Graveyard by instinct? Is it just the fact that only the financially-secure types can really afford to live in a nice area of the Sunshine State? Is it just a myth?


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## pchinvegas

I don't know SifuPhil, that sounds pretty accurate to me. My BFF lives in Lake Placid, Florida. I normally spend my springs there with her and we cruise at some time during my 6 week visit. The Pubix ( PUBIC) market has a whole isle of Depends and there are more handicapped carts than food carts and NOBODY moves faster than 15 MPH, even in a car ! Hairstylists still tease hair and use cans of hairspray. Malls are full of granny panties, checkered pants and shits to match with cute animals embroidered, smocked and quilted on them. It is scary!
They must be financially secure, EVERYONE has a new car!


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## Ozarkgal

HaaHaaa..that sign reminds me of the 70's when I still lived in Oregon.  They had a campaign to discourage California people from moving there.  They were over the top environmentalists at the time and didn't want the Californians messing up the place...they had bumper stickers that said  "People in Oregon don't tan, they rust" and "Last year summer was on July 12th", and others such as that.  

Maybe that sign was to discourage people from flocking there.

Never been to Florida, never had the urge to go there.  I have lived in Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Oregon,Texas and now Arkansas.  Every state in the country has it's good and bad points.  The trick is to figure out the bad points before you move there.  I would never move anywhere based soley on weather alone. 

*Pchinvegas......*LOL...it might be worth a visit just to see those checkered pants with "shits" to match.


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## SifuPhil

LMAO@pants & shits! Now I know why the Depends display is so large!

I didn't know where Lake Placid was - I thought that was where they held the Olympics in NY! layful: I looked it up on Google Maps and I'll be darned - they're smack-dab in the middle of the state. I wonder if less-populated - and less popular - locations like that, away from the water, have become the favored location for seniors. I wouldn't blame them, given some of the nasty crime reports that come out of cities on both coasts. I would think it would be a cheaper COL as well. Thanks for mentioning it - I'll look into it, and maybe I'll end up joining the Baby-Food Brigade!

Ozark, was that when the environmentalists were spiking trees? And what you said makes a ton of sense - don't move just for the weather, although that's very difficult to acknowledge living in the Eternal Darkness of PA.


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## TWHRider

The "Eternal Darkness of PA" and the bone chilling cold that did not agree with my arthritis is precisely why I left - lollollol

Weather equals insurance rates in Florida.  Many insurance companies have pulled out of Florida and the ones that have stayed have raise HO premiums thru the outer stratosphere.

Meaning, if Florida sounds attractive SifuPhil, do your HO insurance homework first, even renters insurance if you don't plan on buying.  For all I know the Comprehensive side of auto insurance may have gone thru the roof.

Since my area has become the new Tornado Alley, our HO premium went up $200 this year and Allstates homeowner rates have tripled in the county due north of me.  That county took a huge hit in 2010 on some very expensive brick homes.  The Big Bad Wolf did a stellar job of blowing two & three story brick homes down to the ground that year.

Setting all that aside, I visited Florida years ago and my fondest memory was the size of the bugs in the winter  lol lol  Back then I was small enough to be carried off by one of them.  A return trip was never in my date book - lol lol


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## SifuPhil

TWHRider said:


> The "Eternal Darkness of PA" and the bone chilling cold that did not agree with my arthritis is precisely why I left - lollollol



I don't even _have_ arthritis and it affects me, more I think on the mental side (which in turn of course affects the physical side). I've always had a preference for living near bodies of water (and no, the Susquehanna River doesn't qualify) - I always feel far more energized when I'm near an ocean. 

Maybe it's that Pisces thing ... 



> Weather equals insurance rates in Florida.  Many insurance companies have pulled out of Florida and the ones that have stayed have raise HO premiums thru the outer stratosphere ...



Luckily I no longer have any HO's. 

I'm one of those odd ducks - I don't drive, don't own a car, don't plan on owning a house, don't even own any furniture. I'm a minimalist and I have no insurance of any kind, so I think that will be a wash for me. But thanks for bringing it up - I think that's the first time I've seen insurance referenced in regards to moving to Florida. Usually the conversation centers on ...



> Setting all that aside, I visited Florida years ago and my fondest memory was the size of the bugs in the winter  lol lol  Back then I was small enough to be carried off by one of them.  A return trip was never in my date book - lol lol



LOL! I was exposed to a few of the critters back when I was hanging around Melbourne for a while and they never really bothered me. I've lived through roaches and rats big enough to ride the roller-coasters ("You must be THIS tall ..."), so a few love bugs, fire ants and jumbo spiders don't mean much to me. I have an arrangement with them - I don't bother them if they don't bother me.


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## SeaBreeze

Never did like Florida, vacationed in Miami Beach in the past.  Too hot, don't like alligators, and too many people letting their huge poisonous pet snakes loose when they get too afraid of them.  There's nothing about Florida that is appealing to me, I'll stick with shoveling my snow and enjoying the four seasons.  I don't know of any other people who retired in Florida except for Jerry Seinfeld's parents.


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## Ozarkgal

SeaBreeze...loved Seinfeld, love four seasons...hate snakes....snakes and lack of four seasons is a deal breaker for me. I have way too many snakes here, (one defines too many) but I haven't seen any 17 foot ones yet....if I do, color me gone!


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## SeaBreeze

We have small garden snakes, larger bull snakes and the occassional rattle-snake...but not too many or too often.  But those huge poisonous monsters I see them trying to catch on some of those cable TV shows are too much for me.  I don't feel that much hatred for the snakes themselves, especially if they're in their natural habitat...but the idiots that buy them and breed them as pets, then either carelessly let them escape, or purposely let them loose to get them out of the house...no excuse for people like that.  Not fair to the snakes, or the neighborhood folks. 

PS: love your little characters!


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## pchinvegas

Florida is beautiful, Lake Placid is known as the city of murals. There are wonderful painted murals on the buildings in this samll town depicting the history and prominent community members. Lake Placid is a city surrounded by Orange groves, the smell this time of year is wonderful when the orange blossoms are in bloom . There are birds, lots of birds they are unbelievably loud chirping all day. The Egrets,  Wood Storks and Blue Herons will land in your yard and eat what ever you throw them. It's really a great place.  Mt BFF lives right on a canal, with a boat dock and yes the gator will come right up into the yard, you gotta be careful.
The teeth were left in a Martini glass in a bar in Lake Placid. The sunset on the lake and the birds being fed.
We go to Tampa, Ft Myers and other beaches every weekend.


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## SifuPhil

Wow, folks here _really_ don't like snakes much! 

I've had my share of encounters with the northern varieties (I used to go free-climbing) so I know that most of them really want to avoid us as much as we want to avoid them. 

I knew a dancer once that had a fairly large (~7'-8') reticulated python as a pet / stage prop. In between sets she'd drape him over my shoulders and tell me to keep an eye on him. 

Vegas, that looks like a nice place (minus the teeth, of course). I imagine some of those communities must be pretty pricey - TOO pricey for a broken-down old bum like me. Maybe I could arrange a long-term lease under the dock with the herons ...


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## Ozarkgal

Here in Arkansas we have six varieties of poisonous snakes.  I worry about snakes more for the sake of my Gangstas, than myself.  Here,we mostly have copperheads and water moccasins, both of which are aggressive snakes.  Living right on a creek increases the chances of encounters with the water mocs and starting in spring I live in mortal fear of the Gangstas finding one.  We keep everything off the ground and keep the grass mowed very short and often, and 5 cats help.

This seems to work well as we have had just a few instances of having them in our living space.


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## SifuPhil

I was invading their space by climbing the rocks, so I'm not surprised that I encountered a few copperheads, a bunch of black rat snakes and, on two occasions, a timber rattlesnake. I wasn't much of a fisherman so I never ran into any of the water snakes, which I understand can be as nasty as a cottonmouth.

Meh - another reason Florida appeals to me is that I'm thinking of getting back into bicycling, and the flat land there would be a blessed relief from these mountains. That way, I could just run over any little slithering things that come chasing after me.


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## R. Zimm

As a Florida native I must remind you that (although it's slowly changing) Florida is actually two states, NoFla and SoFla. SoFla (east) is basically a suburb of the NE US (there are very few people in SW FL). West Coast is more like a suburb of the Midwest US. NoFlas is like Soyth Goergia.


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## SeaBreeze

Ozarkgal said:


> Here in Arkansas we have six varieties of poisonous snakes.  I worry about snakes more for the sake of my Gangstas, than myself.  Here,we mostly have copperheads and water moccasins, both of which are aggressive snakes.  Living right on a creek increases the chances of encounters with the water mocs and starting in spring I live in mortal fear of the Gangstas finding one.  We keep everything off the ground and keep the grass mowed very short and often, and 5 cats help.



A Schnauzer I had in the past was bitten by a rattler in our backyard.  He knew better about snakes and would just wide-circle them and bark until I came out with the killin' shovel. layful:  I think he was just minding his own business, and was bit in the back leg from behind...we never did see the snake.

He started whining and holding up his leg.  I got the dog clippers, and shave off the fur to take a closer look.  Sure enough, two holes that looked like a snakebite to me.  Within minutes, he was panting heavily and foaming a bit at the mouth...I rushed him to the emergency animal hospital.  There they gave him some anti-venom, put him on an IV, and kept him overnight.  Next day he felt a lot better, but my wallet was ailin', lol. :dollar:

We have a big open field behind our back fence, so snakes do stop by and say hello from time to time.


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## TWHRider

I am ok with snakes as long as they aren't in any of the Viper families and don't want to over-populate our property.  Snakes and ticks are two big reasons we are so anal about keeping this place mowed down.

I have seen one or two Black snakes and I have threatened Mr. TWHRider with neutering if he kills them (he probably hates them worse than anyone on here-lol).  They eat rodents and kill what the cats don't.  They are a lot faster than Viper snakes, so if they hunt everything out, there's nothing for the Viper snakes and they move on.



SifuPhil said:


> I was invading their space by climbing the rocks, so I'm not surprised that I encountered a few copperheads, a bunch of black rat snakes and, on two occasions, a timber rattlesnake. I wasn't much of a fisherman so I never ran into any of the water snakes, which I understand can be as nasty as a cottonmouth.
> 
> Meh - another reason Florida appeals to me is that I'm thinking of getting back into bicycling, and the flat land there would be a blessed relief from these mountains. That way, I could just run over any little slithering things that come chasing after me. *Evidently you didn't read my thread quite awhile back about skirting around a Water Moccasin, a/k/a Cottonmouth, when I was on the 4-wheeler.  I was telling one the kids helping us put up hay about it and made the off-hand comment I was too afraid of that larger-than-life snake to run over it.
> 
> His comment was "good thing you didn't.  My brother tried that on the dirt bike --------the snake somehow wrapped around the bike and a managed to flip itself onto my brother".  He didn't get bit, which is probably a miracle but it did scare him straight into a change of underwear; at least that's what I was told - lol lol lol
> 
> So running over snakes with a bicycle is also out of the question - lol lol lol lol*
> 
> View attachment 319


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## Ozarkgal

*TWH...*You and Mr TWH sound like my hubby and I, only opposite. He doesn't want the black ones killed, but at a distance when they're in the creek, water mocs look black also. I don't stop and ask for their credentials, I am one mean killing machine when it comes to snakes. 

 I have heard that the black snakes will eat the poisonous ones also. Don't know how true that is, but I did see a great long one wrapped around a rat right after we moved here. He was under a piece of plastic, and lying next to him were two huge cottonmouths, the female ready to pop. (They were at least 10 feet long. _ )  It was quite a surprise when we lifted that tarp up. We let the black one go, but he was extremely reluctant to leave his rat, the rat was beyond caring. The other two, not so lucky.

Phil..I hear they use snakes in Florida for speed bumps...better have some mountain tires on that bike.


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## Ozarkgal

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/03/02/173315544/florida-sinkhole-so-dangerous-rescuers-cant-search-for-missing-man?ft=1&f=1001

 People were commenting on how sinkholes are common in Florida, because there are so many people, they are draining the water aquafiers, thus creating these sinkholes.....woowza...what a tragic thing.


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## TWHRider

^^^ I know - this has been all over the news. 

 I saw an interview with the sister (or cousin?) who heard him screaming for help and commenting she will hear that the rest of her life.  What an absolute nightmare.

I have heard of sinkholes opening up in housing developments on the other end of county, and halfway swallowing lawn tractors, and there's a house in Shelbyville that got sold for a song because a sink hole opened up under it but nothing like this.  Scary scary scary, so it is

We have three "bowls" on this 22 acres, and when you stand back, you can see a ridge/rim running beside all of them - the grass that grows on that little rim is always the first to die off.  Two of the more defined bowls are so deep that all four horses can get down in there and can't be see from the house or barn.  I have pictures of that somewhere; even though the horses aren't visible in the pic, I took it just to prove my point - lol lol

One of the bowls has a sinkhole, dead center.  I have been dumping old hay and shavings in there for a couple years.  Every time we get a several day rain, the big pile disappears and the sinkhole is at ground level again.  During the "Nashville Flood in 2010, the center bowl completely filled with water and deer were swimming in it --- much to the consternation of my Arab - lol

 I keep telling Mr. TWH that some morning we are going to wake up and find ourselves looking straight down to China in one of those "bowls"  :dread:

There's a cave system that runs through several properties (local folks think our "bowls" are part of the cave family since there is an opening to that system further up a hill on our property, and goes under the road (it's collapsed twice in the 9+ years we've lived here - lol lol) and continues on the other side of the road to "nobody knows where".


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## SifuPhil

Sinkholes are nothing new here in Wilkes Barre, thanks to the decades of coal mining that created a virtual underground labyrinth. Every once in a while some horses, a few little kids or a full-sized pick-up truck will disappear. Folks hereabouts just have a beer and some sausage and get back to watching the ball game. layful:


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## R. Zimm

They are not so common in SE Florida and we sit on something called the "Atlantic Ridge" which is basically a mound of shell rock running up the East coast of Florida with a peak a few miles inland (varies). The ridge is much more solid than the rest of Florida where it's sand on top of limestone over the aquifer.

With new construction they check as best they can so it's often the older structure that disappears into a sinkhole. Usually it's just interesting news but when someone just gets sucked away that's different.


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## rkunsaw

There were a lot of coal mines in this area but I don't know of any sinkholes.My property was once a coal mine but it was a strip mine, hence our lake.
There seems to be some disaster in waiting no matter where you go.


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## SifuPhil

rkunsaw said:


> There were a lot of coal mines in this area but I don't know of any sinkholes.My property was once a coal mine but it was a strip mine, hence our lake.
> There seems to be some disaster in waiting no matter where you go.



I'm not an expert on coal-mining by any means, but isn't strip-mining the _surface_ method of getting the coal out? If so, I can understand why you don't have any sink-holes.

Here in PA we had an historic disaster back in 1959, supposedly the last of the big disasters, in which 12 miners died after a shaft DUG UNDER THE RIVER collapsed. It was such a huge shaft that a whirlpool was created and they dumped railroad cars into the whirlpool to try to plug up the hole. Now, take THAT event and scale it down - the mines that were dug for more than a century under the ground of this town eventually collapse - they can only hold up for so long. 

And yes, I agree that disaster awaits us all, everywhere. That's why pre-planning your survival actions is such an important thing to do, but that's a rant for another thread.


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## rkunsaw

We have both under ground and surface mining in this area. Thankfully the mining on my property was surface mining.

I guess Centralia,PA is the most famous of coal mines.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2013/01/pictures/130108-centralia-mine-fire/


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## SifuPhil

Oh, yeah, Centralia is a weird place! 

When I finally got around to visiting there wasn't much left. Most of the buildings were gone and only one guy (as far as I know) remained. Mostly you could see the smoke still coming up through the pavement at several points and the town was pretty much off-limits to tourists because of all the souvenir hunting they had been doing.

But the history of it, along with PA's use of eminent domain to shut the town down, was fascinating.


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## Ozarkgal

We live about 6 miles from a large silica mine.  They have huge holes in the mountain sides that go underground for who knows where.  I've heard it said someday the highway will probably cave in from all the tunnels underneath.  Don't know how true that is, but I think about it everytime I have to drive on it.  Every so often you hear huge thunderlike booms from the blasting.  I hope this area is not on the 6 o'clock news some night.


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## SifuPhil

Ozarkgal said:


> We live about 6 miles from a large silica mine.  They have huge holes in the mountain sides that go underground for who knows where.  I've heard it said someday the highway will probably cave in from all the tunnels underneath.  Don't know how true that is, but I think about it everytime I have to drive on it.  Every so often you hear huge thunderlike booms from the blasting.  I hope this area is not on the 6 o'clock news some night.



Wow! 

I can just imagine it looking like The Doorway to Hell in Russia ...


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## TICA

I would say to anyone who wants to live close to the water to move to Nova Scotia.  There is not anywhere in the Province where you can be any further than 35 miles from the ocean and there are more lakes than I could count.  Depending on where you are, housing is reasonable, health care is paid by the province (from your taxes - which are high), and there are four distinct seasons.  Not a lot of snakes or spiders that could do any harm either.  I'm parked and wouldn't even consider going anywhere else.


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## SifuPhil

I've heard that Nova Scotia - especially places like Halifax - have foggy conditions 2/3 of the time. How depressing! 

And it gets COLD there in the winter - that's one of the things I'm looking to get away from. I figure, if I'm going to be homeless better to be in a warm climate.


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## Bikeman48088

SifuPhil said:


> Sinkholes are nothing new here in Wilkes Barre, thanks to the decades of coal mining that created a virtual underground labyrinth. Every once in a while some horses, a few little kids or a full-sized pick-up truck will disappear. Folks hereabouts just have a beer and some sausage and get back to watching the ball game. layful:



You're in Wilkes Barre? Half of my family came from that area. Many of them still live in Nanticoke, Glen Lyon, Nuangola and the surrounding area. Is the mine fire still burning in Centralia? I can remember hearing about it since the early 60's, I believe.


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## SifuPhil

Bikeman48088 said:


> You're in Wilkes Barre? Half of my family came from that area. Many of them still live in Nanticoke, Glen Lyon, Nuangola and the surrounding area. Is the mine fire still burning in Centralia? I can remember hearing about it since the early 60's, I believe.



The half of the family that isn't mentioned in public conversation, right? layful:

My former in-laws lived in Nuangola on the lake, and I've hung out in most of those other areas as well - my bouncing job out here was in West Nanticoke. 

Yes, that fire is still burning as far as I know, but they've all but locked-down the town so it's pretty much impossible to go site-seeing anymore unless you're dressed like a ninja.


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## Bikeman48088

SifuPhil said:


> The half of the family that isn't mentioned in public conversation, right? layful:



LOL. My grandfather was a beer distributor in the area for many decades. I used to kid him about being a tailgunner on a beer truck during Prohibition. 



> My former in-laws lived in Nuangola on the lake, and I've hung out in most of those other areas as well - my bouncing job out here was in West Nanticoke.
> 
> Yes, that fire is still burning as far as I know, but they've all but locked-down the town so it's pretty much impossible to go site-seeing anymore unless you're dressed like a ninja.



I remember staying in a cabin on the lake while my grandparents were having work done to their house. That had to be almost 50 years ago now.


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## SifuPhil

Bikeman48088 said:


> LOL. My grandfather was a beer distributor in the area for many decades. I used to kid him about being a tailgunner on a beer truck during Prohibition.



Heh, heh ... even the beer distributors are having a tough time now - the State is talking about getting rid of state-run liquor stores and allowing supermarkets and convenience stores to sell beer and wine.

... you know - like the rest of the country. layful:




> I remember staying in a cabin on the lake while my grandparents were having work done to their house. That had to be almost 50 years ago now.



There's scarcely an open spot to build on the lake now, and the house prices are north of $200k last time I checked.


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