These Snowbird’s Have Been Grounded

The term Snowbird is used to describe people from U.S. cold weather states who migrate South to spend the winter in warmer locales such as Arizona and Florida.   Denise and I always talked about someday becoming snowbirds.  We even went as far as visiting several fabulous Del Webb retirement communities. 

Del Webb - Sun City Anthem (Arizona)

One of our favorites near  Mesa, AZ, had everything you could want.  Heck even the name was perfect “Sun City”.  Community center, pools, golf courses, tennis courts, clubs, warm weather, everything……almost!  What it didn’t have was our family.  Sure the kids could come visit us but realistically how often or for how long?  Call us crazy but the thought of being away from them for several months was not something we could imagine.

Del Webb Nashville Tennessee

So our next strategy was to have a place close enough to drive to within a day, maybe a long day, but a day none-the-less.  So we took a trip to Nashville.  Great city, still warmer weather, but could get to in a day.  On the 10 hour drive home we both looked at each other and agreed that a full day’s drive was still too far. 

So it looks like the “Kuebler Cottage” will have a furnace and a snow shovel in the garage! 

With our search criteria narrowing we concluded if we were going to have something we would use, and our kids would use, it needed to be convenient to get to.  A good friend once told me he had read a study that determined the best distance for a vacation home was within a 3 hour drive.  So we took out a map, and like Gilligan and the Skipper plotted our 3 hour cruise.  Much to our surprise there were more choices than we thought  and we spent the next several weeks making short day trips to explore. 

And the winner is?

                            http://www.applecanyonlake.org/

                            http://www.galena.org/

Our ultimate decision came down to a place I had been familiar with for over 20 years, Apple Canyon Lake in Jo Daviess County, Illinois.  An additional bonus was that a few years ago we learned some close friends from the Chicago area also own a home at ACL.  After a couple of trips there we agreed that this was the spot we had been searching for.  Check out the web sites above and see all the cool stuff there is to do.  Some beautiful countryside in the heart of the Galena Territories.