Relocating to Florida in the next two months : )

Lived in The Keys from '91 to '02 and have a Conch Republic T-Shirt, and wife has a Conch republic front license plate on her SUV:

#16 | POSTED BY ZARNON AT 2025-07-09 10:27 AM | FLAG: Was stationed at Clark AB back in'80 '83. Best assignment of my career. Our favorite hangout on weekends was The Last resort at 100 Islands where we spent each day on our own private islands snorkeling, frolicking, etc. : ) Up a hile high in Bagio, Camp John Hays for cool weather and even fireplace lit in cabin. favorite restaurant was Fernandez {sp?} a traditional French restaurant. Did the boat tour up the river to Pagsanjan Falls where we picnicked, and of course was rafted over to the falls to get that 'water massage'. Partied in Manila frequently.

While there, got our PADI Advanced Open Water dive cert. and dove a number of beautiful reef locations, including off Cebu.

Lived off base in Carmenville, all great times and good memories.

#24 | POSTED BY MADBOMBER AT 2025-07-10 02:09 PM | FLAG: Actually do have mountains, as I misspelled Mile high where Bagio is. Because of that down in the lowlands the restaurants were able to have produce like tomatoes, which did not grow in the hot, lush equatorial climate of the majority of the islands. The cabins there that we rented at Camp John Heys [a military R&R center back then] actually had fireplaces, as cold in the evenings.

The small property we rented while there had papaya, mango and banana trees on it : ) Wild orchids were growing on the four foot high cinder block walls surrounding the property.

The people were so pleasant and friendly that I prefer them to most Americans as neighbors. Als loved having a full time maid to do the cooking and housework etc., as my wife and I back them were both active duty and she also tended out young son from 11 month when we arrived, to 4 years old. It was a godsend for working parents and inextremely inexpensive. We kept in contact with her for years after we left for Rome NY assignment.

BTW, sucked to go from years on the equator to central NY state in winter when the dayeime high was zero [not wind chill] when we arrived! : (

#25 | POSTED BY MADBOMBER AT 2025-07-10 02:17 PM | REPLY | FLAG::
Ref turntables, before departing the Philippines we put together a top end stereo system, and the turntable was a Pioneer PL200A Linear tracking turntable: [where the arm tracke staight across instead of pivoting. A Yamaha main amp and control amp, Nakamichi dual cassette deck, and ADC equalizer. FOr the finalle I designed and had a built a multi shelf solid Philippine mahogany stand, with ball castors and smiled glass inserts in the two front doors, that cost me 400 dollars to be made. Four Acoustic Research speakers, two of which used as end tables on our peeled rattan living room set [also had made while over there].

Gifted that entire system to family when moved aboard my sloop in about '90/91, and considering it was worth about 4k in the states back in the day [not as costly buying through the military AAFES system] they did appreciate. Missed it, and though it is pass nowadays, it was a fantastic system.

Nowadays I have two Bose 500 Bluetooth Home speakers linked for stereo whihc play from my massive iTunes library [currently 17,466 songs 166.7GB!] Also can link to my Nakamichi Shockwave 9.s home theater system.
Guess you can tell that my wife and I are very into music and have pretty much ave every genre covered : )