[e.ortega]

Originally Posted by Lilybeans

I need to get out of here and up to Vermont.

What? You can come up to NYC and I will take Florida any day of the week

[Ken E]

Apparently you've never lived here.

[arel]

Well, I'm from Brooklyn. I've been in Florida twice.

Based on what I have experienced (Fort Lauderdale, Miami and Orlando), I do not like Florida at all and would never move there. I'm sure, though, that there are other areas that might be more pleasant. But Florida is not for me.

I moved to Vermont in September, 2008.

So far I really like living in Vermont, and I do not miss NYC. I don't even miss the ocean. I especially don't miss the ocean now that hurricane season is here.

[Lilybeans]

Well, I'll be up sometime this summer. Probably the end of July, the only hot week in the summer.

[RiWrites]

Florida is more than Miami and Orlando. And the reason traffic is so bad is because there are people from all over the US and the rest of the world driving here. I agree it is hot in the summer. But the winters are a lot better here than up north. We don't have to dig out cars out that have been buried in snow.

Florida does have problems but so does Vermont and other states. I would like to move somewhere else because I have lived here so long I want something new and different. No real complaints about Florida I just want something new.

[TANaples]

Hi, Lillybeans! I defintely feel your pain. North Florida, South Florida, I have lived in both. All too HOT. It's funny, but I have just been thinking about what else I miss about the North besides the 4 seasons. It's MOUNTAINS, summer, fall, winter, or spring. I am so sick of dried out, flat as a pancake Florida. I even mentioned this to my daughter last week and she promised to take me to the mountains when I visit back up North.

I also realized that when we were young marrieds, where did we vacation? We never went to beaches, or some tropical place. We always went to the mountains, although that was to the Poconos, Catskills, Adirondacks. My daughter played ice hockey and we went up to Vermont many times for her tournaments and camps. We even took Amtrak there for the scenic route. Absolutely beautiful. Yes, I could live there too.

[quickdraw]

The only month that really bugs me in Vermont is April. It seems like the rest of the country is going into spring thaw while we are still getting our driveways plowed. The gardening season is ridiculously short too. During the last week of May we had to cover all of our plants because of possible thaw. I almost turned the heat on in my house on June 1 , but I refused because of the principle.

Personally, I could never live in Florida, Texas, Louisiana etc., but I can understand people not wanting our Januarys either. You have to pick your poison - or move to San Diego.

[harry chickpea]

Not only does Florida not have mountains, if you want to see rock other than coral you have to buy a bag of granite imported from China. No joke, Home Despot was selling granite from China instead of from the U.S.. That was one of the many reasons why we eventually said "enough is enough" and moved out. The closest place with any hilly country is central and north Alabama and north Georgia.

When I used to vacation in Florida in the 1970s, it was a whole different world than what it is now. Back then it really was nice, and I have the vacation movies to prove it. Living there over twenty years, I saw a lot of the changes for the worse.

Changes like that occur in Vermont, but at a much slower pace. I understand that the last of the great old farm at Taft's Corners was recently burned.

[Bugnubs]

Both Florida and Vermont are extreme in weather. I moved to Vermont in the late 70's wearing my rose-colored glasses and eagerly looked forward to a more rural life. However, to my own surprise, I was ready to leave and never look back after a couple of weeks living in Vermont. The Green Mountains are beautiful, and the skiing is pretty good for the east coast, but overall Vermont was too bitterly cold and impoverished to suit me. I lived in Chittenden County, the 3rd cloudiest county in the continental USA, according to the information supplied by the company that transferred me there. The data also informed me that Vermont (at that time) had one of the highest alcoholism, incest, violent crime, and poverty rates per capital in the nation. I can't verify that any of that is true, but in my experience living in a very small town there for only 3 years, two 12-year old girls in my tiny neighborhood were attacked, raped and one murdered by a couple of local teenaged kids. The father of one of the guilty boys was also soon after arrested on charges of child porn and the police found handcuffs chained to the wall in his basement. Not long after, a woman was bludgeoned to death by a madman wielding a metal pipe as she ate her lunch on the grassy lawn of the town hall. One night I discovered a man creeping outside the windows of my house and rang police who phoned me back to say the fellow had a long criminal record and they'd arrested him. I found the long brutal winters, frigid temperatures and mostly lead-grey skies apart from a couple of muddy summer months to be oppressive and restrictive. Who wants to spend twenty minutes getting dressed in arctic-like clothes just to go to the post office. Having a frozen shut car door lock and having to warm up the car for at least 10 minutes before driving on slick roads and black ice was no joy. I found little entertainment and few cultural outlets and was shocked to see the grinding poverty........women barelegged in dead winter with a trail of runny-nosed urchins missing buttons on their coats tagging behind. I'd say probably 1/3 the town was on welfare. Unless you can afford to ski often or enjoy snow-shoeing, ice fishing, snowmobiling, hunting, etc., it can be a cheerless and grim place to live.....not at all the idyllic life portrayed on television sitcoms. It's not called "cabin fever" for nothing. The nearest actual town was Burlington....meh....next to nothing there at that time. That was 30 years ago, and solely my personal experience. I expect the area has changed considerably during the interim. I knew people there who absolutely loved living in such a rural, isolated environment, and I suppose people seeking a homesteading or smallholding opportunity would find Vermont suitable.

[Skadess1]

The summers in South Fl are not as bad as everyone thinks. our average temps are 85-90 but its only for a couple months... this year has not been too bad yet, but being near the ocean it keeps it considerably cooler than most other places in summer, even NYC and New england, and definitely cooler than the rest of the state