I finally bought a house in Cave Country! W00T!!!

[ofg-1]

Congratulations on your weight. I did, however, see the word "corral" in your post. If you are thinking of a horse, or horses, DON"T!!! They are perfect machines for converting money, lots of it, into horseshit, again lots if it. I know, we had them for 30 years. Buy a old wooden boat, a British sports car, go to Vegas, buy an airplane.....DO SOMETHING ELSE!
Save yourself!

 

[WarrenZ]

I think the corral is for his collection of scuba goats or at least LilPete and friends.

 

[Akimbo]

I wish someone around here rented goats (nature's all-terrain mowers) to keep the slope around here cleared. Self-propelled autonomous brush clearing and mulching in one package. Unfortunately they aren't very discriminating between gardens and fire hazards.

 

[stuartv]

With 10 acres you could set up one of those army/marines fitness tracks

Or start digging and create your own addition to the FL underwater cavern system....

 

[Neilwood]

I shared this yesterday on FaceBook, but it really belongs here as well:

A year ago I was the heaviest I've ever been: 349 pounds. I didn't want to see 350, but it was a hard struggle. I bought 10.82 acres on 2018-08-01 in Suwannee County Fl and started to live the simple single life. I have a kitten and a cat that keep me constant company, with lots of laughs and of course a litany of friends that come to visit and even help transform this place. I really started to watch what I eat and have increased my outside time exponentially. No doubt about it: I've lost a lot of weight. Today I weighed in at 298 pounds. My goal is to get down to 200 pounds, re-evaluate and now I'm 1/3 the way there. It feels good. I feel good.

BTW, I recently added a Garmin Descent Fitness Watch along with Garmin connect and MyFitnessPal to my regimen. Man is she bossy! Always telling me to "Move!", but then she likes to celebrate things when I meet my daily goal. It's fun. I created a group in Connect: ScubaBoard Descent Divers. Feel free to 'connect' with me there!

It's my belief that the mega-change of buying a house with lots of acreage is what did it for me. Yes, I started slow: I had to. I had hurt my knee in the move, but getting the place "together" has been a constant force to get me healthy and keep me busy, busy. Lots has been done and there's still a lot to do. I've pulled at least 800 yds of useless internal fencing, put in posts for a "corral", cut down trees, cleaned up trees, rebuilt a workshop and more. I've done a lot and still have a lot more to do.

The real secret is the secretly developed government suppressed diet plan code-named ELEM. That is, Eat Less and Excercise More. It's banned in most households and the strength is in its simplicity. When I eat at a restaurant, I only eat half of what they bring me. Half. There are exceptions (like Red Ginger in Lake City), but I really try to eat half of what they give me. Save the rest for another meal. At home, I eat simply and light. Breakfast is usually two poached eggs and two pieces of microwaved bacon for 328 calories. BTW, if you're going to eat a lot of poached/hard boiled eggs then get an egg cooker. Man they've "easified" the whole process and I get consistent "soft boiled" eggs with runny yokes, but firm whites. Yum! Lunch is a Cobb salad, or Ramen Noodles with a tin of turkey. I have snacks, but everything that goes past my lips gets posted in MyFitnessPal diary. I splurge too, but only once a week. This weeks splurge was a 1250 calorie meal at Sonny's with a 750 calorie shake right after. It happens, but the vast majority of meals are light.

Having been in a similar place to you weight wise (I got injured years ago and stopped exercising as much but didn't adapt my diet so my weight slowly crept up and up) I know it is a long (and sometimes hard) slog. I have probably lost 50lbs as well(I don't know as I never weighed myself at the start). I plan to get to about 100-110 Kg (220-240lbs) which for 6'3 is reasonably close to ideal. Got another 10-20kg to go for that goal.

ELEM is the key - you can't lose weight if you eat more than you burn. Also the more you exercise the more muscle you get which in turn burns more calories - the fitter you get the easier it is to stay fitter. I am of the opinion that simply staying on a diet gets you nothing but miserable- better to reduce intake, up the exercise and allow the occasional blow out (denying yourself anything for too long becomes self defeating). I will be good 6 days but the other I allow a bit of a slide.

 

[Bubblesong]

Or start digging and create your own addition to the FL underwater cavern system....

THANK YOU! I have been wanting to suggest this to Pete since this thread began. It IS cave country, so how can a landowner check if there is already a cave system under his ground, just a few feet down? Wait for a sinkhole to open up?

 

[Captain Tim]

I wish someone around here rented goats (nature's all-terrain mowers) to keep the slope around here cleared. Self-propelled autonomous brush clearing and mulching in one package. Unfortunately they aren't very discriminating between gardens and fire hazards.

That is exactly how we kept our 2 acres of natural habitat clear when I lived in Carmel Valley. Started to rent them out to the neighbors as well. My main landscaping tool after they were gone..was a backpack sprayer and 73% Roundup.

 

[stuartv]

THANK YOU! I have been wanting to suggest this to Pete since this thread began. It IS cave country, so how can a landowner check if there is already a cave system under his ground, just a few feet down? Wait for a sinkhole to open up?

It's north FL. Just dig. If you get more than 30 feet and it hasn't opened up, dig sideways just a little ways.

I will never forget when I was living in Tallahassee (most of my life, actually), and a sinkhole opened up in the bottom of Lake Jackson. A very large lake. It literally drained away over night. Full one evening. Completely dry the next morning.

 

[Bubblesong]

It's north FL. Just dig. If you get more than 30 feet and it hasn't opened up, dig sideways just a little ways.

I will never forget when I was living in Tallahassee (most of my life, actually), and a sinkhole opened up in the bottom of Lake Jackson. A very large lake. It literally drained away over night. Full one evening. Completely dry the next morning.

Aah, these underground caves can be unstable and not always reliable diving opportunities. Well, we can dream.

 

[stuartv]

Aah, these underground caves can be unstable and not always reliable diving opportunities. Well, we can dream.

The issue with Lake Jackson was that we had had a very long drought. There was an underground river that flowed underneath Lake Jackson, normally separated by the bottom of the lake/roof of the cave. But, the drought persisted until the underground river subsided. I.e. the river dried up and there was an empty cave, instead of a cave filled with water, under the lake. Eventually, the weight caused the cave ceiling to give away and that's when the hole opened up in the bottom of the lake.

One of my cousins was a geologist (and a diver - Dale, RIP). He took me out to look at it. The hole was only about 5 feet across, IIRC, and maybe 10 or 12 feet deep. He want back later with someone else, climbed down into it (with ropes) and explored it a bit.

The point being, if you were diving the cave, well, the fact that there's water there for you to be swimming in means it's probably still pretty stable. I guess. I'm no cave expert (underwater or not).