Retirees For A Week (7 Day Stay At The Villages, Florida)

Retirees For A Week (7 Day Stay At The Villages, Florida)
August 2014
by Tim Larison, CLIA Certified Master Cruise Counselor (MCC)
with contributions from Travel Agent Anne Larison

In past visits to Florida we’ve noticed a number of age 55+ retirement communities with lots of amenities for the senior set.  What would it be like to live in such a community?  We decided to find out ourselves during a weeklong stay at the Villages in Central Florida – the largest retirement community in the United States.

The Villages offers a “lifestyle preview” program where you receive Villa accommodations, the use of a golf cart, golf, and other activities at a very reasonable cost. We had a wonderful time!

GOLF

Anne and I have taken up golf in the past year, playing an average of once a week back home.  We play 9 hole par 3’s and executive courses in Colorado so at first we hesitated when we saw we could play 2 free rounds at two of the Villages championship courses (provided with the lifestyle preview). We were glad we didn’t wimp out! We played Cane Garden and Mallory Hill on consecutive days (18 holes each) from the “friendly” tee boxes. Having a cart really helped and I liked how the course ambassadors came around to check on you with water at different points during the round. Lifestyle previewers: go for the championship 18 hole round. You get two rounds of executive 9 or championship 18 – the championship 18 is a better value. We thought Mallory Hill was a bit tougher. Both courses were in good shape.

Anne says:

Golf clubs can be rented for your stay.  Tim had made arrangements to borrow clubs from a resident friend, so we were set.  Morning tee times are set aside for lifestyle preview guests so we took advantage of having excellent tee times (not too early or too late).  

GOLF CART

We read the golf cart you get with the Lifestyle Preview is slow. It was but it was fast enough for us! We had others zooming past us but we went at a slower pace, anyway, to figure out directions. The few times we got lost we always had a veteran Villager stop to help us out.

Anne says:

We used our golf cart to go to the pool, restaurants and see the sites around our section of the Villages.  It was a lot of fun.  

PICKLEBALL

We took the Pickleball 101 lesson and that was fun. A couple of Villagers even let us play a game with them as they waited for friends and they were patient with us “newbies”. It took some getting used to for us not to play the game like it was tennis.

RESTAURANTS

We had been monitoring different bulletin boards for restaurant recommendations at or near the Villages.  Here were the ones we tried that we liked best:

Oakwood BBQ – Grade A+: A few rated this as the best place for ribs in the Villages and they were right! We thought the ribs were excellent – tender, fall off the bone yummy. Service was quick and the restaurant manager stopped by our table to chat, too.

Koyame (chinese) for lunch – Grade A: Great prices at lunch and delicious food, too! Not a big place. Service was fast. I had a shrimp and chicken dish which was 95% chicken – next time I’ll order a shrimp only entree (the shrimp was good – just not enough of it!)

Little Joey’s Pizza & Restaurant (Ocala) – Grade A: My wife enjoyed her pizza here and I had a HUGE calzone.

Lighthouse Point Bar and Grille – Grade A: Our favorite seafood meal of the week. We both enjoyed our shrimp dinners here, and getting a table overlooking the lake was a bonus!

Toojays for lunch – Grade B+: close to our Villages Creekside Villa, we ate here on two different days for lunch and enjoyed it.

Sam’s St Johns Seafood – Grade B+: We had HUGE shrimp dinners here (35 shrimp special). Not quite as good as the Lighthouse but still very tasty. Lighthouse has a big edge in atmosphere – this place had a 1950’s decor with tables close together. But the food was good.

Ay! Jalisco (mexican) – Grade B+: I was warned that you can’t find Mexican food at the Villages as good as we have back home in Colorado. They were right but this place was pretty good. Excellent service as our waiter suggested entrees we hadn’t considered and both were tasty.

Square One Burgers – Grade B: Nothing wrong with the burgers here but it was a bit of a drive and I thought my Rocket Burger at nearby Johnny Rockets was just as good if not better.

Confessore Pasta Cucina – Grade B: Very small Italian place. My main pasta dish was excellent (not as good as mama’s food back home – I’m Italian – but close). Ricotta was fresh and delicious. Salad was on the small size and bread was average. The service was slow. The staff tried hard and were friendly but seemed overwhelmed with the big dinner crowd. We waited about 15 minutes for a table and this was in August – I can’t imagine the waits during “snowbird season”.

Anne says:

There were many more restaurants we would have liked to sample.  We will have to return in the future to experience some of the other restaurants on and off the Villages property.

CLUBS

The Villages offers hundreds of clubs for just about any interest.  We were so busy with golf and other activities on our lifestyle preview stay that we did not get a chance to participate in any club meetings.  Should we come back for another stay we definitely want to try these out – the opportunity for social connections at the Villages was amazing.

BEACH

We had read that Fred Howard Park in Tarpon Springs was a good beach to visit and we were glad we did. Not crowded and only a $5 charge for parking. About a 2 hour drive from the Villages, we took a day trip here one afternoon.

Anne says:

Take note that there is not a food and drink vendor on the island.  So you will want to bring your own refreshments when you visit.

THE HEAT

We purposely scheduled our lifestyle preview in August to see if we could stand the heat. It really wasn’t that bad. Not as hot as a summer trip we had further south at Port St Lucie a couple of years ago. We could see ourselves living here during the summer without a problem.

THE PEOPLE

Without exception everyone we met was super friendly and enjoyed sharing their experiences of living in the Villages.

SUMMARY

We are at least 3 to 5 years away from even considering a move to the Villages, with two kids in college back home in Colorado, but the lifestyle preview stay was definitely worth it to give us a taste of “Villager” life. Our Villager real estate agent was great in giving us a “no pressure” tour of different homes, and in setting us up for golf and other activities during the week. The place does sell itself.

While we do not sell vacation packages to the Villages, we can put you in touch with our contact at the Villages who can setup a Lifestyle Preview visit for you.