Hollywood, Florida —
On a sunny and warm late-February day at Richard’s Motel in Hollywood, Florida, guests mostly from Quebec and Ontario dipped into the swimming pool and gathered for morning coffee and conversation in a courtyard the hotel’s Quebecois owner calls the Parc de l’Amitié, or Friendship Park.
The motel’s aesthetic mixes Florida and the far north. Here a snow man statue and wooden fence covered with Canadian license plates, there a sea turtle statue and a tiki bar.
Only one thing seemed off on this balmy high-season morning — a Vacancy sign illuminated to the right of the motel’s office door.
Come winter, beach towns like this one dotting…