I have toyed with getting a bridge camera and there are several that I liked. It is tough to let an older DSLR go for cheap but there are some lenses that are still worth a bit. Post a lot of photos.
My first plan was a DSLR, probably Olympus, that would take my old Takumar lenses, plus my adapted 200mm Vivtar. The only Olympus near my budget was over 6 bills, and the features were limited, IMO. I know what you mean about letting go when you have $3500-$4000 invested in hardware already.
But this ol' dog is always ready to learn new tricks, and being a technophile, I couldn't resist the built-in 15 sec time exposure, not to mention the integrated zoom.
The FZ80 is 16 Mp, 15 sec-1/2,000 shutter speed, ISO 80-3200 with 'extended ISO' a button away. Little things like a pop-up flash PLUS a hot-shoe, both LCD and Optical view finder, etc, etc. The deal-maker is the Zoom. Nothing but raves in the industry for it's clarity, even in the digital range. Optical zoom is 60x (20mm-1200mm) and depending upon which of jillion recording modes you choose, the digital range expands that to 120x, with a 35mm camera equivalent to 6,700 mm!!! Say, WHAT?!

Yeah, although you better have it screwed to a cement block to steady it. The "noise" can usually be edited out easily with post processing.
Oh, yeah...and it has what they call "post focusing", so if you don't quite get it right when you take a picture/video, the camera will analyze 47 elements in the picture and correct the focus for you. Doh....
I may not live long enough to learn this weapon inside and out; like I say the Manual is 331 pages. There are 110 individual settings with their respective icons on the screen, and since its a "touch screen", I find myself pressing "reset to factory settings" quite a bit....hahahaha