Living Our Dream

Change in Plans

Pittsburgh, PA - Events of Tuesday, May 15 to Friday, May 18, 2012

The plans for our spring and summer travel that we made before we left Florida at the end of March were to head to New Orleans after spending about 6 weeks in Summerdale, AL. From New Orleans, we were going to meander northward up the Mississippi River stopping at a few new locations and at several of our old, favorite haunts before taking our time as we made our way east to the Pittsburgh area for family visits and our annual doctor and dentist appointments in the fall.

However, we got word about two weeks before the end of our stay in Summerdale that our daughter, Lora, who is a Mary Kay Beauty Consultant, achieved her goal and met all the requirements to become an Independent Sales Director for Mary Kay. To become a director, she had to recruit the required number of consultants to her team, and the team had to meet the initial sales goals set forth by headquarters.

Lora's debut as a director was scheduled for Monday, May 21 in Pittsburgh. Less than 2% of all Mary Kay Consultants become directors, so her accomplishment is quite a feat. We are so proud of her. We didn't want to miss celebrating her achievement which takes so much self motivation and hard work, so we rearranged our schedule so we could detour to Pittsburgh to attend the event where Lora would debut as a director.

As we have mentioned before, we usually don't travel more than 4 hours a day, and we usually don't travel more than two days in a row. However, we didn't want to cut our time in Summerdale short, so we made an exception for our trek to Pittsburgh and traveled 4 days straight. We tried to keep our travel time as close to 4 hours a day as we could, but we ended up traveling almost 6 hours the first day before our planned stop at Cullman RV Park in Cullman, AL.

Cullman RV Park has all full-hookup, pull-through sites. The space between the sites is fairly decent for a private campground, and most sites are nice and long so you don't have to unhook if you're only staying one night.

Our extra-long pull-through site at Cullman RV

Some of the other sites at Cullman RV

The campground is a couple of miles from the interstate on a dead-end road, so it is pretty quiet. You can barely hear the faint whine of the traffic off in the distance late at night when everything else is very still.

When we called Cullman RV from the road to make sure they had a site available, they warned us to follow their signs after we turned off the main road. Apparently, most GPS units are like ours and want you to go down a narrow, gravel road to get to the campground. The gravel road is a shorter distance, but it is very narrow with lots of overhanging trees - not a good idea with a big RV. The campground signs have you follow the paved road. The paved road is a little rough, but it is better than the gravel road.

Most of the interior roads at Cullman RV are paved, but a few are gravel. All are quite narrow, but at least there are no trees or other obstructions near the roads. If you have to swing wide to make a turn and get over onto the grass a little it's no big deal.

The pads are gravel, and there is nice grass between the sites and shade trees here and there. There were quite a few of what looked to be permanent residents at the lower end of the campground, but all the sites were neat and well kept.

We're not sure about the Wi-Fi at Cullman RV. Sometimes we could get on, and sometimes it asked for a password. The connection was fairly fast when we first got there in the afternoon, but it got real slooooow in the evening. We ended up just using our Verizon Broadband.

We hit the road fairly early the next morning because we had a 5-hour drive to our second overnight stop, and we also knew we would loose an hour going from Central Time Zone into Eastern. Our second stop was at Grandma's RV Camping in Shepherdsville, KY about 20 miles south of Louisville. We stayed there last October when we visited Louisville.

Grandma's has about half back-ins and half pull-throughs. Although they are a decent length, the sites (especially the pull-throughs) are quite close together. The roads are paved, as are the small patios; but the patios aren't very well placed and therefore aren't very useful. The sites themselves are all gravel (the gravel is fresh, clean and plentiful) with no grass. There are full hookups with 30/50-amp electric. There is supposed to be free Wi-Fi, but it required a password. Since we forgot to get the password when we checked in, we just used our Verizon Broadband. The utilities are also toward the rear of the site, which is not bad for 5th wheels; but with a motor home, we needed all 30 feet of our sewer hose.

Our site at Grandma's RV

The view down our row shows how close the sites are.

Grandma's is conveniently located right off I-65, and that means there is quite a bit of traffic noise. Fortunately, we didn't hear as many trains this time as we did last fall.

We hit the road fairly early again the third morning, but not as early as the first two mornings. Our drive was a little shorter this time at about 3½ hours. We were originally going to stop at Deer Creek State Park to the southwest of Columbus, OH, but we decided at the last minute we would be better off having full hookups and a pull-through site so we could save time on the morning of the last leg of our journey to Pittsburgh by not having to take time to go to the dump station and hook up the toad.

We found Jackson Lake Campground in Canal Winchester, OH a little to the southeast of Columbus. It is a little far from the interstate (about 10 miles), but it is the only campground we could find near where we wanted to stop. The upside to being far from the interstate is no traffic noise.

Our site at Jackson Lake Campground

Jackson Lake Campground has apparently gotten some negative reviews on rvparkreviews.com due to poor maintenance, particularly the rest rooms. However, Jackson Lake has new owners who are trying to fix things up. The property is very large so there is still a lot to do, but they have apparently made progress.

The campground was nice and peaceful when we were there in the middle of the week; but there looked to be a lot of seasonals, so it could be a bit zooey on weekends.

Some of the seasonal sites at Jackson Lake

The sites at Jackson Lake are fairly large, but some have side-by-side hookups. Since it was during the week and it was before Memorial Day, we had the place pretty much to ourselves except for some of the seasonals.

We thought the nightly rate of $35 was a bit high (even with full hookups) for the caliber of the campground; but on the other hand, Ohio state parks charge $27 a night for electric only.

There are tent sites with no hookups and RV sites with full hookups. Some sites have 30-amp electric, and some have 50-amp electric. The ones with 50 amps don't have 30-amp receptacles at all. The roads are dusty gravel, and there are remnants of old asphalt paving near the entrance.

The sites in the center grassy section can be used as pull-throughs if there is no one in the site behind. The seasonal sites are around the perimeter and are in the shade and are dirt and gravel. Wi-Fi is available for a fee. There are also rental cabins, a lodge that is in the process of being remodeled, a swimming pool, a rec hall, horseshoe pits, a volleyball net, frisbee golf, and picnic pavilions.

In the evening we took Freeway for a walk over to the fishing lake then settled in for an evening of TV.

Jackson Lake Campground fishing lake

We got on the road the final morning of our trek to Pittsburgh around 9:00 AM, and it took a little less than 4 hours to get to Lora and J. Michael's house. We will only be in Pittsburgh for a few days because Lora and J. Michael are going camping for Memorial Day, and we need to vacate the RV pad beside their garage so they can bring their trailer back to pack it up for the weekend. The good news is we'll be camping with them over Memorial Day. We'll let you know where that is, and we'll give you an update on our activities in Pittsburgh in our next post.

Pine Mountain, GA to Summerdale, AL

Summerdale, AL - Events of Wednesday, April 4 to Sunday, April 8, 2012

We originally planned to make the journey from Pine Mountain, GA to Summerdale, AL in two days traveling a little over three hours the first day and about an hour and a half the second day. However, when we thought about it the evening before we left and realized it wasn't that far, and when we realized we would gain an hour traveling from the Eastern Time Zone into Central, we decided it didn't make a lot of sense to split the travel into two days. Therefore, we switched to Plan B and decided to drive straight through and arrive in Summerdale a day early.

However, when we got up Wednesday morning and checked the weather radar, there was a large, ominous-looking rain storm just offshore in the Gulf of Mexico that looked like it was heading directly for Mobile and Summerdale. We could only think of the videos we saw on the news the day before of semi-trailers being tossed through the air by tornadoes in the Dallas area, so we started to think switching back to Plan A and stopping for the night before we got to Summerdale to avoid driving through the rain storm wasn't such a bad idea after all.

When we pulled off the interstate for fuel at the Flying J just south of Montgomery, Margery plugged our Pantech modem into the computer and brought up the weather radar. To our surprise, the rain had remained mostly out over the Gulf, and Summerdale's weather report showed it was overcast with only a few light showers. We went back to Plan B of driving straight through. We checked the radar again a little later while we were on the road (something we could not have done with the satellite internet service we used to have), and there was still no major rain around Summerdale, so we drove on.

We hit a couple of very light sprinkles, and it got a bit breezy for the last 25 or 30 miles or our journey, but none of that was interstate driving so it wasn't that bad. We pulled into Rainbow Plantation around 1:45 Central Time.

Rainbow Plantation has a campground, co-op sites and deeded lots. The campground has full hookups. The roads are paved, and the sites are widely spaced and are mostly grass, although many of the sites have live oak trees under which the grass is pretty sparse. Even with the sparse grass, we usually prefer a site with some shade given the heat of the Alabama sun. The eastern end of the campground has 30-amp electric and the western end had 30/50-amp electric. Wi-Fi is available for a fee. Summerdale is close enough to Mobile that the the Verizon Broadband service is 4G.

We usually end up getting one of the same two sites every time we stop at Rainbow Plantation, and this time was no exception. We got set up in short order and settled in to relax for the rest of the day.

Our site at Rainbow Plantation (two days later after the sun came out)

Looking down our row at Rainbow Plantation

The campground does get its share of winter residents in spite of the fact southern Alabama can get many nights below freezing during the winter. However, by the time we usually arrive in March or April, the weather has warmed up considerably. Most of the winter crowd has left so there are plenty of sites available.

We ran some errands on Thursday, and we hit Walmart on Friday to restock the fridge and pantry. On Friday afternoon, Paul washed the motor home and the car while Margery caught up on laundry. It had really piled up after we spent a week at the state park in Pine Mountain with no sewer hookup.

On Saturday, we did our weekly cleaning inside the motor home in the morning and then we drove down to Bon Secour to Billy's Seafood to pick up some fresh shrimp for dinner.

Billy's Seafood in Bon secour, AL

Bon Secour (French for good security or safe harbor) was originally a French fishing village dating back to the 1800s. Bon Secour is the home of several packing companies that buy shrimp and fish from the local fishing fleet and ship the seafood all over the United States. We found out they also sell fresh seafood at retail last fall when we visited the Swift-Coles House in Bon Secour. The Swift-Coles House was built around 1900 by lumber magnate Charles Swift. Click here to read about our visit last fall to Bon Secour and the Swift-Coles House.

Billy's Seafood has shrimp in many different sizes. We bought about a pound and a half so we would have enough for dinner that evening plus some left for another recipe Margery wanted to try a few days later.

Many different sizes of shrimp available at Billy's Seafood.

We have several ways we like to eat our shrimp, but our favorite, which is the way we had them on Saturday, is to just quickly sauté the shrimp in oil with a little garlic, then add some Old Bay seasoning and white wine for the last few minutes as they finish cooking. Margery drains off the liquid and serves the shrimp with melted butter. When dipped in the melted butter, the shrimp taste almost like lobster. Yum!

Sunday was Easter, and Paul was up in time to catch a beautiful sunrise.

Easter morning sunrise

Although we didn't make it to the sunrise service, we did attended the 10:00 AM service at the Church on the Eastern Shore in Fairhope. The Church on the Eastern Shore, or COTES as they call themselves, is where we worship when we are staying in Summerdale. It was a beautiful service with great worship and a meaningful Easter message.

Rainbow Plantation had a pot-luck Easter dinner in the afternoon, but we decided not to sign up because we felt like we wanted a quieter dinner after the sightseeing and traveling we had been doing in the past two weeks, so we went to Cracker Barrel for an early dinner. Margery had fried catfish, and Paul had a more traditional Easter dinner of country ham. The food, as is usual for Cracker Barrel, was delicious.

On Sunday evening when we were taking Freeway for his evening walk, we met up with Darrell and Judy. Darrell and Judy have a co-p site at Rainbow Plantation, and we originally met them through their blog. They told us about the new dog run that was just installed behind the RV storage area at Rainbow Plantation, so we all walked over to check it out. It is only about 3 weeks old, and it is great. Is is very large and completely enclosed by a fence. We will be stopping there often because it is a safe place to let Freeway run and a good place to use for training.

Freeway, sit. Stay.

Freeway, come!

We will be staying at Rainbow Plantation for several weeks. We have some projects scheduled, we have some sightseeing we want to do, and we have several favorite restaurants where we want to eat while we're here. We'll let you know what we're up to in our next post.

Tuscumbia, AL to Summedale, AL

Summerdale, AL - Events of Wednesday, Oct. 26 to Thursday, Oct. 27, 2011

As we said in our last post, the weather forecast was calling for another cooling trend, so we continued heading south on Wednesday morning. We were making our way to the Escapees Rainbow Plantation in Summerdale, AL near Mobile. Our first day's drive was relatively long for us at almost 5 hours. We got a fairly early start and pulled into Montgomery South RV Park at about 1:30. It's a good thing we got there when we did because we had not made reservations, and we got the last site they had available.

We have stayed at Montgomery South a couple of times before because it is a convenient place to stop on our way to or from Summerdale, and we didn't expect them to be full at this time of year. However, there is a construction project going on in Montgomery, and the campground has a bunch of construction workers staying there. The campground only has 23 sites, and it looks like the construction company bought about a dozen unmarked, surplus, FEMA trailers and set them up at the campground for some of their workers.

The sites and roads at Montgomery South are gravel, and the spacing is not bad for a private campground. There is grass between the sites.

Montgomery South is a Passport America campground with half-price camping. They apparently have only some of their sites designated as Passport America sites because, unfortunately, we didn't get the discount this time since they were full; but we did get the Good Sam discount.

As we said, Montgomery South is a convenient place to stop for one or two nights. They are located near the interstate exit, but that means there is also a lot of traffic noise. There are also quite a few trains.

Montgomery South has full hookups with 30/50-amp electric, cable and free Wi-Fi. We were located near the office, so the Wi-Fi signal was strong, although we got knocked off several times later in the evening. The connection was also pretty fast.

You may have noticed we have added comments to this and another recent post about the strength and speed of the campground Wi-Fi connection. That's because now we sometimes use the campground Wi-Fi as long as the signal is strong and the connection is reasonably fast in order to save the usage of our Verizon Broadband. We had usage limits when we were on satellite internet, too; but the limits worked a little differently. On satellite, the data usage was also linked to time. The data limit gradually recovered during idle periods, so we could download a fair amount of data as long as we didn't do it over too short a period of time. With Verizon, the limit is strictly 5GB of data per month, period. Therefore, we will try to save on that limit when possible by using campground Wi-Fi. The good news is even if we do exceed our limit by quite a bit, the cost will still be lower or the same as satellite.

We also found out about a nice feature that our Cradlepoint wireless router has we didn't know about. It's called Wi-Fi as WAN (wide area network). This feature lets the router receive an unsecured, campground Wi-Fi signal, encrypt it, and rebroadcast it as a secure connection to our computers. When using this feature, we connect to our own wireless router the same way we do when using our Verizon Broadband (except the Verizon modem is disabled) instead of connecting directly to the campground Wi-Fi.

The next morning, we had about a three-hour drive to Summerdale, AL, which is one of our favorite locations. It is close to Mobile to the west and to Pensacola, FL to the east, so there are lots of things to do, lots of good seafood, and lots of convenient shopping.

As we said, Rainbow Plantation is an Escapees campground. It has paved roads and grassy sites. There are live oak trees between most of the sites that provide welcome shade from the hot Alabama sun, but most of the trees aren't big enough yet to block our satellite dish, which we still use for TV. However, the shade means the grass on some of the sites is a little sparse. The good news is, the soil is sandy so it doesn't get muddy when it rains and water drains away quickly. This time, we got a site with grass that was fairly plentiful so we didn't need to put out our patio mat. As you can see from the next photo, we have a nice tree on our driver's side, which faces west, to shade us from the afternoon sun.

The next photo shows a view down the road.

Except for the dry-camp area (since Escapees campgrounds don't take reservations, they all have a dry-camp area for overflow), all the sites at Rainbow Plantation have full hookups. The sites on the eastern end have 30-amp electric, and the ones on the western end have 30/50 amps. There is Wi-Fi available; but since there is a fee, we will be using our Verizon Broadband. Although this is a 4G area, our connection is a little slower than we experienced in Nashville, but it's still faster than our satellite internet.

Rainbow Plantation is one of our favorite campgrounds, and we usually stay here for at least several weeks on our way to and from Florida each fall and spring. The sites are widely spaced, and the campground is nice and quiet. The rates at Escapees campgrounds are very reasonable to begin with; and on top of that, Rainbow Plantation also has special rates from the end of March to the end of December where you pay for 15 days and get 5 additional days free. That brings down the nightly cost to under $12 a night plus electric (usually around $2 a day). Not bad for full hookups and generously-sized sites with grass and trees.

In addition to the regular campground, Rainbow Plantation has deeded lots, seasonal sites and co-op sites. If Summerdale had winter temperatures a little warmer, we would definitely consider a seasonal site or putting our name on the waiting list for a co-op site. But since we even complain about occasional cold days we experience farther south in Florida, we're afraid Summerdale would not be warm enough for us in winter.

Since we are planning to stay at Rainbow Plantation at least through Thanksgiving, Paul has a project or two in mind to get done during our stay. We'll report on those projects as they unfold in the weeks to come. In the meantime, we plan to have a couple of cheat days from our diet to have some fried shrimp at the Shrimp Basket in Foley and a panini or two at Panini Pete's in Fairhope. We also hope to squeeze a little sightseeing in between our projects and our relaxation, so stay tuned.

Tiffin MotorHomes

Tuscumbia, AL - Events of Wednesday Oct. 19 to Thursday Oct. 20, 2011

Holy cow! When we said there was a general cooling trend on the way, we weren't kidding. We awoke at Cedar Creek on Wednesday morning to temperatures in the low 40s, a stiff breeze, cloudy skys and drizzle. The high temperature was predicted only to be in the 40s. Driving 3 hours south to Tuscumbia, AL didn't help much. It was only about 47º when we arrived around 1:00 PM. Fortunately, the forecast was calling for an increase to the 70s by the weekend.

In Tuscumbia, we stayed at Heritage Acres RV Park. Most of the sites are back-ins, but they do have two pull-through sites in the back row. There are full-hookups with 30/50-amp electric as well as free Wi-Fi (good signal, and pretty fast) and cable. The photo below shows our site at Heritage Acres.

There is a little traffic noise during the day from the four-lane road that passes the campground, but it quiets down at night. Although there are several railroad crossings within earshot, we only heard occasional trains when we were there.

The sites at Heritage Acres aren't very fancy. In fact, there are essentially rows of sites on a gravel parking lot. However, the gravel is clean and fairly plentiful. As you can see from the next photo showing a view down our row, the sites are relatively close together.

As we said in our last post, we are now on Verizon Broadband for our internet access. Tuscumbia is a 3G area. We didn't run any speed tests, but the 3G in this area feels a little faster than our satellite internet. So far at least, we are happy with our decision to switch.

For the past couple of years, we have stopped on our way south in Red Bay, AL where our motor home was built and stayed in the Tiffin Campground. This year, we decided to take a slightly different route through Tuscumbia and not go to Red Bay. The lens on one of our fog lights is cracked, and Paul was going to order a replacement from Tiffin once we got to Summerdale, AL where we plan to stay at least a month before heading to Florida. However, since Tuscumbia is only 45 minutes from Red Bay, we decided to take a day trip to Red Bay to pick up the replacement fog light and to take a factory tour.

Some things about the Tiffin factory tour have changed since we were there last year. Red, who is the 80-something very southern gentleman who used to lead the tours, no longer does that because of his failing eyesight. However, Red is still there every day as the official greeter. He ushers everyone in the door and makes sure they sign in and get safety glasses, then chats with individuals until it's time for the tour to start.

There is now only one tour a day (9:30 AM) instead of two like there used to be. However the tour has been expanded to include the cabinet shop and the Powerglide Chassis assembly building in addition to the main assembly building that used to be the only part of the operation included in the tour.

There were so many people wanting to take the tour the day we were there (about 25 or 30), they split us into two groups. Our group went second, and our tour guide filled us in on some history of Red Bay while we waited about 10 minutes for the other group to get far enough ahead of us that we wouldn't be running into each other once we got into the plant.

When our turn came, we headed through the gate. Tiffin is building 10 motor homes a day (5 days a week), which is down a bit from the peak of 13 they were building when we visited in 2007, but it is up a lot from only 6 a day (4 days a week) they were building when we were there in 2008 when the high fuel prices first hit. We were happy to see there were lots of cars in the employee parking lot (left) and a good many motor homes sitting in the final inspection area off in the distance.

Tiffin employs about 700 people in the town of Red Bay, and 1400 to 1500 total in western Alabama and Eastern Mississippi. They are very important to the local economy.

Our first stop was the cabinet shop. For the second time in less than two weeks, Paul got to enjoy the aroma of fresh sawdust. The first was at the Loiusville Slugger factory. Paul was really impressed by the size and scope of Tiffin's cabinet-making operation.

We entered though the warehouse where we saw stacks and stacks of lumber. This lumber is first planed smooth, then inspected for defects, which are cut out. There were numerous work stations like the one shown in the photo below where boards were being cut to size for various components.

The components are milled to various shapes and profiles, which are then assembled into drawers, doors and other parts. The next photo shows a paneled door that had just been assembled.

And the next worker is assembling a large, decorative ceiling panel for an Allegro Bus.

After assembly, the wood parts are then sanded and finished. The photo below shows finished sections of kitchen cabinets. Rather than a flip-up counter extension, Tiffin uses a roll-out extension in the larger diesel pushers. Drawers are easy to reach since they roll right out with the extension.

From the cabinet shop, we entered the Powerglide Chassis assembly building. Tiffin builds a good many of its own chassis. They build all the chassis for the Allegro Breeze, Tiffin's newest motor home launched last year. It is a smaller, diesel pusher available in 28 and 32-foot lengths. The Powerglide Chassis is also available as an option on some of Tiffin's larger diesel pushers. The next photo shows a chassis for an Allegro Breeze.

The photo below shows Cummins 450hp ISL engines waiting to be installed in chassis for Allegro Buses.

In addition to building some of its own chassis, Tiffin also buys chassis from Ford, Freightliner and Spartan. All chassis go to the welding shop to have floor structures, storage compartment frames and other components welded on. The welding shop is not part of the tour, but the next photo shows a chassis that just came out of the welding shop. Next, it will go to main assembly.

When the chassis enters the main assembly building, workers begin installing components like water and waste tanks, wiring, flooring, interior walls and cabinets, appliances, exterior walls, roof and end caps. We wrote up a fairly detailed description of the assembly when we visited the factory in 2009. If you are interested in reading more about the assembly and seeing photographs, click here.

After the tour, visitors are invited to have a look inside any of the coaches that are parked inside or outside at final inspection. We looked in a few, but some were hard to see because there were several workers inside. We didn't want to get in their way, especially since we are not looking to buy.

From the Tiffin plant, we headed over to the service facility to pick up the replacement fog light. Unfortunately, the company Tiffin used to buy the light from either no longer makes it or is no longer in business, so Paul will have to try to find an alternative. In the meantime, the light still works - it's just the lens that's cracked. We never drive the motor home at night anyway.

Since we just happened to be in Red Bay on Thursday, and since Swamp John's has their catfish special on Thursdays, we decided to have a "cheat day" and stray from our low carb/low sugar diet and stop for the catfish special. The catfish special means the catfish dinner consisting of fried catfish, French fries, cole slaw and hush puppies is available all day.

Swamp John's is a no-frills restaurant that is located in an old gas station. The pumps are still outside, and the main part of the restaurant is where convenience store of the old gas station probably used to be.

We arrived at Swamp John's at the perfect time - 11:45. Tiffin employees have lunch from 11:20 until noon. Lots of people with Tiffin logos on their shirts were leaving, there was only one person ahead of us in the order line and there were lots of empty tables. One of the Tiffin sons was eating with some of the manufacturing employees at one of the few occupied tables. As we were finishing our meals at 12:10, the order line was fairly long and the restaurant was filling up with again with people from downtown businesses on their lunch break.

The catfish was yummy. There was more than we could eat, especially now that we are used to eating less. There were 4 strips of catfish, a hugh pile of French fires, a big mound of cole slaw and two hush puppies - all for $7.49.

Speaking of our diet, we are doing fairly well with our weight loss. We had a slight setback a few weeks ago when we both went up a little at our weekly weigh-in even though we had not cheated at all that week. However, in the couple of weeks since, we lost that slight gain plus a little more. Paul has lost a total of about 10 pounds since we started in early September, and Margery has lost over 6 pounds. This 'diet' is called the Belly Fat Cure which means that we get to measure our waist, too. Paul has lost 1½ inches and Margery has lost 2 inches. Taking a measurment and weighing in means we usually get to see a loss in at least one of those areas.

After lunch, we headed back to the motor home for an afternoon of relaxation (naps). As we keep saying, we have shifted into relaxation mode. However, we haven't stopped sightseeing completely, and there are still some things in Tuscumbia we want to see.

Off We Go

Tallahassee, FL to Summerdale, AL

We had planned to leave on Monday about a week or so before our reservation at Blueberry Hill ran out and head for the Escapees Rainbow Plantation in Summerdale, AL. Unfortunately, Paul started coming down with a bad chest cold over the weekend, so we decided to stay put until he started to feel better.

Finally on Wednesday, Paul felt well enough to continue working on packing things up and getting ready to go. We headed out on Thursday morning for about a four-hour drive to Tallahassee, FL where we stopped at Big Oak RV Park, which is where we stopped on our way into Florida last fall.

The main road at Big Oak RV, a Good Sam park, is part asphalt and part gravel. The pads are all gravel and the patios are paved. There are full hookups with free Wi-fi and cable. Some sites have 30-amp electric, and some have 30/50 amp. Last fall, it was cooler, and they didn't charge us for 50 amps even though we had a 50-amp site. We had the same site this time; and since it was warmer, they did charge us the extra $3 for a total of $36. The sites are a little narrow, but they're fine for a one or two-night stop. The photo below shows our site at Big Oak RV.

As the name of the campground suggests, there are quite a few large live oak trees around the campground. Fortunately for us, there are a few pull-through sites that are a bit more open so we could get good satellite reception. The next photo shows some of the many shady sites.

Big Oak RV Park takes its name from the one HUGE live oak tree behind our site in the first photo. It has been dated at over 350 years old. The arching branches create a densely-shaded canopy.

The next morning, we continued west on I-10 toward Alabama and pulled into Rainbow Plantation shortly after 1:00 PM. Rainbow Plantation is operated by the Escapees RV Club, and it has a campground, co-op sites, and deeded lots. Some campground sites have 30 amps, and some have 30/50 amps. All sites have full hookups and Wi-Fi is available for $3/day. The sites are nice and wide, and there are medium-sized live oak trees scattered throughout. On most of the sites, we have no trouble getting satellite reception between the trees.

Quite a few snowbirds spend the winter in Summerdale. Many of them have pulled out, but there were a surprising number of people left. The campground is pretty empty throughout the humid summer months.

We are planning to stay at Rainbow Plantation at least a couple of weeks. We're not sure what sightseeing we might do, but Margery is still searching for some cooler tops for summer, so we'll probably do a little shopping. We also have a project scheduled, and we'll tell you about that in our next post.

Summerdale, AL, Part I: Computer Woes

It was a little over a three-hour drive from Meridian, MS, to Summerdale, AL. Summerdale, which is on the eastern side of Mobile Bay, is the home of the Escapees Rainbow Plantation RV Park. Rainbow Plantation is one of our favorite Escapees parks. The sites are big, and the campground is quiet. There are no trains and no interstate noise.

The park has a campground, and there are also co-op sites and deeded lots. The roads are paved and the campground sites are grass with some shade. There are full hookups (some with 30-amp electric and some with 50), and Wi-Fi is available for a small fee. Our site for this stay at Rainbow Plantation is shown in the next photo.

The campground wasn't very full when we first arrived, but the number of RVs steadily increased during our stay. The next photo shows the view down the road.

You know how you always read about how important it is to back up your computer files? You know how you're always planning to do it some day? Well, we can tell you from experience to DO IT NOW.

We have a fairly new laptop that is our primary computer. Our old laptop is slow and out of date, but we kept it around because sometimes it's nice for both of us to have access to a computer at the same time even if one of them is a little slow.

About the time we arrived in Summerdale, Paul noticed the old computer had slowed down markedly. It would frequently hang up and had to be rebooted. Scans of the hard drive with anti-spyware and anti-virus software didn't turn up anything, but Paul was fairly certain it was a problem with spyware. Paul spent almost 4 solid days trying to correct the problem. To make a long story short, Paul was finally able to find a program on the Microsoft web site called Microsoft Security Essentials that was able to find and remove the spyware from our old computer. The good news is, after all the things Paul learned about speeding up computers while researching the spyware problem, he was able to tune up the old computer and clean up the hard drive so it is now running faster than it has for years.

The second chapter of the story started shortly after we got the spyware problem with the old computer corrected. The new computer is the preferred machine for downloading, cataloging and working with our thousands of photos. However, since we have two computers, we sometimes need to be able to access photos and other data from either computer. For that reason, we store the photos and some of our data files on an external hard drive so we can plug the drive into either computer when we need to access files.

We started experiencing problems with files on the external hard drive that neither computer could read. Paul figured those files may have been somehow corrupted by the spyware. However, the problem began to grow with more files that couldn't be read. Suddenly, neither computer would recognize the external hard drive at all.

We researched companies that specialize in data recovery from failed hard drives. We got an estimate from one company for $350 to $500. Yikes! Further research turned up Tech Advanced Computers in nearby Pensacola, FL, and we gave them a call.

They seemed to be very knowledgeable, and their initial price estimate was reasonable. About a week after we dropped off the drive, we got a call saying their analysis software told them most of the files could be recovered. So for a cost of a little over $200 we had them transfer our files to a new external drive. That wasn't too bad since a new external hard would have cost about $75-100 by itself.

Paul spent a couple of days re-organizing all our photo files and getting our photo catalog software to be able to find the files on the new drive. In going through the files, it doesn't look like anything is missing. Paul will begin the task of backing up our data so we don't have this problem again.

We've had a good bit of hot, humid weather with several rainy days since we first arrived in Summerdale. With the weather and with spending so much time on computer problems we haven't done any sightseeing, but we did find time to go out to eat. One afternoon we headed down to the Shrimp Basket in nearby Foley for an early dinner.

The Shrimp Basket is a chain of 9 restaurants along the Alabama Gulf coast and Florida Panhandle. As the name suggests, they specialize in seafood. We went on a Wednesday because on Sundays and Wednesdays they have all-you-can-eat fried shrimp baskets. The baskets also include cole slaw (with mini shrimp), potatoes (French fries, new potatoes, or potato salad) and hush puppies. The shrimp is delish, and the creamy potato salad or the buttery new potatoes are a nice contrast to the fried shrimp.

We'll be doing a little sightseeing between backing up computer files, so stay tuned for our next post.

Pittsburgh to Red Bay, AL

Just about the time we left Pittsburgh the weather finally warmed back up. It was in the upper 60s the day we arrived, but then the highs dropped into the 50s with lows in the 40s for the whole time we were there. It was also cloudy, rainy and dreary. When we left, the 5-day weather forecast was finally calling for partly to mostly sunny with highs in the 70s every day. Oh well, that's Pittsburgh weather for you.

In spite of the fact it was getting warmer again, we still headed south. Our first stop was at Caesar Creek State Park where we stayed Labor Day weekend. We arrived on Thursday, and as is usual for the middle of the week, we had the campground pretty much to ourselves.

As we described in our earlier post about Labor Day at Caesar Creek, the campground has electric only hookups (30 amp) and the sites are widely spaced.

The final destination for this leg of our travel was Red Bay, AL, which is where our motor home was built. Our electric awning had been acting up and frequently balked when we tried to deploy or stow it, and some of the clear coat paint on the top of the front cap had started to peel. We could probably get any RV dealer to repair the awning, but we wanted to stop at the factory repair facility in Red Bay to have the top of the cap repainted before the peeling got worse.

Tiffin Motorhomes (TMH) has a campground with about a hundred full-hookup sites adjacent to their repair facility. We have stayed there several times before - once to have fogged dual-pane windows replaced and a few times to tour the factory. We know from experience the campground empties out somewhat on Fridays and fills up again by the middle of the afternoon on Sunday. Once the full-hookup sites are gone, there are a couple of electric-only sites, then you get to dry camp at the far end of the campground. 

Because Margery had one last doctor appointment on Wednesday, we couldn't leave Pittsburgh until Thursday. Therefore, we had to make tracks to get to Red Bay on Saturday in order to have the best chance of getting a full-hookup site so we wouldn't have to dry camp with the highs in the upper 80s that were being predicted for Red Bay for the following week. That meant driving about 5 hours a day for three days in a row. We could have taken our time and arrived the following Saturday, but we hear the repair facility gets busier and busier as it gets later in October because early snowbirds stop for repairs on their way to Florida.

Our second overnight stop was at Bluegrass Music RV Park in Franklin, KY. Bluegrass Music RV has full hookup sites, some with 30-amp electric and some with 50-amp only. There is free Wi-Fi, the roads and pads are gravel, and there is sparse grass between the sites. Most of the sites have decent spacing for a private campground.

Bluegrass Music RV is a Passport America campground, but we thought the price was a bit high at $23 a night after the 50% discount. Some PA campgrounds discount their entire camping fee, but others discount only the base camping fee, then add on chargess for things like sewer hookups and 50-amp service at the full price. We're not sure because we didn't get an itemized bill, but we're guessing Bluegrass falls into the latter category.

The entrance to Bluegrass Music RV is between a Speedco truck service garage and the Pilot truck stop; and even though the campground has a large sign across the road from the entrance, the entrance is a little hard to see. We almost ended up on the truck scale at the Pilot. The campground is far enough from the road there wasn't any noticeable noise from the Speedco or the Pilot. If there was any noise from Speedco or Pilot, it was drowned out by the noise from the interstate.

The drive for our third day took us on Natchez Trace Parkway. Natchez Trace Parkway is under the juristiction of the National Park Service. It follows the approximate route of Natchez Trace, which was a Native American trail that was later followed by traders in the 1700s and early 1800s. The traders would take flatboats down the Mississippi, sell their cargo and sell the boat for its wood, then follow the trail back north. The trail ran from present-day Natchez, MS, to Nashville, TN.

Natchez Trace Parkway is a slower-paced, scenic drive that has a 50 mph speed limit for most of its length. Commercial trucks are not permitted, and there are no stop signs, no traffic signals, and no towns directly along the road. We drove it this time on a Saturday, and there were lots of bicycles and a little more traffic than usual, but it was still an easy road to drive. The road is lined with woods and farms, and there are pull-offs where you can see and walk the historic trace.

We arrived at the Tiffin campground in Red Bay in the early afternoon and got one of the last 4 full-hookup sites. The campground is intended to be used by those waiting for service, not as a destination campground, so it is nothing fancy. The sites are close together, and although most of them are pull-throughs, they are too short to leave your toad attached. But the campground does have full hookups, free Wi-Fi and cable; and at a price of only $10 a night it's a pretty good deal.

The campground is located on the site of an old airport, and the main road of the campground is the old runway. The rest of the campground is somewhat dusty gravel. The photo below shows our site at the Tiffin Allegro Campground.

There are occasionally one or two motor homes in the campground that are not made by Tiffin, and we even saw a 5th wheel there once. Those people probably were making a one or two night stop for a factory tour rather than waiting for service. Staying here is like suburbia where all the 'houses' look the same. You'd better remember your site number since it would be easy to park by the wrong RV!

The campground is pretty quiet on the weekend except for new people pulling in. By Sunday evening, the electric-only overflow sites were filled, and new arrivals were starting to use the dry-camp area. On Monday the bustle starts when employees begin arriving about 6:00 AM. Rigs start pulling out of campsites and into the service bays around 6:45. There are over 40 service bays.

There are two ways to get service for your motor home at Red Bay. You can make an appointment ahead of time and get right in on your scheduled day. The problem with that is the appointments were running almost a year out. They recently started a new system where appointments are made on a quarterly basis. We're not sure exactly how that works yet.

The other way to get service is to just show up and wait for an opening. This is what we do, and it also seems to be what most other people do. A few years ago, they designated some of the service bays as express bays for work that is estimated to take less than 3 hours. A lot of work falls into this category, and customers with small repairs can get in and out in a few days.

The paint and body shop at Red Bay is always very busy. Tiffin works with a couple of body shops in town, and they recommended one of those to us to get the top of our cap repainted. Since our peeling clear coat was a simple job of sanding and repainting, using the body shop in town would save us several days of waiting. The body shops in town are used by Tiffin all the time, and they are familiar with the Tiffin paint formulations.

Our awning repair fell in the under three-hour category, but we still had to "hang loose" to find out exactly when we would get called to a service bay. We'll tell you all about the rest of our stay in Red Bay in our next post.

On the Road Again

First of all, we would like to thank all our friends and readers who expressed their condolences about the loss of our sweet dog, Molly. She was such a good traveler, and we'll miss her.

After delaying our departure from Bushnell, we finally hit the road on Thursday. We made an overnight stop at Pine Lake RV, a Passport America campground near Fountain, FL, in the panhandle. In other years after leaving Bushnell, we stayed at Chattahoochee RV located on the Apalachicola River. Chattahoochee is closer to half-way to our destination in Summerdale, AL; but last year, the river was flooded and some of the sites at the campground had recently been underwater. With more rain this year, we thought we would just drive a little farther and try a new campground that wasn't located near a river. The next photo shows our site at Pine Lake RV.

Pine Lake RV is located about 16 miles from the interstate, but there is still some highway noise from four-lane U. S. Highway 231 that passes by the campground on the way to Panama City. There is a railroad track a few hundred feet on the other side of the highway. Fortunately, there were very few trains because the rumble of the few that did pass was very loud. Fortunately, there is no crossing near the campground so there were only a few, distant toots of the train horns.

The roads through the campground are paved, but the pavement is quite narrow. The sites are a combination of grass and sand, and most are extra-long pull-throughs. The site width isn't too bad for a private campground. Pine Lake has full hook-ups with free Wi-Fi. Some sites have 30 amp electric and some have 50 amp. As you can see from the above photo, there are a few trees, but the office was very accommodating in allowing us to move to another site to get satellite reception. In the first site they gave us we could get internet, but not TV. They are on two different satellites, and a tree branch was blocking the TV signal.

In the morning we hit the road at 8:30, which is a little earlier than usual. We pulled into Rainbow Plantation in Summerdale, AL, shortly after noon. It was a good thing we got an early start because we got the last available site. A lot of Escepees spend the winter in Summerdale; and although some had moved on, others (like us) were stopping on our way north from Florida.

Rainbow Plantation is one of our favorite Escapees RV parks. The roads are paved, and the sites are a combination of grass and sand. There are full hook-ups and free Wi-Fi. Fifty-amp electric is available for an extra charge. Sites are nice and wide, and the campground is quiet.

One of the things we like about the Summerdale area is there are lots of things to do and see. Even though our visit to Summerdale was shortened because we extended our stay in Bushnell, we still wanted to see the azaleas blooming at Bellingrath Gardens over in Mobile. Bellingrath is famous for the over 250,000 azaleas that normally bloom around the middle two weeks of March. Unfortunately, when we checked the Bellingrath web site, we found out the unusually cold weather this winter had delayed the blooming by about two weeks. This delay was confirmed by observing the azaleas in people's yards in the area. Only about a third of the blossoms on most of the plants open, and it looked like the azaleas still had at least a week to 10 days to go before they even neared their peak. Therefore, we decided to save seeing azaleas for another time.

One of the other things we like about the Summerdale area is the close proximity to the Gulf of Mexico which means there is a lot of delicious seafood available. Last fall when we were in the area we discovered Shrimp Basket restaurants. Shrimp Basket is a chain of about a dozen restaurants with one in nearby Foley. Paul was hungry for fried shrimp, and the Shrimp Basket has all-you-can-eat shrimp baskets on Wednesdays and Sundays, so we headed down to Foley on Sunday.

 

After spending the weekend at Rainbow Plantation, we hit the road again on Monday. We were heading to Branson, MO, for the wedding of Heather, who is our daughter Lora's best friend and former roommate. We were friends with Heather's parents from our former church back in Pittsburgh, and we were pleased to have been invited to participate in the festivities.

With extending our stay back in Bushnell, our recent travels were a bit less leisurely than normal. We usually plan to travel no more than four hours a day, but this time, we would be traveling 5+ hours a day for a couple of days in a row. Our next overnight stop was at Movietown RV Park in Canton, MS, a little north of Jackson.

Movietown RV is a nice RV park. It has gravel roads and pads with full hookups and 50/30 amp electric. Sites are mostly pull-throughs and are fairly wide with grass between. Even though the campground is conveniently located near the interstate, there is surprisingly little traffic noise - and there are NO trains!

Apparently, the name of the RV park comes from the fact that quite a few movies have been filmed in the Canton area. Canton even has a movie office and a couple of movie museums. Maybe we'll go back some day for a longer visit, especially now that we know a good place to stay.

From Canton, we drove north to Little Rock, AR, in another 5+ hour travel day. We stayed at Maumelle Park north of the city last fall when we met up with our friends Marilyn and Alan. Since that time, Alan took a voluntary layoff when he found out the company he worked for was planning a cut-back, they sold their house, and they are now full-timers.

Maumelle Park is a Corps of Engineers campground located along the Arkansas River. The campground has paved roads and pads and gravel patios. There are water and electric hookups (30 amp) only. As with most COE campgrounds, sites are very generously spaced. The photo below shows our site at Maumelle Park.

We didn't make reservations because we were uncertain about our arrival date and because we thought the campground would be empty in the middle of the week in March. Boy, were we surprised when we arrived and found the campground was almost full! It looked like a lot of families were spending the week at the campground, so we're guessing we hit spring break for the Arkansas schools. There were also some college kids on spring break, and we're pleased to report the group tenting on the site next to us were very well behaved. The next photo is a view down the road from our site and gives you an idea of how crowded it was.

We normally look for a campground with pull-through sites when we make a one-night stop, but we liked Maumelle so much, it was worth unhooking the toad. Not only that, but Marilyn and Alan took us to Larry's Pizza when we were there last fall. Larry's is a chain of about a dozen restaurants around the Little Rock area, and, fortunately, there is one right down the road from Maumelle Park. They have a lunch buffet every day, but they only have the dinner buffet on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Luckily for us, we were there on Tuesday, so we had another good reason to unhook the car. The next photo shows Margery loading up at Larry's. Yum!

Here Paul is toasting Alan and Marilyn for introducing us to Larry's.

The next morning, we headed out for an unprecedented third straight travel day. The distance was a little shorter, and we were only on the road for about 3 1/2 hours instead of the 5+ hours we had been doing. We pulled into Escapees Turkey Creek Campground near Branson, MO, a little after noon.

In contrast to Maumelle Park, the campground in Branson was nearly empty. Late spring, summer and fall are the most popular times for Turkey Creek Campground, and we were a little early. But that was OK because some of the sites are also a little small, so we had plenty of elbow room with the campground almost empty.

Turkey Creek has gravel roads and pads, full hook-ups (there is an extra charge for 50 amp electric), free Wi-Fi and cable. Although the temperature was in the 60s when we arrived, we opted to pay extra for a 50 amp site because the weather forecast was calling for rain and falling temperatures so we thought 50 amp would make it easier to do laundry and use the electric heater at the same time. The photo below shows our site at Turkey creek.

We'll be spending a week in Branson, so we'll have time to relax a little between the wedding festivities. We're also looking forward to seeing Lora and J. Michael. We might even come up with some other activities or possibly a good restaurant, so stay tuned.

 

Myrtle Beach 2009

By the time we left the Mobile area, the weather had cooled off and warmed back up again two or three times. We visited Bellingrath Gardens over in Mobile last spring (click HERE and HERE to read out two posts about Bellingrath Gardens from 2008), and we wanted to see the gardens again in the fall. However, the warming of the weather toward the end of our stay when we planned to go to Bellingrath brought with it clouds and a chance of rain every day, so we decided to save a fall visit for another time.

It was about 700 miles from where we were staying in Summerdale to our next destination in Myrtle Beach, so we decided to break the trip down to three days of driving. After about a four-hour drive, we stayed the first night at Leisure Time Campground near Auburn, AL. The roads at Leisure Time were paved, and pads were a combination of gravel and dirt. They had full hookups with 30/50-amp electric and cable with a limited number of channels. The photo below shows our site at Leisure Time Campground.

 

The campground is built on a hillside, so some of the sites aren't real level. The hillside overlooks a municipal park with four ball fields, and there were several games going on in the evening when we were there. Fortunately, the the games weren't noisy, and the lights were out and everyone was gone before 10:00 PM. However, we could hear the traffic noise from the nearby interstate all night.

After another four-hour drive, we stopped for the second night at Flynn's Inn Camping Village. Flynn's is an older campground that is located a little south of Augusta, GA on U. S. Highway 25. Highway 25 is four lanes, and it's a busy road. Our site was only a couple hundred feet from the road, and there is no barrier of any kind - no shrubs, no fence, and no buildings - to block the traffic noise. Flynn's has full hookups, and a few sites have 50-amp electric. The main road is paved, but it is very rough and uneven. The sites are mostly grass. The next photo shows our site at Flynn's Inn Camping Village.

 

We usually don't like to drive three days in a row, so we scheduled two nights at Flynn's. While in the Augusta area, we checked out a Corps of Engineers campground north of the city. It was a nice campground; but as we suspected, it turned out there were way too many trees for good satellite reception.

We also stopped to visit one of Margery's former coworkers from back in Pittsburgh. It was great catching up with Andy and Liz Reid along with their children (l-r) Helen, Noah, Sam. This very talented family has an author, composer, and sports fanatic among their children.

The next morning, we had another drive of a little over four hours to Myrtle Beach. We discovered Ocean Lakes Campground in Myrtle Beach our first year of full-timing, and we have returned every fall since. Ocean Lakes is a large campground with hundreds of sites and beach houses. In the summer, there are activities (especially for kids and teens) and special events like concerts, a golf cart parade, and a craft fair. The campground is so big, it's almost like a small city. We hear things can be a little zooey in summer; but by fall, things quiet down quite a bit and the lower winter rates kick in November 1.

Ocean Lakes has paved roads and full hookups including 30/50-amp electric and cable. Wi-Fi is available at extra cost. Many of the sites are paved, and they continue to pave even more every year during the off-season. The paved sites cost $5 more a night, so we always chose an unpaved site in the past. Early this year, we got a letter stating the site we had reserved had been paved and the price would be going up. We had the option of calling the reservation desk if we wanted to change to a lower cost, unpaved site, but we decided to keep the paved site. The pavement is really nice to keep the sand out of the rig in spite of the higher cost, and we didn't want to give up our site which is just two back from the beach. The photo below shows our site at Ocean Lakes.

Our friends from North Carolina, Barbara and Dick, were going to be returning home from Jekyll Island about the time we were planning to be in Myrtle Beach, so they made reservations for a site near us at Ocean Lakes for a few days. We originally met Barbara and Dick last year in Davenport, IA, and we look forward to when our paths cross. The last time we saw them was last winter when they visited us at Blueberry Hill RV Resort in Bushnell, FL.

Our first full day in Myrtle Beach was cool and cloudy which precluded riding bikes or sitting on the beach to chat, so we all piled in their car and drove over to a shopping area called Broadway at the Beach. Broadway at the Beach is a collection of about 40 or 50 shops, a couple dozen restaurants and snack shops, and a number of entertainment venues. The shops are laid out around a lagoon and there are sections that have different themes such as Caribbean, New England, and Charleston. The whole thing has a little of the flavor of Disney's Epcot.

It was a cool, dreary weekday so it wasn't very crowded as you can see from the next photo.

We strolled around a while checking out some of the shops. Barbara bought some gifts for her grandkids, and Paul was attracted to a shop selling saltwater taffy. We are still watching our carbs, but we couldn't resist buying a few pieces of taffy. Yum!

 

And, of course, we couldn't pass up the opportunity for a tourist photo.

 

So far, we're just having a good time hanging out, sharing dinners, and visiting with Barbara and Dick. You never know what else will turn up, so stay tuned.

Mobile, AL Part I: USS Alabama

We left the Corinth Recreation Area, drove east a few miles, then headed south on I-65. After about a three-hour drive, we pulled off south of Montgomery in Hope Hull, AL, for a one-night stop at Montgomery South RV Park. Montgomery South is a fairly new campground with full hookups, 50-amp electric, and cable TV. The roads and pads are gravel, there is sparse grass between most of the sites, and the site width isn't bad for a private campground. All the sites are pull-throughs, so we didn't have to unhook the toad.

The campground is conveniently located right off the interstate, but that means there is a fair amount of traffic noise. There is also a railroad track right on the other side of the interstate, so we could hear train whistles as well. Fortunately, it was warm when we were there, so we just ran the air conditioner all night which helped cover up the noise outside.

The next morning, we continued south to Summerdale, AL, to Rainbow Plantation RV Park where we stayed after we left Florida this past spring. Rainbow Plantation is owned by the Escapees RV Club and has a campground, co-op sites, and deeded lots. The campground has full hookups, and about half the sites have 30-amp electric and half have 50-amp. The roads are paved, and the sites are mostly grass with a few bare, sandy spots under the live oak trees and where the RVs park. The sites are fairly widely spaced, and the campground is nice and quiet.

Although the campground is in a quiet area, Summerdale is near Mobile, AL, and the campground is convenient to shopping, restaurants (the area is known for seafood), and lots of things to do and see. It was sunny the day we arrived; but for most of the week afterward, it was hot and humid with clouds and showers almost every day. We didn't do any sightseeing, but we did run some errands, and we ate out a couple of times.

One of the restaurants we tried was the Shrimp Basket. The Shrimp Basket is a local chain of a half dozen or so restaurants with one in nearby Foley, AL.

The Foley location has all-you-can-eat fried shrimp on Sundays and Wednesdays. We went on Wednesday, and we both had the shrimp. The meal, which was excellent (probably the best fried shrimp we've ever had), and included hush puppies, slaw, and a choice of fries, potato salad, or boiled new potatoes. Everything was yummy, and the price was only $9.99. We got there early, so it wasn't very crowded when we took the picture below of Margery about to dig in; but it was filling up fast by the time we left.

 

The hot, humid weather eventually gave way (after a night of thunderstorms) to cooler, clear air. The temperatures dropped from highs in the mid 80s to the mid 60s with lows in the low 40s. Brrrrr! But the lack of the threat of rain was a little more conducive to sightseeing, so we headed across Mobile Bay to Battleship Memorial Park to see the USS Alabama. The USS Alabama is a battleship that served in WWII in both the Pacific and the Atlantic theaters.

The Alabama was built in Norfolk, VA, and was commissioned in 1942. She was decommissioned in 1947 and assigned to reserve duty. In 1962, the Alabama was retired, after which she was taken to Mobile Bay and opened as a museum ship in 1965.

The USS Alabama is 680 feet long, a little over 108 feet wide, and has a draft of about 34 feet. Her fully loaded weight is 42,500 tons (that's 85 million pounds).

 

As we boarded, we saw a few of the twenty 5-inch guns. These guns could fire a 5-inch diameter projectile distances of up to 10 miles.

We were able climb up into the conning tower (the tall structure in the center of the ship) to get a good view of the BIG guns. There are nine 16-inch guns - three facing aft, and six facing forward. These guns are capable of firing a 16-inch diameter projectile weighing 2,700 pounds distances of up to 21 miles!

The lower part of the gun turrets that lie below decks are called barbettes. The Alabama is one of the only ships where visitors can enter the barbettes of the 16-inch gun turrets to see how the shells were loaded and fired. In the next photo, Paul is standing beside a number of disarmed 16-inch shells. You can see part of the circular track where the barbette, which is to the left, rotates.

The USS Alabama carried a crew of 2,500 during war time. We saw how closely together the men lived and worked. The officers had things a little better than the crew sleeping only two or three to a room, but the rooms were still very small. The next photo shows a typical office. Four sailors would have worked in this small space. There is also a bunk (called a rack) in the background, so it looks like at least one of the men would have also slept in this room.

The Alabama would have been out to sea for months at a time, so there were facilities on board to tend to the crew's needs. We saw the mess halls, galleys, sick bay, doctor's offices, and dentist offices. They also had a soda fountain where the crew could enjoy special treats like ice cream, a store where the sailors could buy necessities like razor blades, and a barber shop.

The ship is powered by two oil-fired boilers driving two steam turbines that produced a total of 130,000 hp. The turbines, one of which is shown in the next photo, drive the ship's four propellers to move the ship at speeds of up to 28 knots (32 mph). We could only imagine the noise the sailors endured while serving on these battleships...and we won't go into the smell of 2500 bodies in close quarters, but a locker room comes to mind. :-)

 

Battleship Memorial Park also has a number of other military exhibits including the submarine the USS Drum. The Drum was commissioned in 1941 and saw action in the Pacific during WWII. She was donated to Battleship Memorial Park and opened as a museum ship in 1969. The USS Drum is almost 312 feet long.

Inside the hull of the Drum, the space was even tighter than in the Alabama. The next photo shows the forward torpedo room.

 

There are also a number of planes on display at the park. Some of the larger ones are outside; and some, like the F-16 in the photo below, are housed in a 36,000 square foot indoor pavilion.

 

In addition to ships and planes, the park also has a collection of other military equipment such as tanks, armored vehicles, and guns. The large gun in the foreground is a 155mm artillery piece, and that's an M60 tank right behind it toward the left. Many U. S. allies around the world are still using newer versions of the M60 tank, which was first introduced in late 1960.

 

There is a lot to see at Battleship Memorial Park. We spent several hours there, and we could have easily stayed longer to view the displays in more detail. But, although the sun was out the day we were there, it was quite cool and breezy...no, it was windy...there by beside Mobile Bay, and we were getting tired from all the stairs we climbed. We were also getting hungry, so we headed back to the motor home to put our feet up and to have a snack.

Although we are definitely in relaxation mode, there is still a little sightseeing we want to do in the Mobile area, so look for our next post.

Corinth Recreation Area, AL

We have been following the same route we took last year from Memphis. Although we will soon be heading in a different direction, we continued last year's route after we left Red Bay with another stop at Corinth Recreation Area near Double Springs, AL. Corinth Recreation Area is in the Bankhead National Forest.

Corinth has paved roads and pads, gravel patios, and widely-spaced, grassy sites. The campground isn't heavily used, and it's the only thing at the end of County Road 57 so there are few people, no traffic noise, and no trains. The only things we heard were the birds, cicadas, and the occasional acorn dropping on the roof.

Corinth has two loops of RV sites, one of which has full hookups. All but 5 or 6 of the full-hookup sites are non-reserveable, but most of the 5 or 6 full hookup sites are open enough for us to get satellite reception. We reserved the same site we had last year.

Being a national recreation area, there is a 50% discount on the camping fees with the America the Beautiful Senior Pass. Unlike Corps of Engineers campgrounds that discount the entire camping fee, however, Corinth only discounts the basic camping fee, not the extra charges for hookups. But including the $9 reservation fee, the nightly cost worked out to about $16, which isn't bad for a quiet, uncrowded campground with huge sites and full hookups.

We continued to have rain off and on, so that was a good excuse to not do much. We got our bikes out of the car, aired up the tires, and rode a little; but the rain and wet roads in the campground limited our riding. There isn't a Walmart anywhere near the Corinth Recreation Area, so we stopped to stock up on groceries at the Walmart in Russellville on our way to Corinth. Therefore, we didn't even leave the campground the entire week we were there. However, we did get the screens and the windows on the motor home cleaned inside and out in spite of the rain, Margery did some research for our future travels and for a project she's working on for Lora, and we did some more general puttering around the motor home.

That gave us plenty of time to read, to relax, and to reflect on our travels to the Pacific Northwest this past summer. In addition to all the interesting things we saw and wrote about in our posts over the past few months, there were a number of things we observed that were interesting, but that didn't really relate to any of the major things we wrote about.

For example, one of the things we noticed was how many people ride bicycles in northern California, Oregon, and Washington. All the towns and cities have bike lanes, and you have to keep a sharp eye for cyclists when you're driving. We saw cyclists on the hills of San Francisco as well as on the 3,000 or 4,000 foot climb up to Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park in Washington. All we could say was when we saw the hills was, "Are they crazy?" Well, maybe they are, but they're really in good shape, too.

We saw an astounding number of espresso huts in Oregon and Washington. We knew Starbucks got its start in Seattle, and we were aware the area is known for coffee and coffee shops; but there are coffee shops and little drive-through and drive-up espresso huts like the one below just about EVERYWHERE, including many that were right across the street from each other.

 We were also surprised at the dearth of country music stations in Oregon and Washington. We always thought of the area as being somewhat sophisticated and anything but red-neck, and we didn't expect to find many country stations; but in most places we couldn't find ANY.

Seattle reminded us a lot of our old hometown of Pittsburgh. There are hills, the roads have a lot of twists and turns, and there are many of roads that intersect at odd angles. In fact, not only do the streets in Seattle intersect at odd angles, we felt like we could count on the fingers of one hand the number of intersections that involved only 4 streets. There were a lot of 5-way, and even some 6-way intersections. 

Northern California and the Northwest have a lot of old cars. By that we mean classics, not clunkers...and many are not restored to their former glory as a collector's item, but driven daily as the family car. California is known for its car culture, which includes an interest in classic cars; but we were surprised to see a lot of classics in Oregon and Washington, too. There is also a way bigger percentage of cars along the West Coast from foreign-owned car companies than there are in Middle America or in the East. In fact, we saw only a handful of American-made cars in the Silicon Valley. Some of the more popular makes in Silicone Valley include Lexus, Acura, BMW, Mercedes, and Audi.

Speaking of cars, like most people, we usually sneak a little above the speed limit when we're driving in the car. Of course, there are always a few who drive way over the speed limit and a few who doddle along at well under the speed limit, but it usually seems like 90% of people drive at the speed limit or a little above. In the Northwest, it seemed to us there were an unusually high number of drivers (one third to almost half) who drove under the speed limit.

Dump trucks we saw in the Northwest are different from those we are used to seeing in other areas of the country. Most of the dump trucks had dump trailers with long tongues. We're not sure of the reason for the long tongue, except that maybe the long tongue allows the truck itself to be dumped without unhooking the trailer.

As expected, we saw a lot of RVs in Washington. However, most of the license plates were from Washington rather than from other states. Many of the out-of-state tourists we met in Seattle flew in. 

Another thing we noticed was the large number of Thai restaurants in the Northwest. They're as plentiful as Italian restaurants are back in our old hometown of Pittsburgh.

We did write about all the flowers in Oregon and Washington, but they were so impressive, we thought they warranted being mentioned again. The roadsides are lined with wildflowers like these in the Hurricane Ridge area of Olympic National Park.

 

There are also many gardens from large, public gardens to small, home-owner gardens. The garden in the next photo is at a lavender farm in Washington.

After a week of relaxation at Corinth Recreation Area, we hit the road again and continued on our way south. There will be more information about our next destination in our next post.

Red Bay, AL 2009

After we left the Memphis area, we stopped in Red Bay, AL, like we did last fall. Red Bay is the home of Tiffin Motorhomes, and we wanted to take another plant tour to see the new 2010 models. Even though we weren't having work done on our motor home like last year (click HERE to read that post), we stayed at the Allegro Campground again because it's conveniently located right at the edge of town and it's cheap.

The Allegro Campground has full hookups, 50-amp electric, and free Wi-Fi. The campground is built at an old airstrip, so it is all gravel, except for the main campground road which is the old asphalt runway. The repair facility, which has 40+ repair bays, is right next to the campground. The sites are pretty close together, and there is a fair amount of commotion between 7:00 and 8:00 AM when everyone is taking their coaches over to the repair facility. But, like we said, the campground is convenient to town, it's cheap ($10 a night), and it's also fun to see all the Tiffin motor homes all lined up in a row and to talk to some of the other Tiffin owners. The photo below shows our site at the Allegro Campground.

The Allegro Campground does not accept reservations, and it fills up by Sunday night or Monday, especially during the snowbird migration, with people coming in for service. Therefore, we timed our arrival for Saturday to avoid the rush and found the campground only about half full when we pulled in around noon.

We headed into town to Tiffin Motorhomes on Monday for the 10:00 AM tour. There is also a 2:00 PM tour; but since the workers go home at 2:30, there isn't as much going on during the afternoon tour. The tour starts at the visitor center outside the main gate.

Red, who is now 83 years young, is still leading the tours. He is very well informed about Tiffin Motorhomes, and he is sharp as a tack. If someone makes a joke, he will pick up on it immediately and join in with some good-natured banter of his own. He knows all the models and all the floorplans; and if someone asks a question to which he doesn't know the answer (which is rare), he will usually find the answer by the end of the tour.

As we walked through the plant gate, we were heartened to see many more motor homes sitting around than there were last year and to see a good many employees' vehicles in the parking lot. Back in 2007, Tiffin built 13 motor homes a day; but when we visited last year when fuel prices were so high, they were only building 6 motor homes a day and they were only working 4 days a week. This year, even with the weak economy, they are working 5 days a week and producing 7 motor homes a day. There are still a lot of lay-offs, but things are on the upswing and they said the number of motor homes will soon be increased to 8 a day. The next photo is the view inside the main gate. Motor homes waiting for final inspection are in the distance, and a portion of the employee parking lot is to the left.

The tour includes only the main assembly building. The chassis shop welds the beams that support the floor and other brackets and components onto the chassis. The chassis then enters the main assembly building under its own power (notice the temporary seat to the left) where workers begin installing wiring, holding tanks, storage bays, and plumbing under the floor.

Workers then install the floor, the carpet, and the tile. Wires and plumbing are fished up through openings in the floor.

Interior walls and appliances go in next. More wiring and plumbing are added.

In another area of the plant, exterior walls are being fabricated. Slabs of polystyrene foam are cut by CNC (Computer Numerical Controlled) routers to hollow out slots for the aluminum frame.

In the next photo, pieces of pre-cut, square aluminum tubing are being installed into the slots in the foam at the table on the left. On the right, the pieces of aluminum are being welded into a strong, solid frame.

After the frames are welded, an outside skin of fiberglass and an inside skin of thin, wallpaper-covered plywood are laminated to the foam. Workers then cut openings for windows, doors, and slide-outs in the walls. The completed wall leaning against the ladder in the photo below is waiting to be hoisted into place on the motor home behind it.

A foam ceiling assembly is fastened down on top of the walls in the bay with the overhead walkway to the left in the photo below. A one-piece, molded fiberglass roof (stacked on the floor) is lifted by the overhead, yellow-frame hoist with vacuum-powered suction cups and placed on top of the foam.

Workers then install slide-outs. A few, smaller Tiffin motor homes have two slide-outs. The rest have at least three slide-outs, and most have four.

Next, the workers install storage bay doors, interior cabinets, furniture, trim, front and rear end caps, and miscellaneous items. When the assembly is complete, the motor homes are driven a few miles north to Belmont, MS, to the paint shop. All Tiffin motor homes get full body paint. The units are then returned to Red Bay for final cleaning and inspection.

After our plant tour, we stopped at La Estancia Mexican Restaurant, which is right down the road from the campground. The food was good, although not as good as our favorite Mexican restaurant Cozumel back in Greensburg, PA; and prices were reasonable. We both had Lunch Special #1, which consists of a chili relleno, a taco, salad (guacamole was extra), and refried beans. Margery substituted rice for the beans. In the next photo, Margery is about to take a bite of her taco.

When we got back to the Allegro Campground, we stopped in at the surplus store. Tiffin sells furniture and other components leftover from older models in a warehouse-like building adjacent to the campground and repair facility. We didn't find anything we needed this time, but you never know what they may have.

We stayed in Red Bay a week, but other than taking the plant tour and eating out once we didn't do much. We stopped at the local grocery story to pick up a few necessities; Margery got a haircut, read, and did some budget work and travel research on the computer; and Paul ran over to the local hardware store, washed the car and motor home, and did a little puttering around the motor home. And to help with the puttering, all the men on the Tiffin plant tour got a gift of a 10' tape measure with the Tiffin logo. It was the best promotional gift he could have gotten. You know men and their toys...big and small.

From Red Bay, we had a short drive to a new destination where we planned to relax some more. Look for our next post, and we'll tell you all about it.

Mobile, AL Part I: Shrimp and More

After spending four full months in Florida (with the exception of taking three trips to Pittsburgh with a duration of about ten days each), we headed north and west to begin our summer travel adventure. Our primary destination this year will be Yosemite National Park in California, but we will make a number of other stops on the way there. Afterward, we plan to visit northern California, Oregon, and Washington before heading back east for fall and winter.

After we left Bushnell, we made an overnight stop at Chattahoochee RV Resort in Chattahoochee, FL. We stayed at this campground, which is located right along the Apalachicola River, our first year of full-timing. The campground is located just downstream of a dam that forms Lake Seminole. The city of Chattahoochee operates the campground and honors a 50% Passport America discount for stays of up to three days. There is also a picnic and boat launch area adjacent to the campground.

The use of the word "resort" in the name may be a little too hopeful, but it is still a fairly nice campground - especially at a Passport America price of about $8 a night. The photo below shows our site at Chattahoochee RV Resort.

 

If you go to this campground, make sure you use a pressure regulator because their water pressure is very high. Without a regulator, the pressure pegged our 100 psi gauge.

The main road in the campground is paved, but the rest of the roads are gravel. Some sites are gravel, but the ones down over the hill near the river are grass. The sites are all back-ins; but the last time we were there, they let us park down over the hill and just pull across several unoccupied sites so we wouldn't have to unhook the toad for a one-night stop. This year, since they again weren't very filled, we did the same thing except we were at the far end of the upper section of the campground. The sites near the river were still a bit soggy because they had been underwater until a few days prior.

Northern Florida and Georgia have had quite a bit of rain lately. There have been a series of heavy storms passing through for the past few weeks. A storm gave Chattahoochee over four inches of rain the day before we arrived. After we got set up, we walked down to the boat launch and picnic area where we could see the water was still pretty high.

From Chattahoochee, it was on to Rainbow Plantation, the Escapees RV Park in Summerdale, AL, near Mobile. Rainbow Plantation has a transient camping area, leased/co-op sites, and deeded lots. The photo below shows our site in the camping area.

We also stayed at Rainbow Plantation our first year of full-timing; but it was fairly cool because it was the end of December so we didn't stay long and we didn't do any sightseeing. Summerdale is located on the eastern side of Mobile Bay, and the city of Mobile is located on the western side of the bay.

One of the things Mobile Bay is known for is seafood. We did a little research online and decided on a restaurant not too far from Summerdale called Big Daddy's Grill, which is located on the Fish River. Big Daddy's is shown in the photo below.

Big Daddy's has live entertainment on weekends, but it bills itself as a family restaurant. The entertainment usually runs from 3 or 4 in the afternoon until 7 or 8 in the evening instead of late into the night. They even have a couple of piles of sand for the kids to play in. There is indoor seating, outdoor seating in the pavilion shown above where there is a huge fireplace for cool evenings, and outdoor seating behind the restaurant overlooking a small marina. Although is was a weekday when we were there and there was no activity to watch at the marina, we chose a picnic table overlooking the water.

 

Margery had a catfish strip basket and Paul had a fried shrimp basket with local shrimp. Both were excellent. The baskets come with hush puppies, slaw, and a choice of fries or onion rings.

Another thing that showed up in our research for seafood was the fact that the Annual Shrimp Cook-off would be held in Mobile the Saturday we were in town. The cook-off is a fund raiser for an organization called Volunteer Mobile, which seeks to promote volunteerism to solve community problems such as disaster relief.

The admission price to the cook-off is a little steep at $15 per person; but it is for a good cause, and it entitles you to all the shrimp you can eat at no additional charge. Advance purchase discount tickets are available at some of the area banks, but the branches on the Summerdale side of the bay didn't have the tickets because they said they were too far from downtown Mobile.

The Organized Seafood Association of Alabama provides all the shrimp for the cook-off at no cost. The contestants, which are made up of professionals such as area restaurants and amateur teams such as civic groups, submit their dishes for judging. The winners in both the professional and amateur categories receive bragging rights. The teams also serve samples of their dishes to the public.

The event is held in Bienville Square, which is a pleasant, shady park that covers one square block in the downtown area of Mobile.

 

The cook-off runs from 11:00 AM until 2:00 PM. We arrived around 11:30, and some of the booths already have fairly long lines. We developed a system where one of us would stand in one of the longer lines line while the other would walk to one of the nearby, shorter lines and bring two samples back to where the other was waiting. The photo below shows Margery enjoying one of our favorite dishes of the entire cook-off - shrimp in an Alfredo-style cheese sauce. We liked that one so well, Margery went back three times and Paul went back four times.

 

The shrimp cook-off had live entertainment that included a band that sounded pretty good. Miss Seafood, the event queen, and several pre-teen members of her court also sang. They were quite talented.

 

We had fried shrimp, peel-and-eat-shrimp with old bay seasoning, shrimp with pine nuts, shrimp with rice, barbecued shrimp, grilled shrimp wrapped in prosciutto, oriental shrimp, and our favorite shrimp in cheese sauce. By about 12:30, most of the lines were getting quite long, but that was OK with us because we were getting pretty full. We had another sample or two and left a little after 1:00.

Since it was still early in the day and since we were already downtown, we decided to drive several blocks to the Mobile Carnival Museum. Carnival is another name for Mardi Gras. The Mobile Carnival Museum is shown in the photo below.

When someone mentions Mardi Gras, we always think of New Orleans. The celebration in New Orleans is more well known than the one in Mobile because New Orleans publicizes theirs more. Carnival in Mobile bills itself as being more family oriented which may also help account for the greater notoriety of the celebration held in New Orleans.

Mobile claims to have the oldest Mardi Gras or Carnival celebration in what would eventually become the United States dating back to 1703. Mardi Gras literally means "fat Tuesday" in French. It is a celebration prior to Lent when supplies of fat and other foods that the pious would traditionally forgo during Lent are used up. Parades and masquerading typically associated with Mardi Gras and Carnival can be traced back to medieval Italy.

Carnival in Mobile is centered around mystic societies (called krewes in New Orleans and other locations) that sponsor parades, balls, and other activities for members, guests, and the public. The mystic societies are private organizations that grew out of the social and business structure that cotton brought to the city. There are approximately 55 active social societies today. Membership in a society is by invitation only.

The king and queen of Carnival are selected almost a year in advance. The selection is made based on social standing, connections, and money. The king and queen don't necessarily need to be residents of Mobile, but they must have a connection to the city. For example, one past queen was a New York opera star, but her mother was a resident of Mobile.

The debutantes of the season serve as Ladies of the Court. Each lady selects her escort. The societies kick off the season in Mobile with a formal debutante ball held Thanksgiving weekend.

The societies also select their own kings and queens who wear elaborate costumes that include ornate trains to some of the events. The Carnival Museum has many of these beautiful costumes and trains on display, some of which are shown in the photo below.



The photo below shows the trains and costumes of the 2008 Mobile Carnival Association king and queen.



The next photo shows the costumes of the 2008 Mobile Mardi Gras Association (formerly the Colored Carnival Association) king and queen.



The gown and train shown in the photo below are from 1936. Although this train is very elegant, you can see how much more elaborate the trains have become today.

 

Children's page costumes are shown in the next photo. The job of the pages is to look cute and stay out of mischief.

The importance of the king and queen having financial resources can't be overstated. All of the dresses, robes, crowns, scepters, and men's costumes are paid for by the families. Each train is designed to include symbols which are meaningful to the wearer. The embellishments are all hand-sewn and the costumes take many months to complete.

The museum also has portions of a couple of parade floats on display. The floats are made from paper mache. The photo below shows us pretending to ride on a float and to throw Mardi Gras beads.



The next photo shows a decoration from another float on display in the museum gift shop.



And finally, here we are posing as King Felix III and Queen Margery. All Carnival kings in Mobile are traditionally named Felix, and since the current Carnival Association is the third embodiment of the ruling organization, the king is called Felix III. The queen gets to use her own name. We can't seem to pass up those tourist cutouts and statues that you stick your faces through for photos.



It was a fun and interesting day, but there is more to see in Mobile. Look for our next post in a few days.

Change of Plans - Heading for Charlotte

We left Red Bay on a Wednesday and drove an hour and a half east to the Corinth Recreation Area located in the Bankhead National Forest. As we said in our last post, there wasn't much to do in Red Bay so we had plenty of time to drive out to Corinth one day to pick our site in advance. We probably wouldn't have needed reservations; but there were so few sites where we could get satellite, we went ahead and made them just to be sure.

Corinth Recreation Area is located about 4 miles east of the small town of Double Springs and then about 3 miles south of U. S. Highway 278, so it is kind of in the middle of nowhere. (Zeller translation - the closest Wal-Mart is at least 25 miles away.) Consequently, the campground doesn't seem to be used much. That's unfortunate, because the campground is beautiful and is very well maintained. The couple that manages the campground is very conscientious. The grass was well manicured, the fire rings were all cleaned out, and the gravel at all the sites had been raked.

Corinth has full hookups with 50 amp electric. Most of the campsites are well shaded, except for about a half a dozen sites on Firefly Loop, where we were located, that are a little more open with a clear view of the southern sky for satellite. Roads and pads in the campground are paved and the patios are gravel. The America the Beautiful Pass is honored at Corinth for half-price camping. The photo below shows our site at Corinth Recreation Area.

The seclusion was refreshing after the close quarters and bustle of Red Bay. The recreation area is at the end of a county road, so there is no other traffic. We could hear birds during the day and crickets at night. There were no trains, no highways, and few other campers - except for the weekend when they were about 50% full. Even with all that seclusion, we still got 3 bars on our cell phone. Corinth will definitely be on our list of places we want to return to soon!

We got the opportunity during our five-day stay at Corinth to sit outside to read and relax (there were very few bugs), to walk, and to ride our bikes. Right outside the entrance to the recreation area is the Corinth Baptist Church, which was built in 1884. Late one afternoon, we rode our bikes to the church.

We just looked around the church and the adjacent cemetery and enjoyed the quiet.

The photo below shows the ladies' rest room. It was curious that there were only "facilities" for the women, but it WAS decorated with silk flowers in the corner. :)

Last year, our travel route took us through Charlotte, NC, in October. We were there the week before the fall NASCAR race at Lowe's Motor Speedway, and we toured the track as well as the shops of several race teams.

Our daughter, Lora, and our son-in-law, J. Michael, have gone to the fall race in Charlotte with friends the last several years. This year, we got a call from Lora saying one of the couples who usually goes with them wouldn't be able to attend this year. Since Charlotte wouldn't be very far out of our way from our route to Myrtle Beach, they wanted to know if we were interested in the tickets. We had planned to meander over to the Escapees' Raccoon Valley Campground outside Knoxville, TN, until it was time to go to Myrtle Beach for our November 1 reservations. However, we jumped at the chance to go to the race instead, and immediately began researching places to stay.

We found a county park with full hookups about an hour from the track just over the border in South Carolina, and we also found a reasonably-priced spot without electricity within sight of the speedway. The plan would be to go to the county park a week or so before the race, then move to the spot near the speedway for the night before and the night after the race. Since we usually don't like to drive more than four hours a day, we planned on stopping a couple of times between Corinth and the county park outside Charlotte.

The first stop was Wills Creek RV Park in Fort Payne, AL. Wills Creek is an 18-month old campground that honors Passport America for a maximum of two nights during the week. They have full hookups with 50 amp electric, excellent satellite reception, gravel roads and pads, cable, and relatively widely-spaced sites with grass between. The owners are working hard to make sure the campground is in top shape. There are newly-planted trees, decorative lamp posts along the roads, and they are in the process of installing patios made from pre-cast concrete pavers. The campground is relatively quiet, but there is some distant noise from I-59. There are also some construction workers from a nearby highway project staying there who leave for work in their diesel pickups about 6:30 AM. The photo below shows our site at Wills Creek RV Park.

One problem with our plan to go to the NASCAR race in Charlotte was with the availability of gas. Even though many of the refineries were back on line following Hurricane Ike, there were lingering distribution problems in the Southeast. A few weeks ago, we heard about gas lines in Nashville. Then it was Atlanta. Then, the spot shortages spread even farther, and many areas of the Southeast (particularly Georgia and western North Carolina - especially around Asheville and Charlotte) were reporting gas lines. Even though the pipeline that distributes gasoline to the Southeast had been repaired, shortages were expected to continue a little while longer.

All the stations except Wal-Mart near the interstate exit in Fort Payne were out of gas. The Wal-Mart gas station was much too small and much too crowded for the motor home, so we had to pull into the campground with less gas than we would have liked, especially since we would be crossing the border the next day into Georgia where supplies were reportedly very low.

After leaving Fort Payne, we passed many stations that had bags over the nozzles indicating they were out of gas, but there were also some stations with gas and without long lines. We were able to buy gas, albeit premium grade, in Summerville. The station we stopped at was out of regular unleaded; and all the other stations in the area, while they didn't exactly have lines, were too small and too crowded to get into with the motor home. The RV pumps at some of the Flying J stations were limiting purchases to 25 gallons, but gas was available. We are hoping things get back to normal in Charlotte before race weekend.

Our next stop was Hartwell Lake Corps of Engineers Campground near Springfield, SC. Hartwell Lake is a typical, heavily-wooded, COE campground. But, since they have photos of each campsite online, we were able to pick an available site where we might get satellite.

When we arrived it was early in the week, and we found the campground was almost empty. They told us in the office we could have any vacant site since we were only going to be there one night; however, we were pleased to find the site we had already picked was fine for satellite. Because it was also a pull-through, we didn't have to unhook the toad for a one-night stop. The photo below shows our site at Hartwell Lake COE.

The water level in the lake was way down due to the ongoing drought in the Southeast. The online photo showed the site we picked was a waterfront site; but when we got there, the inlet behind the site was totally dry. Judging from the size of some of the saplings where there used to be water, the water level has been down for some time. The photo below shows what's left of the inlet behind our site.

At Hartwell Lake, we got to enjoy another afternoon and evening of seclusion. We walked almost the entire campground, which felt good after sitting and riding in the motor home for several hours on each of the past two days.

The next morning, we left for Ebenezer Park, which is where we planned to stay for a little over week until we are ready to head to Charlotte for the race. Ebenezer Park is owned and operated by York County near Rock Hill, SC, and is about an hour from Lowe's Motor Speedway just north of Charlotte.

Ebenezer is first-come, first-served so there are no reservations and no saving of sites. The locals have figured out a way around the no reservation policy by using tents to hold their favorite sites, so the best lake-view sites seem to be hard to get. There is a sign that says "NO SAVING SITES"; but, the ranger turns a "blind eye" while the locals use tents to hold sites for themselves or for their friends who might be arriving later.

Even though we arrived in the middle of the week and fairly early in the day, there weren't many sites left. Most of the available sites were in the one section of the campground that was heavily wooded. There was one available site, however, with a partial lake view. It looked like the tree on the back of the site might block our satellite dish, but we backed in anyway before someone else came along and snatched up the site. We sent the dish up to search for the satellite; and to our surprise, the dish found a signal!

One of the reasons the campground at Ebenezer Park is so popular is the price. Their regular rate is $15 a night, but they only charge $10 for anyone over 60 years old.

Ebenezer Park campground has gravel roads and pads. Most of the sites are fairly widely-spaced with grass between, except for the sites in the heavily-wooded section which have little or no grass. The sites all have full hookups, there is free Wi-Fi, and many of the sites have 50 amp electric. We don't know about the other 50 amp sites, but ours had 50 and 20 amp only. There was no 30 amp plug, which might be an inconvenience for some people with a smaller rig. The lack of a 30 amp plug, plus the fact the site is very close to the one to our right, may be the reason the site was still open and hadn't been saved by one of the locals. The photo below shows our site at Ebenezer Park.

 

The park is located on Lake Wylie which has a surface area of 21 square miles and a 325-mile shore line. The lake extends well up into North Carolina. The Catawba River was dammed in 1904 in order to build a hydro-electric power plant. Today, Wylie Steam Power Station is located on the northern part of the lake and Catawba Nuclear Power Station is located on the southern part of the lake a short distance from Ebenezer Park. Because of the power plants, the water in the lake must be maintained at a relatively high level in spite of the drought.

In addition to the campground, Ebenezer Park has a day use area, which is shown in the photo below. There are also boat-launch ramps out of the photo to the left.

 

From the dock by the boat launch, you can get a beautiful view of the sunset over the lake.

 

One day we headed to Matthews, NC, to visit with friends whom we had met in Davenport, IA, while we were waiting for the flood waters to subside this past June. Although they travel extensively throughout the year, they fly home every 3-4 months to see family. Our timing was just right to re-connect. We enjoyed a barbecue lunch at Mac's Speed Shop and especially appreciated eating in the outdoor dining area on a mid-70's afternoon. The pulled pork sandwiches were delish and their onion rings outstanding. 

On our way back to the house, our friends wanted to show us Calvary Church, an evangelical, non-denominational church that is stunning in its architecture, envisioned as a modern day cathedral. This photo was shooting into the sun, but it gives you an idea.

It is home to one of the largest pipe organs in the world. The blue shadows between the windows and the large panel in the back of the platform are some of the 11,499 pipes. Notice the cross on the ceiling. The sanctuary seats over 5,000 and has two balconies.

We have yet to visit the Crystal Cathedral. Until then, this is the most beautiful modern cathedral we've seen. The photo below shows the entrance to the lobby.

It was great re-connecting with friends, and we look forward to seeing them "down the road."

We will stay at Ebenezer until heading into Charlotte for the race. There is plenty of time for us to chill out. During our stay at Ebenezer Park, we will catch up on some shopping now that we're in a metro area with our favorite chain stores. Margery will be trying to pick a beauty shop for a haircut (always a challenge), we'll have our mail forwarded, and we'll need to restock our pantry. We will be tailgating in the parking lot on race day; and since the other couples with whom we will be attending the race will be staying in a motel, we're going cook ribs for the tailgate party.

Red Bay, AL Part II: Around Town

Red Bay is a fairly small town (Zeller translation - they don't have a Wal-Mart). Red Bay has a nice, Southern, small-town feel; but there isn't much to do. Our primary reason for being there was to have the windows on the motor home replaced. We needed to stay around the rig much of the time anyway during the early part of the week waiting to talk to the service liaison and during the latter part of the week waiting for them to call us over to service; but we didn't want to spent the entire time just sitting around either.

We knew we would have a couple of hours to wait while the motor home was in the repair bay, so we decided to take a drive to the Coon Dog Cemetery. The cemetery is a little over a half hour northeast of Red Bay off State Route 247.

In 1937, Key Underwood buried his beloved coon dog, Troop, in a grassy meadow that was a popular gathering spot for hunters. Soon, other hunters started burying their coon dogs in the same location. Today, there are over 185 coon dogs in the cemetery.

These guys are serious about their dogs! When asked by a reporter why other types of dogs weren't allowed to be buried there, Key Underwood responded, "You must not know much about coon hunters and their dogs, if you think we would contaminate this burial place with poodles and lap dogs."

Markers range from hand-lettered wood plaques...

...to elaborate, polished-granite grave stones.

After the completion of the repairs to the motor home, we decided to stay in Red Bay a little longer. We still needed to research our next stop, the inland path of hurricane Ike was still a little uncertain, and getting gas had the potential for being a little dicey with many Gulf Coast refineries shut down because of the hurricane. Staying put after the motor home work was completed seemed like the prudent thing to do. It also gave us time to relax after our western U.S. "vacation" this past summer.

One thing there is to do in Red Bay is to eat. There are quite a few small restaurants that many of the locals frequent. One of the local favorites is Swamp John's. The restaurant is in an old gas station (the pumps are still outside) and looks like a real dive, but they serve delicious fried catfish. Catfish is available every day for dinner and all day on Thursdays. Meals are ordered cafeteria-style and are served on paper plates.

Another couple we met at the Allegro Campground also suggested Reeve's Fish and Steakhouse for catfish. They are only open on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. On Thursday of the following week, we headed out to Reeve's. The restaurant is located about 8 miles south of Golden, MS and about 10 miles west of Red Bay on Mississippi Route 25.

The decor at Reeve's has a little (but not much) more ambiance than Swamp John's. The inside is paneled with OSB (Oriented Strand Board - a type of low-cost construction panel similar to particle board), and there are some old photos on the walls. The menu is quite a bit more extensive than Swamp John's with healthier side dishes offered including a bountiful salad bar. Reeve's is a sit-down restaurant, but prices are very reasonable and only slightly higher than Swamp John's.

We both had the fried catfish, and, although they do offer healthier side dishes, we had french fries and onion rings. :) Cole slaw and hush puppies were also included. The catfish was great - piping hot, light, and crispy. The sides were also good.

One day during our extended stay, we went over to Piney Grove COE in Mississippi, a campground on the Tom-Bigbee waterway, to check out campsites suitable for satellite for a possible future stay. We found this COE on our first visit to the area and loved it. Here's a picture of our favorite site in the campground from that 2004 stay in our pre-satellite days in our travel trailer.

As you can see, the park is heavily wooded and the chance of getting satellite is extremely limited to say the least. In fact, we only found one or two sites out of 200+ that might work.

On another day, we also scouted out Corinth Recreation Area campground, a national forest campground, for our next stop. Sometimes we can tell from an aerial view (available from Google Maps) whether or not there are campsites that are suitable for satellite reception. There were several sites at Corinth that looked good, but we couldn't tell from the campground maps exactly what the site numbers were. Therefore, since Corinth was only about an hour and a half from Red Bay, we decided to drive there in person to pick our site in advance.

During the remainder of our stay, we also made a Wal-Mart run to nearby Russellville for groceries, Paul rotated the tires on the Vue, we cleaned the carpet in the motor home, Margery finished entering all her recipes into the computer, and we researched and made some reservations for Thanksgiving weekend and for the Florida Keys. We've learned that the popular camping months in the South are September through March, when the temperatures moderate, so reservations are advisable for popular areas and for holiday weekends.

As we said, we will be going to Corinth Recreation Area about an hour and a half to the east near Double Springs, AL for our next stop. We look forward to getting back to a more natural setting.

Red Bay, AL Part I: Tiffin Motor Homes

We left West Memphis for the three-hour drive to Red Bay, AL, home of Tiffin Motor Homes. We pulled into the Allegro Campground shortly after noon and got set up. The Allegro Campground is owned by Tiffin and is right next to their new 105,000 square foot repair and parts facility, which has over 40 repair bays and which is shown in the photo below.

The campground isn't much to look at, but it has full hookups with 50 amp electric and free Wi-Fi. It is built on an old airstrip and consists of 3 rows of about 80 pull-through sites that are rather close together. There is another small group of "overflow" sites in back with water and electric only and there is more room for dry camping beyond that at the far end of the old runway. The main campground road, which was originally the runway, is paved; everything else in the campground is gravel. Unfortunately, the gravel has a lot of the fine stuff that gets tracked into your rig easily. The photo below shows our site at Allegro Campground.

Although we did see quite a few Tiffin motor homes at Tom Sawyer's RV Park in West Memphis, we have never seen anything like the Allegro Campground. Looking up and down the rows, all but one or two of the rigs were Tiffin motor homes; and, although there is some variation from model to model and year to year, almost all had similar paint schemes and colors.

The campground is a bargain at $10 a night. They will give you one complimentary night if you come for a factory tour, and your stay is free if you are there for repairs during the one-year, basic warranty period. Most of those at the campground are waiting for service in the adjacent repair facility. Consequently, there is a fair amount of hustle and bustle early in the morning and later in the afternoon as rigs pull in and out of the service bays; but the campground is still surprisingly quiet most of the time considering the close proximity to the repair shop.

We have had very few problems with our motor home since we first bought it in 2005. There were problems with our hydraulic jacks back in late 2006 and early 2007, but those were handled satisfactorily by HWH, who is the manufacturer of the jacks. However, a little over a year after we picked up the motor home, we noticed the dual-pane window in the kitchen was fogged indicating the seal between the panes had failed.

Over the next 6 months, three more windows fogged, including the very large (and very expensive) side window by the passenger seat in front. There was a one-year warranty on the motor home itself. Because the windows fogged after this one-year warranty period and believing we would have to absorb the potentially high cost of replacing them, we figured we would have to live with the faulty windows.

Then, when we were talking to a fellow Tiffin owner parked next to us last fall, the subject of problem windows came up. He had a 2006 Phaeton that was built early in the new model year shortly after our Allegro Bay, and he said he had the same problem with some of his windows. Tiffin realized they had a problem with their process around that time (Tiffin makes their own windows), and they replaced his faulty windows at no cost after almost two years under an extended warranty.

Paul continued to drag his feet about the windows thinking our motor home, which was then 2 1/2 years old, couldn't possibly still be covered. Besides, it seemed we were traveling extensively; and it would be inconvenient to stick around near where a dealer was located for several weeks while they ordered the windows and none of our travels took us near Red Bay to have repairs done. Finally, Margery decided to take the bull by the horns and called Tiffin herself. By this time, a fifth window had fogged.

We found out Tiffin had extended the warranty on the problematic windows to two years for parts and labor, and they would cover the cost of parts only for the third year. Unfortunately, our motor home was then about six weeks over the three-year limit. However, since it was such a short time over the limit, Tiffin agreed to cover the cost of the windows.

Tiffin has a reputation for going the extra mile to service their customers. That's one of the big reasons we bought a Tiffin in the first place, but this was beyond our expectations. We arranged our travel schedule to pass through Red Bay after Labor Day on the way back east. Our next, firm campground reservation is November 1 in Myrtle Beach, so we would have plenty of time to have the repairs done.

There are two ways to get service in Red Bay. First, you can call and request an appointment, but it can take up to a year to get scheduled. The good thing about scheduling an appointment is they get you in right away on your scheduled day. The second way to get service is to just show up, and wait until they can fit you in. This can vary from a few days to over a week, depending on what you need to have done and how busy they are when you happen to arrive. We opted for the latter method since our short-term schedule was flexible.

When checking into the campground, they give you a service number if you're there for repairs. Norris, the service liaison, will stop by your site to see you, get any necessary details on the work, and give you an estimate of when they might fit you in.

A total of 55 rigs came in over the same weekend we came in, so it took Norris two days to get to us; but he said our work would take less than three hours so he was going to schedule our rig for the express bay. Although he said he thought we would get in the next afternoon or the following morning, it turned out to be the end of the week.

While we were waiting to get called over for our repairs, we headed into town to tour the Tiffin plant. We had already taken the tour on two previous occasions, but we wanted to see what was new for the 2009 models. Margery couldn't help but think about our first visit in May of 2004 when owning a motor home and going full-time were still only a dream. What a difference four years can make. We are grateful for the way God has ordered our steps.

The photo below shows the visitor center where tours start.

And the view below is of some of the factory buildings. The tour is through the main assembly building, which is to the far right.

As you can see, there are very few motor homes sitting around. The areas inside the fence to the right and left of the entry drive are usually lined up with motor homes awaiting final inspection and delivery. In fact, there weren't very many motor homes in the factory either. The high oil prices are taking a toll on the RV industry and motor homes have taken the biggest hit. Across the RV industry, motor home sales are more than 50% below what they were last year. At least five RV manufacturers have gone out of business in the past year.

Even though Tiffin has had the #1 selling motor home model for the last 2 or 3 years (Phaeton) and the #1 and the #2 selling motor home last year (Phaeton and Allegro Bus), they have not been immune from the big sales drop. Tiffin used to produce 13 motor homes a day. Now they are only producing 6 a day and only working 4 days a week.

One thing we did notice on the plant tour was that most of what was on the assembly line was either Allegro Buses or Zephyrs. These are Tiffin's two highest-priced motor homes. Even though they are selling fewer motor homes, at least a fairly high percentage of the ones they are selling are the high-dollar units.

The tours are led by Red, who is about 82 years young. Red is a soft-spoken, Southern gentleman who came out of retirement and has been leading plant tours for the past 7-8 years.  He is very knowledgeable about Tiffin products; and if there is something he doesn't know, he will find out for you. If you ask a question, Red may lead the tour off in a new direction to show you the answer.

Although Red has his usual route for the tour, he will go almost anywhere in the main assembly building anyone on the tour happens to want to go. In fact, on our tour in 2004, the motor home order for a couple on the tour was scheduled to be on the line. Red spent time tracking down their order and finding their unit under construction. They had the opportunity to go into their motor home before any of the interior cabinets had been installed. It's like they don't take your order for granted and, realize it's a big deal to the customer.

After the tour, we headed back to the motor home to play more of the waiting game. Paul walked over to the parts department and bought a new fog light to replace the one whose lens was cracked, undoubtedly by a rock thrown up from the road. We also went over to the surplus sales warehouse. There are chairs, sofas, carpet, wood trim, TVs, and leftovers of all kinds from previous model years that are no longer needed by the parts department that are for sale to the public. There are also scratch and dent items. It's a fun place for a "do-it-youselfer" to poke around.

We arrived on a Sunday and finally got called over for service on Friday. After the work on the motor home was done, Paul went into the office to pay. To our surprise, there was no charge for either the parts or the labor. When Paul questioned this, they told him we would have had to pay for labor if we had the work done at an RV dealer; but the service manager decided since we came all the way to Red Bay, they would cover the labor as well as the parts. What a surprise...and a blessing!

Even though there isn't much to do in Red Bay, we did find a few things to occupy our time. Check back in a few days for our next post to see what we found.