Travel Days From Lower Alabama to Piedmont, SC

Piedmont, SC - Events of Wednesday, April 27 to Thursday, April 28, 2016

Last Wednesday morning, we left Lower Alabama and headed north and east toward Piedmont, South Carolina. On our way, we made an overnight stop at Lakeside RV Park in Opelika, Alabama, which was about a four-hour drive from Fairhope. Lakeside RV Park has 40 or 50 RV sites, all with full hookups and 20/30/50-amp electric. There is free cable and free Wi-fi. Our computers could connect to their Wi-fi network; but even though it was an open connection with no password required, it never gave us internet access so there appeared to be something wrong with their system. Fortunately, there is a good Verizon 4G signal in the area so we used that.

The campground has about a dozen pull-throughs, and the rest of the sites are back-ins. The sites are fairly large, and the roads and RV pads are gravel. Some of the sites, like ours, and some parts of the road were in need of some fresh gravel, and that was exacerbated by the fact they are in the process of grading for the addition of new sites across the road behind our site, and a lot of the red clay had washed onto the road.

Our site at Lakeside RV with construction of new sites behind

View down the road toward our site

There is a lot of traffic noise during the day from US 280, which is the busy, 4-lane highway that passes right by the campground. Fortunately, the traffic diminishes somewhat at night. We paid the Passport America rate at Lakeside RV of $20.

On Thursday morning, not only did we have another four-hour drive, but we would we be losing an hour going into Eastern Time and also be driving through Atlanta with its infamous traffic. We wanted to leave early to give ourselves plenty of time, but not too early that we hit Atlanta during the morning rush.

As we approached Atlanta around 10:30, we checked traffic using Google Maps on our iPhone. The app showed slow-downs going through Atlanta on I-85, but it showed the I-285 bypass was clear so we made the decision to take the slightly-longer bypass. However, as we approached the exit for the bypass, one of the lighted, overhead, informational signs warned of a backup on the I-285 bypass near the Camp Creek exit with all three lanes blocked. Not being familiar with Atlanta, we had several minutes of lively discussion as we tried to determine whether or not to take the bypass. We decided to stick with the bypass, which ended up being the right choice. It turned out the Camp Creek exit and the traffic stoppage was on I-285 to the north, not on the eastern leg of the I-285 bypass that we were planning to take. Traffic was heavy, but it moved along at or near the speed limit the entire way.

We eventually re-joined I-85 and made our way to Ivy Acres RV Park in Piedmont, South Carolina. Ivy Acres has about 50 campsites, all of which have full hookups with 20/30/50-amp electric. There is free Wi-fi, which was fairly fast and fairly reliable, especially considering it was the weekend when we were there, and the campground was full. There is also a good Verizon 4G signal.

The gravel roads are pretty dusty and are somewhat rough in spots. The RV pads are also gravel. There is some shade, but the sites are predominantly sunny, which is good for our rooftop satellite dish. Most of the sites are back-ins except for where our site was located in the short-term stay section, which consists of about half a dozen pull-throughs. Although most of the sites are fairly spacious, ours was one of the narrowest. Our cost at Ivy Acres was $32 a night.

Our pull-through site at Ivy Acres

View of the row of short-term pull-through sites from the rear

Our ultimate destination is Amish Country in Ohio, which for us is a 4-day drive from Fairhope. We usually don't like to drive more than two days in a row, so Piedmont was a good place to stop for a couple of days because it was close to a good sightseeing opportunity Margery found on her online research into things to do. We'll tell you about it in our next post.

Comments

[Marsha]

So far each time we drive through Atlanta it has been on Sunday morning. Now that is a great time to drive through that area. Safe travels.
It is cold and rainy here. Don't hurry.

[Bob and Jo Baskerville]

Have not yet driven Atlanta traffic in a RV, can't wait