Tampa, Florida - Bay Bayou RV Resort

Last Thursday we set off early-ish (early no longer means the same thing to us that it did a couple of months ago!) from Savannah southbound toward Tampa. It was a great day of driving- no traffic issues at all. We arrived here at Bay Bayou around mid-afternoon and spent the rest of the day just settling in and getting the lay of the land since we'll be here for a while. The campground is beautiful - we're on a spacious, grassy site along the creek, with a patio pad.

On Friday we drove out across the causeway to Honeymoon Beach:

On the way back we stopped for a first of the day at Whisky Joe's, right on the causeway, which incidentally is where Music on the Bay will be in February - we'll be right there and look forward to meeting up with lots of old friends!

The weather has been fabulous since we got here - sunny and around 80 every day. There is a little garden path that leads from our site to the pool and we walked down for some poolside time yesterday. I swam 10 laps...don't make fun, that's a lot for me! Then I had a cocktail, which probably undid all the good the swimming did for me.

Other than that, we've been meeting some of our neighbors and getting to know the neighborhood since this is the longest we'll be in one place for a while. Tomorrow morning we are heading off to Key West for Meeting of the Minds and we'll be gone 6 days, but the moho stays here in Tampa. Looking forward to meeting up with all our homey PH peeps from Chicago, as well as the "extended family" from New Hampshire, Seattle and the rest of the country!

Savannah, GA

Early morning here in Savannah and I'm having coffee. We arrived here yesterday, after finishing up our Charleston stay with a tour of Boone Plantation. The old Plantation house of course did not survive the Civil War and the current one was built in 1935. But the slave cabins date back to the 1600s and were fascinating. My favorite part was the "avenue of oaks", dozens of 200+ year old live oaks that line the drive all the way up from the road to the estate. The pictures didn't turn out great from my phone camera but this is the view from the house:

We learned that the name "live oak" refers to the fact that these trees are evergreen. They actually do shed their leaves but the new ones are coming in continuously so the tree is always green. And the Spanish moss that hangs from the branches is not a parasite and does not harm the trees. I'm happy to hear that because it's so beautiful.

After we left Boone Plantation we went on to downtown Charleston and walked through the Market. Later we stumbled across a welcome sight in front of Mac's Place bar:

So of course we had to stop in for a drink to see if this was really a Chicago bar. We spotted a guy in a Bears cap and joined him and his wife at the bar. They were Dave and Kathy who were from Palatine but had moved to Charlotte 13 years earlier. We spent a great afternoon with them - meeting new people everywhere is one of my favorite parts of this adventure.

On Tuesday we left Charleston and drove just about 100 miles down to Savannah, staying at Savannah Oaks RV Park just off I-95. Our next door neighbors here are from British Colombia, and like us they are on an extended road trip so it was interesting exchanging war stories. They've had more time than us to accumulate those, but we know they're out there! On another note, I have to give a shout out here to the power of Facebook - and the Parrot Head network - in keeping us in contact with everyone and enabling new connections. I had asked my friend Kelly back home for recommendations of "can't miss" stuff in Savannah since she and Bob travel here often. She put me in contact with her friends Wendy and Sean who are local. Wendy and I exchanged FB messages yesterday morning and agreed to meet up for dinner. I told her we were planning to drive out to Tybee Island and she told me to stop in Stingrays and ask Shannon the bartender there for one of her special margaritas. So while driving through Tybee we happened upon the very place, met Shannon and followed Wendy's advice. Margaritas were awesome and Shannon was great and lots of fun to hang out with. While out Tybee-way we also toured Ft. Pulaski, which factored significantly in the civil war. Lots of history in Savannah.

Later on, we went into town and we did meet up with Wendy and Sean at the Cotton Exchange restaurant on old River Street. We had a great evening and made great new friends. Thanks Kelly!

Wednesday evening, same day:

Today we went back into downtown Savannah and did the trolley tour. Yes, I know it's touristy but we wanted an overview of the entire city and that's exactly what we got. This is an amazing city - there are 200 and 300 year old building everywhere. My favorite place was the river walk - just getting there was an adventure. The only access is by ramps from the main drag down to River Street. The ramps are very steep and constructed of rough cobblestones, which don't even seem like a road we should be driving on. But once you get to the bottom you're at the river and the road straightens out, although it's still cobblestones. There are shops and restaurants and bars lining the river walk - such a fun place. No Wal-Marts or McDonalds anywhere!

After the trolley tour we headed back out to Tybee Island and visited the lighthouse.

Yup, we climbed it.  The view from the top:

There is a museum that surrounds the lighthouse. Fascinating pictures and stories of the families that lived there over the last couple of hundred years. There were gale force winds up at the top so we didn't stay long. It was a little scary but so cool.

After that we headed to the beach - hello, there was a beach - where else would we go?

There is a beach bar and you can bring your drinks down to the beach with you in a go-cup. Perfect!

Tomorrow we head for Tampa, where we'll be for a while - except for a minor detour to a place called Key West! The moho will stay in Tampa since we'll be staying in town with friends. More on Tampa when we get there.

Charleston, SC

Wow, lots to catch up on!

Last Thursday we arrived at Lake Aire RV Park in Hollywood, SC just outside of Charleston, after overnight stops in Connecticut and Virginia. We spent Thursday getting settled in, doing laundry and grocery shopping since we would be here for a few days. It's nice to stay put for a few days after several days of being on the road.

Friday morning we did a harbor tour of Charleston Harbor - we saw the Yorktown, Fort Sumter and various other historical sites located in that area. After lunch we spent some time at the Isle of Palms County Park beach - holy cow, what a great beach.

The ocean was like bath water, the beach was clean and beautiful and they had changing rooms, rinse off showers and parking, all at no charge. Later on, we met up with our hometown friends Teresa and Cheryl at their hotel, where they had just checked in. We all went to Windjammers on the island for dinner and drinks but didn't hang around for the live music since it was getting late and us girls were going to have a big day on Saturday.

Saturday, I left Bill to hold down the fort (this means drink beer and play video games - no big hardship for him!) while I spent the day with the girls at the Southern Ground Music Festival. We attended the Zamily (Zac Brown Band fan club) gathering in the morning and met some fun people from all over the country. We had pit tickets for the show so we staked out a little piece of real estate right in front of the stage and hoped for the best. We saw several different bands and artists from the ZBB label throughout the day and finally the headliner came on at 8:30. At that point it was getting a little rough to defend our spot but we weren't giving in after having spent the whole day there! It got really crowded but we had befriended the security guy that was stationed right next to us and he looked after us when it got really crowded. All worth it to have Zac playing just a few feet away from us.



The show was awesome and no one moved an inch until the last encore was played out. By the time we got back to the hotel it was very late and since I had brought an overnight bag I stayed with the girls and came home in the morning. It was a great day and I loved sharing it with my home girls - but missed the rest of our ZBB posse: Sharon, Kristin, Claudia, Terrie...we wish you'd all been "knee deep in the water" with us!

Today, the Bears flag is out and we'll be hanging around to watch football. The plan for tomorrow is to spend the day in Charleston, including a plantation tour and following up on some other suggestions we've gotten from people who are familiar with the area. Tuesday we'll be moving on to Savannah.

Great times in New Hampsire - followed by Our Very Bad Day!

Sorry, I've been out of touch for a while so this one will be a bit long.

We arrived at the lovely lake home of our friends Greg and Linda in Laconia NH on Lake Winnepasukee last Wednesday evening. We were able to back into their side driveway and tuck the moho right up alongside their house. On Thursday night we watched the Bears and of course our local friends helped us cheer. The next few days flew by in a flurry of good times with great friends. On Friday Greg took us to Boston and we got the tour of the town - we stopped at Fenway, the Old North Church (one if by land, two if by sea...), Beacon Hill, and the Prudential tower. Then we popped into Cheers, where everybody knows your name. So get this - true story - we walk into Cheers and Bill said to the host at the door, "I'm testing an urban myth - what's my name?" Without batting an eye, the guy replied "Bill". No, he wasn't prompted - Greg was parking the car and Linda was with us. So I asked him, "How about my name?" His first guess was "Kathy" and the next was "Linda". So ok, he didn't get "Dee" until we prompted him for the 4th letter of the alphabet but still, pretty good. And we did have a Linda. I should have gone for "Daniela" - we'd probably still be standing there!  Anyway, the weather was perfect and we had a great day in that beautiful city.

On Saturday we went to a pumpkin festival with the New Hampshire Parrot Head club - we worked a booth helping kids make their own scarecrows. It was very popular and lots of fun to be involved. After the festival we were warmly welcomed to a bonfire at the home of Heather and Shawn, along with several other members of the club. As always, when you're among parrot heads, you're among family. It's nice to feel at home!

Sunday was spent watching the Patriots with old and new friends - of course we returned the favor by cheering for the home town team and it must have done the trick because they won. (There may have been some eviserating...) All in all, what a great weekend. It was sad to say goodbye but we'll see Greg and Linda soon in Key West. Thanks to them both for awesome hospitality and a huge shout out to the New Hamphire Parrot Heads.

But that brings us to Monday morning and...

Bill & Dee's Very Bad Day:

Holy cow, what a Monday we had. First problem - the moho wouldn't start in the morning. We called our roadside assistance and they sent out a tech who found a bad battery. No problem - battery replaced.  Oh, if only that had been all. But after the battery was replaced we found we had no 12V, which in non techie terms means that we're fine while we're running and we're fine when we're plugged into power. But in between, we have no power. So if we stop for lunch on the road, we have to keep the moho running in order to be able to use anything that requires power, like lights or the water pump. Not a huge deal but annoying. A troubleshooting phone call to Tiffin tech support yielded no results other than we need to get it serviced somewhere. Ok, we can live with this slight inconvenience until we are somewhere for more than a day. And we do have an extended warranty.  So we got on the road by noon or so and right off the bat we ran into traffic...and then more traffic...and still more traffic. So it was a long stressful day of driving. Then at one point I found my credit card to be missing. A frantic search yielded no results so I called the credit card company to put a 48 hour hold on it. No sooner did I do that when Bill asked if I was wearing the same clothes as when it went missing and I remembered that I had taken off a hoodie - so I went to check it and lo and behold, there was my credit card in the pocket. Yay. So I called the company back and got the hold removed. At least one problem solved. Traffic issues continued, along with horrible roads, construction and at least a couple of accident delays. We stopped for the night somewhere in Connecticut but I'm damned if I remember where. It was a whole day ago.

Today we had a better day - no major traffic issues and we're in a nice KOA in Jonestown PA. We did find that Pennsylvania has the worst imaginable roads in the history of roads - I-84 to I-81 was pretty much washboard off and on most of the way.  Lots of things in the moho hit the floor but luckily nothing was broken. We're enroute to Charleston SC but taking a bit of a wide swath around in order to -  avoid New York City and Washington DC - this route added about 150 miles to our trip but totally worth it to avoid any major cities. We hope to be in Charleston by Thursday evening. I'm meeting up with Teresa and Cheryl there to see the Zac Brown Band on Saturday - yippee! Bill was invited to join us but he said he preferred to have a nice day of computer gaming to spending hours on his feet and going "Woohoo!" with the girls. Fair enough!

Bar Harbor, Maine - Why we're traveling with a shrub

And no, I don't mean a house plant - we're traveling with a shrub.

The story of Frosty:

Our shrub's name (of course he has a name!) is Frosty the Snowball Bush. His story begins many years ago...in the early 1900s, when a great uncle of Bill's brought a snowball bush over to the new world from Poland. I imagine that original shrub's journey was even more adventurous, be somehow it persevered. Cuttings from the "grandfather shrub" found their way into the backyards of his children and other relatives, all descendants of that well traveled plant. Eventually, Bill's cousin Fred planted one in the backyard of his home in Downer's Grove. Fred then started a lovely tradition of bringing a cutting of the snowball bush to each member of the extended family to plant in his or her backyard. So each of us had beautiful flowering snowball bushes every Spring, reminding us of that long-ago voyage.

When Bill and I were getting ready to embark on our own "voyage" a few weeks ago, Fred brought us a cutting from his snowball bush. Since our daughter Bethany and I were going to road-trip all our furnishings out to Olympia WA to put in storage, the original plan was that we would take the new cutting (newly named Frosty) with us and plant him in Bethany's backyard. When we eventually have a house again, we would then take a cutting from that one and plant it in our yard, thus two birds with one stone - both of our homes would be graced with a beautiful shrub. Well, sometimes plans go awry - the cab of the moving truck we were in was simply not going to accommodate the shrub and we had to leave him behind at our temporary rental in Naperville with Bill. But never fear - we nurtured Frosty along for the next few weeks, planted him in a large pot and decided he would go on the road with us. So he rides in the kitchen sink when we're underway and sits outside the moho when we're camped somewhere. He looks pretty happy, doesn't he? And that's the story of Frosty.

October 6,2013 - Bar Harbor, Maine

After making an ambitious start the first few days, we decided that there was no reason to hurry so we started getting off to later starts in the morning and calling it a day earlier in the afternoon. We probably didn't travel more than 250 miles a day the last couple of days, taking a total of 5 days to get here from Pearl Lake.

On Thursday we stayed at Minuteman RV Park in Littleton, MA for the night.

The drive has been beautiful with fall colors everywhere across upstate New York, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Maine. We pulled in here to Bar Harbor yesterday afternoon. We're at the Narrows Too Campground, just a few steps away from the water.

 

Last night we had a great lobster dinner at the Trenton Bridge Lobster Pound and then headed into town for a drink at Paddy's Irish Pub.

Guess they heard we were coming! The bartender was from Rockford IL, so we touched base on the homefront a bit.

We're all set up to watch the Bears today and luckily it's a beautiful day so we'll be outside with flags flying. Wish all our football peeps were here with us.

Day 2 - Westfield NY

So we finally got out yesterday around noon - later start than anticipated but ok. There were a few glitches but nothing serious and all were easily handled. We stopped for the night in Pioneer OH and got out just a bit earlier this morning. We're towing the Honda CRV behind us and Bill is still new to driving the moho with a tow vehicle but he's rocking it. We aren't supposed to go over 60 mph while towing - this was really stressed to us by Finnegan's RV who installed the tow package for us so we're following the rules. It was a little hairy going through Cleveland but other than the traffic issue there it's been smooth sailing. Today we had planned on getting past Buffalo but it was such a beautiful day that we decided to call it around 3 and stopped in Westfield NY. We're at a place called Brookside Beach RV Park right on the shore of Lake Erie. Weather is fabulous - no rain or weather issues so far.

We met a lovely little family from South Africa - young couple with three little ones. They're on a one-year VISA and traveling the USA in a rented C class motorhome. After they leave here they're heading for where else but Chicago! We gave them a few suggestions for things to see and do there including my favorite standby - the Wendella river and lake tour downtown. What a great experience for those kids.

Tomorrow we continue heading northeast.

Departure?

October 1 - Early morning at Pearl Lake and we're taking care of about a million last minute details before (hopefully!) setting off later this morning. Not easy to make your whole life fit into an RV, even though we've been planning and preparing for months. The long term stuff is in storage out in Olympia WA, where it will remain until we're ready to have a zip code again, and everything else has been stored in one cubbyhole or another here in the moho. Since we really have a generous number of cabinets and drawers, it hasn't been as hard as we thought.

It's been an emotional couple of weeks, saying so many goodbyes to cherished friends and family. But I keep telling myself over and over, it's not a goodbye - it's a "till I see you again" (thanks, Kenny!)   But now it's time, so deep breath and let's hit it.