Florida White

We moved from our Gulf Shores State Park site in Alabama to a more remote state park in Florida on the northern panhandle. What a difference in campgrounds we experienced.  The coastal park was very popular and civilized and held a few hundred uniform campsites. We were provided with a cement pad to park on and full service: electric, water, and sewer connections. And don’t forget the storm shelter.

The Ochlockonee River State Park in Florida holds only 30 sites, none with sewer connections, and no two are the same shape, length or size. Instead of having landscaping around a developed area, this campground has created sites around the natural landscape.  Mature trees are given priority over big rigs, making manoeuvring into certain sites difficult. We only had sand to park on and not necessarily flat sand at that.

But the sand was white. Beautiful, fine white sand that gets into everything.

Over the next two weeks, white became a theme.

The isolated location of our campground gave us many opportunities to see wildlife. Some were even proactive in our relationship and came out to meet us. The unique white squirrel of the park greeted us early in our visit, curiously investigating our rig and campsite, and posing sweetly for pictures. The more numerous grey squirrels were shy and watched from the trees, often jumping onto the top of our trailer and scampering noisily around.

Deer was plentiful and we saw many on our walks around the hiking trails. These are white-tailed deer, and often the only thing you saw of them were the white tails waving back at us as the deer scampered for the bush.

Then there was the big white boulder in the woods. At least, that’s what we thought it was until her head popped up from where she had been grazing. Among all the normal coloured deer was a doe with a brilliant white body.  A unique discovery that made our day.

At this point we wondered if there was something in the water.

Indeed there is. White manatees float around the warm Wakulla Springs just north of our campground. We spent a day there, taking a boat tour and walking the trails.

The boat tour was fabulous, taking us around an isolated river to show us the white ibis and white egrets. Finally, however, we escaped the singular colour scheme. Black vultures crowded the shores of this warm river, sitting on the banks and tree branches and overshadowing the herons and grebes paddling the shallows. Grey alligators soaked up the sun, often directly under the watching vultures.

Though we were not right on the Gulf itself, we were close enough to reap its benefits. In the little town of Panacea we enjoyed browsing through an aquarium before a seafood lunch. And we picked up shrimp from a blue shack on the road where the catch was so fresh that they were pouring it out of the back of the fisherman’s truck as we stood there watching.

For two weeks we spent most of our time around the campground, spending only a couple of days in the city of Tallahassee. This despite the fact that we had no cell service, Wifi or TV at the state park. The peaceful setting of the park gave us long walks, easy bike rides, and meandering canoe routes through marshlands.

We paddled down the Ochlockonee River to fish and soak up some of that abundant white sun for ourselves.

Hopefully, we will leave our winter white skin behind. 

Or at least one of us will.

W

Low Country

The southeastern coastal states are often referred to as low country. That probably is because the land is barely higher than sea level. There are benefits and drawbacks to these areas.

As someone who is uncomfortable in high places, this is the perfect place for me to hike.  Far too many times in the past I have doggedly pursued my dear hubby as he was climbing ever higher along some mountain ridge. Finally, I can keep up with his strides without holding my breath and looking anywhere but down. Granted, the aerobic effort is practically nil, but at least I am breathing.

So for more strenuous exercise, we can turn to bicycling. Here, too, are the benefits of a flat land. What’s not to like?

Well, for one thing, the weather.

Most of the time, the weather around here consists of warm ocean breezes and sunny skies. It’s one reason why we come down this way.  But all those picturesque houses on stilts along the coast are built that way because of the threat of floods and hurricanes. We’ve luckily managed to avoid those issues. I’m not sure what we would do if presented with such an emergency. Hopefully we would realize what the wheels on our home are for, and skedaddle.

But we did experience an unexpected weather event.

We had settled in for the night at our campground along the coast of Alabama. At 1:30am, my I-phone, plugged in beside me, started emitting long tones. This wasn’t a text, nor a phone call, and sure as shooting wasn’t a Facebook  message – the only other sounds I had heard from this electronic device before. One eye open, I peeked at the screen to see the words,  “ Tornado warning in the area. Take cover immediately.” Really?  My I-phone did that, too? Who knew?

There was indeed lots of lightning going on outside our little tin can, but the winds weren’t strong so we weren’t terribly concerned. I did get up, though, and noticed not only several trucks and other vehicles parked at the bathhouse in front of us, but more coming as well. It looked like there was a convention being held across the street. Being a nosy person, I threw on a robe and crossed over to where a dozen people were milling about.  I sidled up to one lady with a question, and was told that this was also a storm shelter.  

Now, this building is short and stout, and made with big blocks and beams, but I wasn’t sure that it would stand up to a direct hit from a tornado.

Rules being rules, however, I did go back to the trailer and suggested to hubby that we should join the crowd. He looked at me and asked if I was going “like that”. Oh, I’m supposed to get dressed for a middle of the night emergency? I must have missed that particular etiquette lesson.  I compromised by taking clothes over to the shelter with me and changing in a stall.

Once the rains started, most of the crowd outside moved inside. There are always some die-hards that want to see it coming.

I found the people inside were much more interesting, however. There was a young couple with a toddler, half asleep in his mom’s arms, with the father trying unsuccessfully to put a bicycle helmet on him. There were two teenage girls with their cell phones in front of their faces, and another young lady with a smart phone giving us updates on how many tornadoes had touched down. The two couples with dogs were on opposite sides of the shelter, and in the middle was a lady with a parrot on her shoulder. There were at least 24 people inside, and no one seemed panicked or upset, and neither were we.

After 45 minutes, the lady with the smart phone declared an “all clear”, and we dispersed. Of course, hubby and I were far from sleepy and spent the next hour sitting up with coffee and hot chocolate, hubby playing with the weather radio that should have given us a pre-warning but didn’t. He got it working and we went to bed. To have the weather radio go off twice more before morning,  merely to warn of high winds.  The I-phone remained mercifully silent.

Such was our high adventure in the low country.

W

                                                                                                                                   

Lost in Space

In November and December, we took a brief hiatus from travelling by occupying the spare rooms of assorted family members.

That is still a form of traveling, I guess, drifting from one home to another over a month and a half. It was certainly entertaining.

But after spending time with our children and grandchildren, my siblings and their spouses, and then having a final bash thrown at me unexpectedly for an early birthday celebration, finally the last month of the year is almost over and it’s time to skedaddle south again.

We crossed the border on a sunny, cold day, munching on leftover chocolates from my party, and promptly met snow in the New York/Pennsylvania mountains. This was not a surprise. We hit the same winter storm system in the same place last year. It’s a good reason to leave earlier in the fall.

Whenever we cross the border, we get into the routine of changing over the cards and cash from our wallets, changing the SIM cards in our phones, and changing the habits of a Canadian tongue. We now have to remember to use the southern lingo: miles not kilometers, Fahrenheit not Celsius, napkins instead of serviettes, and restroom in place of bathroom or washroom. Now I know why travel is so good for the mind.

Although, I can’t say it has helped me all that much.

My mind must have been so busy trying to keep up with the nuances of being south of the border that it forgot basics. After many years of travel experience, we have developed a “final check” routine. This happens whether we are leaving a campground, a hotel room, or a family home. Last one out the door does a visual sweep of the area to make sure nothing gets left behind. In the last 4 years of constant travel, our record has been almost immaculate. On this one trip down to Georgia, it was totally destroyed. When we left North Carolina and the second hotel we stayed in, our SPOT GPS got forgotten on the window sill. We didn’t realize it until the next night in Georgia.  Housekeeping promised to mail it on to us.  There was a third night in a hotel while we were in Georgia, near where the trailer was stored.  In leaving the next morning, I managed to not only miss collecting a charging cord, but also left behind my all important cell phone. Literally, the head that is not attached to my shoulders.

Luckily, we now had the trailer out of storage and into a campsite merely around the block from that hotel. So going back, twice, for forgotten items was merely embarrassing, and not expensive. Thank goodness we are now in our own home, where anything that is lost can be no more than 34 feet away.

Except maybe my mind.  Seems that I can leave that just anywhere.

W

Deffense Mechanisms

I’ve seen a few forts in my day. There is a whole spectrum of forts, from snow forts and tree forts to the imposing Fort Henry near my home town.

I’ve seen a whole lot more now. It seems the Americans and the British got into a couple of tiffs over the years and decided to resolve the conflicts by throwing cannonballs at each other.  Then they started a little bit of sibling rivalry called the Civil War.

The forts that we’ve seen on this trip are right on the Atlantic Ocean, and took a lot of battering in all that fighting. We toured Fort Sumter, built on a sand bar in Charleston Harbour, where the first shot of the Civil War was fired. Rocks had to be brought in to stabilize the sand enough so they could build walls on it. The fort took up the entire resulting island. It was a brilliant position for defending the harbour and the city. Except that the fort was built and controlled by the Union, while the Confederates held the city and all the rest of the land around the harbour.

It was a short-lived battle.

Fort Pulaski is just south of Savannah. It was protected by a moat, and with 7 foot thick brick walls it was thought to be impenetrable. Their greatest fear was a siege, so it was built with an amazing water collection and storage system and ample room for supplies.  But then the Union developed a cannonball that was shaped like a bullet that could travel farther and inflict more damage than the commonly used round ones.  After a few well placed shots, the Confederates at Fort Pulaski surrendered.

Defense is important in current affairs, too, and we had an interesting tour of a Marine training base and got to watch a graduation of recruits. These boys and girls had spent 13 weeks away from home to endure the physical and mental endurance testing necessary to become Marines.














After the final order from their drill sergeant, “Dis-missed!”, their proud families ran onto the parade grounds and mobbed them. What a sight.

But humans didn’t invent defense. I found it interesting that all the barrier islands that we saw were surrounded by marsh. It is often so dense that it looks like land, but on the maps is designated water. These marshes are pockmarked with mud flats during low tide, and crisscrossed with deep channels at high tide. They often dull the fury of a storm surge and provide protection for wildlife.

One of the joys of visiting the southern states is the view of the Spanish Moss hanging from trees. It has such an ephemeral look to it as it wafts gently in the breeze.  This trip we learned that the moss is in fact a plant that takes all its nourishment from the air, like an orchid. 

 




This plant is very soft and does not harm its host; therefore no defense mechanism from the tree is required. The moss itself is not defenceless, however, for a simple touch on it will bring out a horde of biting insects locally called “chiggers”.

But even though we are in the south right now, there is a cold front coming in. And we are going to have to brave that cold front and even attack it. Just like in a battle, we are going to rush the enemy. We are going to drive north into the very heart of that cold.




And shortly after, turn tail and run right back south again.

It’s our personal defense mechanism.

W

Go South, Old Man

As November approaches, we feel like we are in a mass exodus.  Besides our group of 21 rigs ambling our way along the coast, we have huge motorhomes and 5^th wheels passing by us, hurrying south on the highways.  When we are on the barrier islands, we see strings of sailboats on the Intracoastal Waterway working their way to a warm winter. And above us all, the Canadian geese are going the same way.

I must admit, the weather has been very pleasant so far.  Even when Hurricane Gonzalo passed a few hundred miles off the same coast we were sitting on, we only experienced strong winds and thundering high surf. Both were very appreciated by the surfers and kiteboarders.

The fishermen may not have thought quite so much of the wind. But it sure didn’t slow them down any. Along the coast, fishing is ever-present.  And the boys have all the toys to prove it. Platforms are hitched to the back of their trucks to hold not just tackle and coolers but also the wagons to pull them on when they get to the pier or beach. 

And one might say that there is a little bit of rod envy among these sport fishermen. Their fishing rods are very long and do not stay inside their trucks, but have to be displayed prominently, attached by racks to the front bumper.

Again, my hubby has not had much chance to partake of that sport. I wouldn’t dare suggest that he was ashamed of his short rod. 

But neither of us would want to miss any of the tours that we get on this caravan. There was a tour of plantation grounds that had been transformed into a sculpture garden. Huge live oaks draped with Spanish moss lined the paths and the roads. The sculptures were carved out of rock and moulded from metal. My favourite was the aluminum sculpture at the entrance titled "Fighting Stallions". I think it would make a great mascot for our aluminum caravan.

The weather was great for our wide open trolley tour of Wilmington, where we passed many large 18^th century homes. 

It was a little cooler for our horse drawn carriage tour of Charleston, but still sunny. Both cities had war stories from the American turmoil of the late 1700's and early 1800's.

We had the chance to stop in for lunch at Ella’s of Calabash. The original owner was the Mrs. Calabash of Jimmy Durante fame. “Goodnight, Mrs. Calabash, wherever you are.” The selection of choice from the lunch menu was, of course, seafood.

And we had a tour of Fort Sumter, an island fort just outside of the harbour of Charleston. The island was small, created specifically for the purpose of protecting the city. It was barely big enough to hold the battlement, and much of the fort was destroyed when the Confederates finally lost the war.

But now the cold is catching up to us, and soon we will be off again to a new destination.

Heading south, like all the others.

W

Names and Places

Chocowinity, Hatteras, Kiptopeke, Chincoteague, Assateague, and last, but not least, Chicamacomico. These are the places we’ve been to along the east coast. I’m sure they are originally native names, and I don’t know the exact interpretation of these words. But I’m pretty sure every one of them means “place of great seafood”, because that’s what we found at each spot. 

No matter what town along this coast we stop in, we can always find a fish market with freshly caught shrimp, scallops, crab, and flounder. We even lucked in to finding one having a “customer appreciation” day that served us a free lunch along with our purchase.

In Virginia the clams and oysters (pronounced “orr-sters” by the locals) were plentiful.

South of Chesapeake Bay, they specialize in blue and soft shelled crabs. In fact, one town put up blue crab statues all around the town because they were just so darned proud of them.

The focus of this trip, besides overeating, seems to be the barrier islands along the U.S. Atlantic. Our first campground in Delaware was on a thin strip of land between the Ocean and Indian River Bay. Hubby rushed right out and got a fishing license so he could surf fish off the beach in high tide, and then fish in the bay when the tide was out.

We were in a similar spot when we camped on the Outer Banks, the barrier islands of North Carolina. 

Hatteras Island is a sliver of land about a hundred kilometers long that protects Pamlico Sound from the unpredictable Atlantic. The entire strip is little more than an overachieving shoal, made entirely of sand. Before the locals finally bolstered the dunes to strengthen the shores, during storms the ocean would wash entirely over the island and into the sound on the other side. 

All the houses are built on stilts, using the underneath as carports and boat storage, even today.

With all these geographical drawbacks, it is hard for me to understand how this was the perfect place for the Wright brothers to attempt flight. But Kitty Hawk, which is on this barrier island, was specifically chosen by those two because of it has no trees, and it is made of flat, ocean washed sand with a steady ocean breeze.


There is a huge monument there to celebrate their success.

And in a fitting tribute, the kiteboarders and sailboarders frolic in those same winds, just off the island on the sound side.

Unfortunately, success hasn’t been the word to use when it comes to my “hunter-gatherer” bringing home the bounties of the sea. It’s not his fault. He certainly tries hard, and I am very glad that he at least enjoys the attempts. But the schedule on this trip is very tight, and between tours and dinners, group meetings and travel days, there hasn’t been a lot of free time to dangle one’s hook. Let’s just say that we are grateful for the many local seafood stores.

The tours we have taken so far have run the gamut from aquariums and bird banding stations, to a NASA flight facility, and we even took in a river cruise. Local history is always a favourite with us, and we did a walking tour of a small town called Washington, North Carolina. Of course, right on the coast as it is, it had its share of catastrophes in both the American Revolution and in the Civil War. We found a house built in 1785 that still held a cannonball lodged in its façade.

And to take history just a little farther, we were given a tour of the Aurora Fossil Museum.

When potash was discovered just outside this little hamlet, the fossils uncovered in that mine were rejected in favour of the economical benefit of the fertilizer. To appease the historians and archaeologists, the mining company does give the rejected material to the town to be sorted over. As an attraction, the town and museum allows tourists to also dig through these piles of discarded dirt in hopes of unearthing a fossil or two.






I found the tooth of an extinct snaggletooth shark. Hubby, not to be outdone, spent half an hour on his knees and came up with many more shark teeth and some small vertebrae bones.

We expect to have more history lessons on the way south. But hopefully, the tongue twisting names are finished for this trip.

W

Caravan

car-a-van:  noun;  1) a community travelling in wheeled conveyances along a route. 2) A convoy of trailers. 3) A rolling party.

We were promised seafood on this caravan. We got it in spades. I forgot to notice whether they promised a 3 o’clock wine and cheese.

The trip down to Delaware was uneventful –as all the best trips are. We met up with an Airstream owner in Upper New York State who allowed us to occupy the field next to his house overnight.

 

 That gave us an early start for the attack on the traffic and construction at Binghamton. Once we reached the flat shores of Delaware, it was an easy drive to the State Park where we were to meet our travelling group. We even made it before my afternoon wine time. 

Which unfortunately, I never had because immediately after unhitching the trailer, the transmission linkage on the truck broke. It would not go into any gear, even Park, and needed the parking brake set to stop it from rolling. The tow truck came and took it away at 5pm, just when the dealer closes, so we knew we were going to be without a vehicle overnight.

The benefits of this lifestyle are that at least we are home. We had supper, slept in our own bed, and got up in the morning to walk on the beach.

 A phone call determined that the dealer did not have the part for the 2 hour fix, so we got a car rental for the day. I'm sure if we hitched it up right, it would pull an Airstream.

But we also needed groceries to replenish the fresh produce and meat that we had consumed just to cross the border without grief. All of the tours and meals of the caravan were also off site, but most people carpooled, so that wasn’t an issue.

We got our groceries away just in time to head off to the first group meal at the aptly named “Hook ‘em and Cook ‘em”.  The buffet dinner of flounder, scallops and shrimp reassured everyone that seafood was going to be plentiful on this trip.

This was our first look at our group. It consists of 43 retirees, and most of them have done this “caravanning” thing before. Very few are full-timers like us, but they are all avid travellers. Our convoy has 18 iconic Airstream trailers, and 4 Airstream motorhomes (yes, they make them, too).

The second day, we had 3 tours and a group lunch that kept us busy until late afternoon. 

We saw a museum about a Dutch shipwreck off the coast, an aviation museum, and a tour of a “lightship” – a floating lighthouse that sat a few miles out from the harbour in the early 1900’s.

 And we got to pick up our truck.

I finally sat outside that evening with my wine and cheese.  As people walked by, they would come visit and join us, until we had about a dozen of our group sitting with us, drinking and snacking until dark. I think we were immediately labelled as “party animals”.  As if.

It took only 2 hours of travelling to get to our next campground in Virginia. But 45 minutes more to merely go the 500 meters from the front gate to our allotted site. More trailers than just our 22 were lined up coming in. This was going to be a very busy area for the next 2 days.

We were barely set up before we had to dash off to another tour, and then had a group meeting after a quick supper. At this rate, the 3 bottles of wine I bought in Delaware will last all 6 weeks of the caravan. 

The reason the campground was so busy was they hold OysterFest in this particular campground every fall. Tickets are sold to keep the number of participants down to 3500. Booths are set up that offer clam chowder, steamed crab, and oysters raw, cooked, and frittered. 

Side dishes were also available: salads, fries, and hush puppies (fried bread that looks kinda like an unfrosted timbit). Everything is free with your purchased ticket. Our group tickets were bought last December before they were all sold out.

Some eating groups were claiming their space by decorating the provided picnic tables early in the morning.

Our caravan group followed suit. Although, unprepared, the best we could do was to post flags and flamingoes and cover our tables with aluminum foil – Airstreams for eating on, one could say. 

We certainly couldn’t outshine our neighbors, who dressed as hippies and had psychedelic clothes and décor.

Once the feeding frenzy began at noon, we had to negotiate long lineups. They meandered so deep among the picnic tables that one had to start at the booth you wanted and follow the line back to find the end of the queue. This event lasted 4 hours, and by the time it was finished, nobody was interested in dinner.

Our caravan leaders allowed us to relax the next morning to recover from our bloat. And then got us an afternoon tour of nearby Assateague Island, where wild ponies graze. This is a National Wildlife Refuge, so vehicles are confined to a small area. They do have a large trail system for hiking, biking, and the tour bus. We were able to get a good view of the beautifully coloured horses, mostly paints and palominos.

With our evening free, I was able to enjoy my wine while hubby grilled up some scallops. We started a campfire, and again drew people in for another impromptu party. I think we’ve got a reputation.

W