Alabama Bound

I see it's been awhile since I posted (again)! To my followers, I'm sorry.

We haven't traveled to any "sights" to write about and the every day mundane things are really boring.

We really enjoyed our time at Orlando Thousand Trails and the time spend with Jake & Nancy and Henry & Anne. Both of them left this past Monday for other areas of Florida. We left Tuesday, slowly heading back to Fairhope, AL.

Our first overnight was in Lake City, Fl at Oaks N Pines RV Park. This is a nice park just off I-10 about 3 miles east of the junction of I-10 and I-75. This was our second time to stay there and will most likely make it a stop again the next time we are Florida bound.

Wednesday night we stayed at Arrowhead Campground in Marianna, FL. Driving in I remarked to Dean that I remembered staying here before. Everything looked so familiar. Then it dawned on me - this is the campground we came to when running from Katrina when we first began fulltiming. We, along with Jack and Danielle Mayer, left the Escapee park in Summerdale and came here for several days until we knew it was safe to return. It is a OK park, but not really designed with 40' motorhomes w/toad in mind. Short sites put you end to end with the roads and very tight turns getting out of the campground when you leave.

Anne called me that afternoon and said that they would be joining us at Arrowhead and sure enough, mid-afternoon in the come.

On Thursday we had already planned to go to Blue Springs State Park, Clio, AL to visit a night with Garry and Jenny, another couple that fulltime and were working at the park. We haven't seen them in a couple of years and the word on the street is that they are going off the road back to Wisconsin. We knew that this may be the last chance to see them in a long, long while and wanted to badly. The same went for Anne & Henry and they decided to surprise Garry & Jenny by showing up with us.

Thursday afternoon we arrived at Blue Springs and Garry was at the gate to meet us. At this point I need to tell you a story! When I pulled in, Garry of course greeted us and then I saw him look behind at Anne & Henry's motorhome. I told Garry "I don't know what's up with the people in that motorhome, but they have been following me since Florida and I can't seem to shake them". I don't know what their intentions are! Garry asked if I knew them and I shook my head. He goes "hmmmm" and steps back for a closer look and realizes who it is. Well, he all but hollers "You really got me, that's Henry & Anne". We all had a really good laugh! But the best is yet to come. Jenny still doesn't know that Henry & Anne are with us!

After selecting our campsites and getting settled in Garry goes to get Jenny who is at their motorhome just a short way from us. He tells Jenny that she needs to come up to our motorhome because there may be a problem and proceeds to tell her the same story I told him, except he added that I was really mad and scared and he didn't know if there would be trouble or not. Well, I'm standing in front of our motorhome watching Henry back his in and I hear the gold cart drive up and all of a sudden I hear a loud shriek. It was Jenny as she spotted Anne directing Henry. After all the hugs many times around, we all had a good laugh about "the story". Hope you did too!

That evening we went to Abbyville, AL for dinner at Huggin Molly's. Oh my gosh was it good! You need to know that Abbyville is a small town and one that I have to say, I'd never heard of. Well, I know about it now and hope one day I can get back!

Abbyville is home to Yellawood which I'm sure most of you have seen the commercial with it's owner Jimmy Rane as the star Yella Fella. Well the story has it that he is buying a lot of the closed up store fronts in Abbyville and putting antiques in so that it still looks nice and not boarded up. He has also put a lot of old signs up and you feel like you are walking the street of a 40's/50's town. It's so cool!

I have posted pictures at Picasa that I took around town to give you just a taste of what it's like. It is one place that if your in the area you really should visit. It's about 40 miles north of Dothan, Al on US Hwy 431.

Back now to our visit with Garry and Jenny. After dinner we all gathered in our home for a rousing round of Wii Bowling. Let me warn you - Garry is wicked! If I remember right, he scored around 220 and beat the rest of us!

The next morning we drove back to Abbyville to the local donut shop for breakfast. Dang, I forgot my camera or you would be drooling when you looked at the pictures of the sweets they had! They also had the traditional breakfast of eggs, hash browns, etc. We drove our motorhome to Abbyville since we were leaving Friday morning, going to Pensacola to Carpenters Campers where we are having some items worked on.

After about a two hour breakfast where we were served with a lot of southern charm, we said our farewell's to the others and got on the road.

Garry & Jenny - we sure hope to see you this summer in Janesville, WI. You know that we wish the best of everything to you in your new endeavors. Lots of love to you guys!

Henry & Anne - we will be waiting for you to catch up with us in Baldwin County, AL. Lamberts is waiting......

We are now parked at Carpenters Campers lot. They actually got two items done yesterday and the rest will wait till Monday morning. We got lucky though - they are having their annual RV Show here today so we get free lunch - hot dogs! They also have their "certified" techs do seminars on maintenance which are always good! Looking forward to a sunny fun day and of course I'll have to inspect some new coaches...

So till next time - be safe.....