Tuesday and Wednesday of this week were just relaxing and camping days. As the old saying goes, "I did nothing and LaVerne stacked it up". Well, maybe we did take care of a few house cleaning chores and a couple of maintenance items. The weather was very nice - sunny days with temperatures in the high 70's. In fact, the weather has been great the whole time we've been here - no rain, no wind, lots of sun, moderate temperatures!
Yesterday (Thursday) we went to Mobile and met some old high school friends for lunch. It's great to be able to keep in touch with these folks and always a treat when we're able to get together for a visit. There was going to be six couples, but two couldn't make it. One had knee replacement surgery Tuesday and the other had a prior commitment they couldn't get out of.
As I mentioned on the last post, this campground gets pretty crowded and busy on weekends. The next campsite over on the back side of our camper is very close and very small. Luckily, no one has occupied it all the time we've been here, but a couple moved into it yesterday afternoon. In order to give themselves a little extra room, the guy angled their camper in rather than back it in straight. When he put out their awning, it came to within a foot of our living room window! We are leaving tomorrow morning, so unless someone else comes in on this site, I guess they'll have a little more room.
And for you that were wondering -- yes, there is a beach here at Dauphin Island. We went over today to take a few pictures. It was not crowded at all today, but if it's at all like it was last weekend, it'll be packed tomorrow! There are lots of off-shore oil rigs out in the Gulf of Mexico and also the big shrimp boats ply the waters. The water here is very dirty looking - not the clear blue like in Panama City or Destin. We don't know for sure, but think it might be all the off-shore oil rigs that cause it.
Well, as mentioned above, tomorrow is moving day and will get us a little closer to home. This will be the last 'blog' post I make because the rest of the trip will be three separate stops visiting relatives, kids & grandkids, and making it to one of our grandson's high school graduation. The plan at the moment is to be home on Monday the 23rd. We left home on March 31st, have put 3644 miles on the motorhome so far with about another 460 to go. God has taken care of us and kept us safe and we pray that He will continue to watch over us until we get home. One thing we're really thankful for is the gasoline prices. Back in 2008 when we went to Alaska, the gas prices were as high as they had every been - we paid over $5 a gallon in Alaska a couple of times with the average in the lower 48 states pushing $4. This year the prices were the lowest they've been in many years - averaged $1.88 per gallon!
We hope you have enjoyed our 'blog' for this trip - we were glad to have you along for the ride.
Thursday May 5th was a long, but good travel day - 432 miles. We left High Island, TX early and hit I-10 east. Of course, the longest part of the drive was across Louisiana, and even though the roads are better that they used to be, there are still a few rough spots. There is especially one bad section east of Lafayette for about 15 miles that make you think it's going to shake the motorhome apart - a slow 40mph is about all it can take. We crossed the 18 mile bridge over the Atchafalaya Swamp and then the Mississippi River in Baton Rouge. Seems like a long time ago that we crossed the Mississippi going west.
Once through Louisiana, we crossed the gulf coast part of Mississippi and then about 30 miles into Alabama to Dauphin Island. Sure was thankful to cross the Dauphin Island bridge and get here safe & sound. We checked into the Dauphin Island Campground after an almost 9 hour day!
Friday and Saturday were just days to relax - beautiful weather, sunny and in the 70's. This campground and our campsite is backed up to the Audubon Bird Sanctuary, but all of the migrating birds seem to have moved on. We walked into the sanctuary and also went to a couple of the other birding spots on the island, but there's not much activity. We put up our bird feeder pole and LaVerne put out seeds, but the only birds we're getting are the locals.
Sunday (yesterday) we went to the Dauphin Island Baptist Church for a great Mother's Day worship service. The pastor remembered us from last year. Afterwards got a burger at Billy Goat Concessions across the street from our campground by the ferry terminal. The rest of the day we relaxed and sat outside watching all the weekend activity -- the campground was really crowded both Saturday and Sunday and was good for people watching. By dark most of them had departed and it quietened down somewhat.
Today (Monday) was an exploration day. LaVerne had never been to Gulf Shores and Orange Beach, both of which are summer tourist beach get-aways - some of our kids & grandkids vacation here sometimes. Of course they are across Mobile Bay from Dauphin Island, so rather than drive back north to Mobile and then back down the other side of the bay, we opted to take the ferry. It is a toll ferry that runs about every hour and a half and goes back & forth across the bay from Dauphin Island to Ft. Morgan - the terminal is right across the street from the campground.
There are two old forts (on opposite sides of Mobile Bay) that used to guard the bay. Ft. Morgan on the eastern side is the oldest and was instrumental during the War of 1812, then again during the Battle of Mobile Bay in the Civil War. On the western point at Dauphin Island is Ft. Gaines just down the street from our campground. It was built in 1821 and was also instrumental during the Battle of Mobile Bay. It was interesting on the ferry trip to see Ft. Gaines as we were leaving Dauphin Island and then to see Ft. Morgan on the other side. Here's pictures of the two forts, plus us aboard the ferry, and also one of the off-shore oil rigs that we passed close by.
Once across the bay we went to Cracker Barrel in Foley, AL for breakfast, then rode up and down the beach at Gulf Shores and Orange Beach. We stopped and walked out on the pier at Gulf State Park in Gulf Shores. Both Gulf Shores and Orange Beach are like lots of other beach resort towns - lot's of condos. On the outskirts are a lot of beach houses - on stilts, no trees!
Since we needed to stop at WalMart for a few commodities, we took the scenic (long) way back rather than the ferry return trip. Even with the short-cut ferry trip over, we still put over 100 miles on the Jeep today! Lot of riding and lots of scenery!
We're still here for the rest of the week, so I'll probably do another 'blog' post later. Even though we missed the bird migration, we're still enjoying it here.
Yesterday (Tuesday May 3rd) was a day of birding with some domestic chores mixed in. Early in the morning we went about 15 miles to Anahuac National Wildlife Refuge (that's pronounced "Anna wock") and rode the auto tour loop a couple of times. When I was a kid growing up, we called the Cattle Egrets "Cowbirds" (mainly because they like to hang out with the cows). At the NWR we also caught a Common Nighthawk taking a nap on top of a post. Saw a lot more water birds, plus a Kingbird.
Back at camp around noon we used the RV park laundry facilities to take care of the dirty clothes, then it was back to the Audbon sanctuary for more birds. There seemed to be more birds that have come in after the rainy weather - more warblers. One of these pictures isn't too good, but there were others that I couldn't get at all - birds won't sit still!
Later in the afternoon we rode back down the beach highway (yes, there is a beach here) to Rollover Pass and rode some of the streets that run from the highway to Galveston Bay. Here's an idea for some of our RV buddies - on many of the lots, rather than put up a dwelling to possibly get blown away in a hurricane, these folks are building high-rise shelters for their RVs. When the hurricanes come, they can just haul their RV away to safety. If the shelter gets blown away, it would be much cheaper to replace (which I'm sure the insurance companies would appreciate). Saw an interesting post someone had by their driveway.
And of course, we saw more birds - here are a few more.
Today (Wednesday) we went to another of the Audubon sites where there is a rookery. Hundreds of Great Egrets, Snowy Egrets, Roseatte Spoonbills, and Double-crested Cormorants are all piled in on this island nesting - almost on top of one another. It's truly an amazing site with all the squawking, squabbling, and complaining going on. There was also a lone Black-crowned Night Heron just sitting on the ground taking it all in.
Later in the day we went back to the main Audubon site to get in a last look before wrapping it up. We've been here 5 days, wore out all the birding sites around the area, so it's time to move on. Early tomorrow we'll be pulling out, hitting I-10 east again headed across Louisiana and Mississippi to Dauphin Island, AL - another of our favorite birding spots. We plan on being there over a week.
