Month: May 2019

After posting a partial list of locations and dates, we received several comments about it looking like a concert tour and thanks to the suggestion of one follower, we’ve decided to give this upcoming trip a name – “The Mended Bones Tour”. We are even having t-shirts made to commemorate getting on the road.

The “tour” starts and ends in Atlanta, leaving Atlanta in May and returning in August. More about this in coming blogs. In the mean time, we’ve finally been on the move and have been enjoying a week in Orange Beach, Alabama. We have a lovely site on a lake with a tiki hut, outside kitchen, lots of seating and just across the street from the lazy river pool.

But before we could get to Orange Beach, we encountered some electrical challenges with our “house” batteries. Although fully charged, they would not provide any electricity to the “house” portion of our coach. That meant the engine ran fine and we could drive over to Orange Beach but nothing inside was working – no AC, no refrigerator, no radio, etc. After an hour of trying to diagnose, we finally decided to pull out and just drive over (luckily, it wasn’t too hot and it was a cloudy day so it didn’t get too steamy in the coach and the contents of the fridge survived until we could hook up to shore power again).

After a few days of tinkering and testing, we determined all the batteries were fine but found one cable broken and a lot of build up on the terminals that was blocking flow. A new cable and some cleaning and we were back in business.

After three months of parking on a gravel/dirt space with no picnic table and no amenities at all at our site, Orange Beach was a real treat. We had a deluxe site on a lake, a Tiki Hut and a 6-burner grill. Needless to say, we were happy to just hang out many afternoons and evenings! And, the resort even had a lazy river pool!!!

• 

• 

We didn’t do a lot while in Orange Beach. Mainly relaxed, visited a few restaurants in the area and did a few touristy things. Dan drove out to Fort Morgan which separates Mobile Bay from the Gulf. Very similar to Fort Pickens in Florida, both in design and current state. Fort Morgan’s claim to fame was that it was in engaged in the Civil War and is where Admiral Farragut is rumored to have uttered the famous phrase: “Damn the torpedos, full speed ahead.”

The absolute highlight of our visit was a Dolphin Cruise in the marshes and backwaters of the area. We took a trip on a small boat thru Cetacean Cruises and it was highly entertaining and we saw TONS of dolphins while remaining in very calm waters. After spending time with the dolphins, our guide was eager to show us “the lady of the lake”…a floating sculpture that a very rich man had commissioned and now sits at his marina! Real classy Alabama 😉

• 

• 

• 

After ten wonderful days in Orange Beach, it was time to turn our wheels north and away from the beach. And we won’t stop heading north until we reach upper Michigan in late July!

First stop, Fort Gaines, Georgia (yeah, I know, it’s on everyone’s bucket list!). We stayed a couple of nights at a Corp of Engineers (CoE) site on lake Walter F George so Jill could visit relatives in South Georgia. It was also the first time in over 4 months that we were camping with trees and shade! How we had missed a shady place to call our own 😉

After this short stop, it was back to Atlanta for doctor appointments (much overdue), vet appointments, hair appointments and catching up with friends and relatives. It was a crazy busy week for us, seemed like we barely saw each other (we rented a 2nd car so we could cover more ground individually). It was great to see old friends, Dan spent a lot of time with his mom, and we got (most) of our needed visits completed (long story about our dermatologist appointments that were cancelled without notice…).

On May 19th, we officially began the “Mended Bones” tour. If you can’t read the back of the shirt above, here is what to come:

• Chattanooga, TN
• Nashville, TN
• Louisville, KY

As of the writing of this blog, we’re actually just wrapping up Nashville (Chattanooga was just a two-night stop/layover) so we’ll update that week in the next blog.

Thanks for following us and until next time, take care and stay cool (what is with this hot May in the south??).

Given we stayed here way longer than planned, we got to know this park and the people who work there much more than usual. And given how they helped us out in our time of need, are review and perspective is probably a bit biased. But for those looking to camp in this area of Florida, thought we’d provide a review.

First off, this area of the Florida panhandle is really laid back, sitting between Destin and Pensacola (both about 30-45 minutes away). Other than one weekend during Atlanta Spring Break, we never found there to be heavy traffic or issues getting into any place, restaurant, etc. Navarre is on the Santa Rosa Sound with Navarre Beach just across the bridge. The beaches are wonderful, featuring the flour/sugar soft sand that this area of Florida is known for. In addition to the Navarre Beach Park, just 15 minutes down the road is the Gulf Shores National Seashore with terrific beach access and miles and miles of empty beaches. If you do need activities and the bustle of more bars, restaurants, etc., you can be in the middle of it in Destin (east) and Pensacola (west) are a short drive away.

With regards to the park, it might not be the fanciest in the area (that award goes to Santa Rosa RV Park just down the street) but it has some great amenities that include:

• Heated pool
• Inexpensive laundry facilities
• Concrete pads and picnic table areas
• Great soft sand beach on the sound (never have big waves!)
• 325′ pier with fishing allowed with no permits needed
• Tiki huts with stools and tables over the beach to watch the sunsets
• Great cable and OK WiFi
• Kayak rentals
• Activities center
• Very friendly office staff as well as campers

On top of this, they have created two emergency/temp spaces which, of course, came in very useful to us in our time of need. In addition to our need, they also helped out a man who had a heart attack while visiting the area and a family who needed a place to camp while tending to their parents who were in a local hospital due to an auto accident. We really lucked out when we picked this place.

In summary, there are more fancy campgrounds around but you can’t beat the amenities and the people at Emerald Beach RV Resort