Category: Florida

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Topsail Hill Preserve State Park – 3/3/2018 – 3/10/2018

We finished packing Friday after work and decided to take off and knock out a few hours of the trip.  We spent Friday night in the Lake City Cracker Barrel parking lot and had a delicious breakfast (with extra orders of Hash Brown Casserole) before heading West.

Naomi Enjoying Some Sun on I-10 Westbound

We left Cracker Barrel around 9:30AM and arrived at Topsail Hill Preserve State Park Site #14 at approximately 2:30PM.

This gave us enough time to setup the campsite and get the satellite dish connected for the Purdue vs Rutgers game in the Big 10 Conference tournament.  We were able to place R2D2 in a spot on the left side of our site with a Southwestern view between the gap in two trees and pickup Dish’s Western Satellites (110, 119, 129).  The campground also has HD cable which can be picked up as long as you have a TV with a QAM tuner.  We were able to pickup all of the local channels on antenna as well.  Verizon LTE upload/download speeds measured in at 20/10 Mb/s.

Sunday

  • Topsail Site 14
  • Topsail Site 14

We took the shuttle to the beach at 10:00 AM.  The beach here is very pristine and very unmolested.  It was about 65 degrees with no wind.  My new perfect beach climate.

Following our trip to the beach we drove into Destin and ate lunch at Buffalo Jack’s.  This is  a nice little Sports Bar with the best boneless wings (all white meat chicken breast) I have ever had.

Monday

Due to an unexpected issue with our RV toilet, we had to make a run to the Panama City Camping World to purchase a Floor Flange Seal Kit.  On the way there, Beth used TripAdviser to find Patches Pub & Grill on Panama City Beach.  What a great meal.  I had Fish & Chips (Cod) which was great, but Beth had a French Dip made with Brisket smoked on their back lot with Burnt End Baked Beans (she wins!).

French Dip Brisket with Burnt End Baked Beans

Tuesday

We drove to Seaside, FL to see the perfect little beach town selected for the filming of The Truman Show in 1998.  We drove by Truman’s (Jim Carrey) home and took a quick photo.

Truman’s Home

Wednesday

Following another fun morning playing with toilet seals, we drove into Destin to eat at Harry T’s.  This was by far the best meal of the trip.  Beth had a nice Chicken Caesar Salad, but I won again (as always) with my choice of Grouper Strips.  There was enough grouper here to feed an army and it had a real light spiced breading that was to die for.

  • Harry T’s
  • Beth’s Chicken Caesar Salad and Brian’s Grouper Strips
  • Beth’s Dessert

Thursday & Friday

We both had to work Thursday and Friday 🙁  However, we did manage to cook some nice Sam’s Club steaks and baked potato over a fire.  Unfortunately, Beth started having symptoms of a head cold after dinner and was miserable Friday and Saturday.

  • Phoebe – Trash Inspector
  • Baking the Potato
  • Steak & Baked Potato

Saturday

Beth was still pretty sick for the trip home, but the beauty of a motor home is that she managed to sleep on the couch for almost the entire panhandle.  Traffic was pretty heavy due to Bike Week and Spring Break traffic and slowed to a crawl from Ocala to the Turnpike.  We departed at 9AM and arrived home at 5:30PM.

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Cypress Glen Campground – 12/28/2017 – 1/1/2018

We spent New Year’s 2018 weekend at Cypress Glen Campground in the Withlacoochee State Forest at Silver Lake in site #46.  This is a nice campground, but there are not a lot of  level sites big enough for a 34′ motorhome.  We barely fit in our site, had to jack our front wheels 8″ – 10″ off the ground, and our front door barely cleared a large oak tree.  It was difficult to enter or exit the camper without making contact with the tree.

We managed to place our portable satellite dish in a spot where we could acquire 2 of the 3 Dish Network Satellites which provided us with every channel we required for New Year’s Day college football.  Satellite access from any other site would have been difficult.  There was no access to broadcast television via the antenna.  We did get good Verizon voice and LTE data coverage as I was “on call” all weekend and unfortunately it was a busy weekend.

All negatives aside, we camped here with friends and had a great time.  We took the Weber Bullet Smoker with us and smoked ribs on Saturday.  Smoking at the camp site was easy, but cleaning up the mess while camping was not nearly as convenient as at home.

Heidi’s Panoramic of Our Camp Sites

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Sunset King Lake RV Resort

Today we decided to head home a day early and try to get south of what was left of Hurricane Irma.  We were very lucky to have no damage at home an no loss of power.  We called the campground in Alabama we had planned on staying at and they couldn’t assure us that they’d have any spots available because they weren’t sure all of their hurricane evacuees would depart today.  We decided to leave at 10:40 AM EDT and see how far traffic allowed us to go.

We took US-49 from Vicksburg, MS to Hattiesburg, MS and then US-98 to Mobile, AL.  US-49 was fairly good road most of the way and US-98 was real nice until just a few miles prior to the Alabama state line.  It switched from 4 lane to 2 lane in Alabama and it seemed to take forever to get to I-65 and I-10 in Mobile, AL.  There was quite a bit of congestion where I-10 narrows to 2 lanes for the tunnel under the Mobile river.

We started to receive Hurricane Irma’s winds and rain when we got on I-10.  I truly white knuckled it across Pensacola Bay.  The wind gusts were heavy and blew the Winnebago all over the lane (fortunately there was not a lot of traffic around me on the bridge).  Beth called quite a few campgrounds throughout the afternoon and they were all full of evacuees.  We finally got a call back from Sunset King Lake RV Resort with an opening and we jumped on it.  By then we were tired of fighting Hurricane Irma and the traffic.  We probably passed a couple hundred power trucks from Arkansas, Missouri, and Alabama in route to help with the recovery.

We haven’t seen much of this campground because it was raining and windy when we arrived at 6 PM EDT, but it seems very nice.  There is a large percentage of permanent RV’s, but all are kept up very nicely.

We are in Site J-1 and have 50 Amps and full hookups.  We are able to access their Wi-Fi, but the speeds are very slow.  Verizon service is 3 bars but the LTE is very slow (0.57/2.47)

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Site J-1

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Colorado Trip – Days 1 & 2

We departed yesterday at 6:15 PM and arrived at the Cracker Barrel in Lake City, Fl at 10:00 PM after topping off our fuel tank at the same exit.

Breakfast at the Cracker Barrel today was great.  We bought some candy for the kids and grandkids in the gift shop when we checked out (including a HUGE Tootsie Roll for Beth).

We were rolling by 7:00 AM and made our first stop at the Flying-J in Jackson, GA (just North of Macon).  Traffic slowed down to a crawl south of Atlanta near the I-285 and I-20 interchanges, but kept moving and traffic flowed well through the remainder of Atlanta.

We arrived at the Marion County Park Campground just west of Chattanooga, TN along the Tennessee River just after 2:00 PM (EDT) in plenty of time for Brian’s “on call” coverage.  It’s important to note that the entrance can be confusing.  The campsites are off to the left, but you are required to report in at the office first and the arrows for the office point to the right.  The problem is there are two roads to the right.  You want the far right road. (the middle road takes you to the boat ramp). This is a nice campground with 50 Amp electric and water and we would definitely stay here again.  We camped in Site #34 which is across the road from the lakefront sites, but is a pull-thru.

We sat outside and enjoyed the view for most of the late afternoon and early evening.

Marion County Park Campground Site #34
Marion County Park Campground Site #34
Marion County Park Campground Site #34