Gulf Coast Florida Trip-first stop at St Andrews State Park / Panama City

Florida trip

We left for our well-planned 11 months in advance trip to the gulf coast of Florida on January 15. Our reservations began January 16 but we wanted to get an early start. We were also anxious to leave Crossville, Tennessee and the rain/wind/cold behind us for a while. We picked a good day to go. Traffic was surprisingly light and the skies were blue all the way down to our first stop at Troy, Alabama. It was also unseasonably warm – highs were in the low 70s. We stopped at Deer Run RV Park in Troy. We had full hookups and a really good selection of cable tv channels. We were able to watch the Dallas Cowboys/Green Bay Packers playoff game (congrats Packers!).

We slept really well that night. I don’t know if it was the lull of the steady traffic from US-231 or just being on the road all day in the motorhome. We slept 10 hours (!) and ended up leaving later than we had planned. Still we were on the road by 9:30 and didn’t have far to travel.

Now our first stop was St. Andrews State Park in Panama City, Florida for 10 days. After that we are to head on to Grayton Beach State Park for 14 days; last stop is Topsail Hill Preserve State Park. We took our time driving and got to the state park around 1:30. We were able to check in right away although check-in is officially at 3:00 p.m.  Our campsite is very roomy and the park is really pretty. We have a very good view of the bay. The campground appears to be about two-thirds full. The main empty spots are for tents/pop-ups. There are many big campers here. There is ready access to the beach. The restrooms are in decent shape and are clean.

view of bay

 

The first day we did take a quick walk on the beach at the state park after we set up camp. The first night we were here we ate at Runaway Island at Panama City Beach. We were hungry because we skipped lunch so we got there around 4:30. They had early bird specials until 5:30 – which is good when you are retired! We had really good fish dinners – I had mahi and Ben had salmon – for $13. And we had happy hour $4 house wines which were decent.   We also stopped at Publix on the way back to the camper to pick up a few groceries.  We don’t like to pack a lot ahead of time.

Tuesday we woke up to electrical issues. Oh – oh – it was bound to happen sooner or later. We found a campground volunteer and asked if they had any recommendations for repair. They recommended Beach RV in Panama City Beach. They were very helpful and had our problem fixed by the end of the day. It turned out we had a bad wire. At least it wasn’t an expensive repair!   We did manage to get a short bike ride in this day and spent a lot of time reading books while we waited on John from Beach RV to show up.

Wednesday we decided to explore the historic part of Panama City and St. Andrew. This was interesting but there wasn’t as much to explore as we thought. And there was hardly anyone walking the streets! Still there were some interesting places to see and the drive was really pretty along beach drive. When we got back to the campground we had a nice bike ride to the picnic area, alligator lake and then to the beach. We stayed at the beach for about an hour.

 

 

We ate at Uncle Ernie’s Bayfront Grill and again the food was good. They have excellent fried oysters and shrimp. It looked like a popular local place that had been there a while.  We also hung out at the marina next door for a bit.

 

Didn't eat here but it looked like a cute place

Uncle Ernie's

 

So, Friday, Saturday and Sunday were bad weather days, and we mean that seriously. There were severe weather and event and to take it seriously. So we ended up staying at the Hampton Inn close to the state park. It was actually a nice, clean place and for this time of year really quiet. When I booked this state park I couldn’t get a spot for Saturday night, but we did manage to find one after we got here. But to get a spot close to us we ended up changing the campsite twice. It was a bit of a pain and we had to time the move of the camper in-between storms. It all worked out though, and the state park didn’t get much storm damage. In fact, many of the bad storms went around us. We did get a lot of rain. When we checked out of the motel Sunday we had to move to the site we had reserved for Sunday-Wednesday.

After that we decided to get some lunch and then pick up some more groceries. Well, the bad weather hung around and we were under a tornado watch for much of the day. When we stopped at Dockside down the road for lunch a tornado warning was issued. We (especially me) were terrified. The alerts on phones kept going off and the restaurant had an alert notification and it was going off as well. There were actually two possible tornado sightings. The storm was really bad and one tornado was close by but no direct hit, thank goodness.  The younger workers were pretty scared and some of us were huddled around the tv watching the weather warnings. We were amazed at two tables of older customers who sat by the windows and didn’t seem to take any of it seriously (!) The windows are the worst place to be during such a serious threat.

When we got back to the state park after the storms passed the tornado watches were cancelled and our camper was still standing unharmed. Some of the campsites had quite a bit of water and a couple could not have been used that evening. During the end of the day a big group from Quebec came into the campground and were pretty much all around us but they only stayed one night.

We had to move campsites Sunday.

Monday was quite windy. We took a drive down to Mexico Beach and then to Port St. Joe, about 45minutes outside of Panama City. We passed Tyndall Air Force Base, which is really big. We drove around and took pictures but a lot of the restaurants that we had wanted to check out were closed. So we drove back to the campground for the day. We rode bikes and read books.

Tuesday the wind had died down. The weather was a little cooler but still a good day for biking and walking. We want to just hang at the campground today, since we  will be moving on to Grayton Beach State park Wednesday. in the evening a family of deer crossed right in front of us as we were sitting outside our camper!

 

 

 

 

Fall 2016

We were back in Pigeon Forge on September 24. Back in our RV at Bear Cove RV park. We had a slightly better camping spot this time and very nice neighbors. They were also workcamping – at Dream More Resort- making pizzas!

Ben thought he was going to start his Dollywood workcamper job when we got there – he was scheduled to work the fall festival at the Market Square food court through October 29. But when he reported for work he found out he needed a one day food safety course first. That actually put his scheduled first day of work out until Sept 29. Dollywood provided him with a letter of employment so we could go ahead and take further advantage of the free shows and sights. One of the first places we visited was Parrot Mountain. We had always wondered what it was like and it is very close to Dollywood. We really enjoyed this visit. There were so many beautiful birds as well as a hands-on exhibit. We would definitely pay to go again!

 

We spent some time at Patriot Park and the Island. We hadn’t seen much of the island over the summer as it was just too hot for us to walk around much on concrete. We also went to Dollywood and caught some of the shows and rode a few rides.

Once Ben started work he pretty much worked 32-36 hours a week. October is a very busy time for Dollywood. The first few days he cooked big batches of potatoes, onions, and sausage. Some days he cooked fried green tomatoes. He also helped man one of the outdoor food booths by serving customers. And occasionally he got pulled over to the Ham and Beans restaurant to clear tables and wash dishes. He was also really tired when he got home.  We had an unusually hot fall so there were many days he was hot and tired.

 

 

Ben’s parents came to visit us for a few days the first week in early October. They had a really nice room at the Arbors at Island Landing Hotel. This is an older hotel but it was had extensive renovations. Their room was big and very nice. While they were there we had two picnics- one with grandson Everett and the other with Everett and son Robby and his two sons Lincoln and Kyler. We had a very nice time- the weather wasn’t as hot on these days.

 

Grandson Everett spent four days camping with us during his fall break. We took him picnicking, to play putt-putt, and   shopping at some of the swimwear shops.    He really just wanted to look at their aquariums to see the baby sharks. On the way to take him back we went to the Island and had lunch at Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville. The next week grandson Jupiter stayed with us for three days. I had a blast shopping with him for new Under Armour clothes as well as the hat store. We went out to eat at TGI Fridays.  We played three different putt-putt courses. On the last one Jupiter won a free game with a nice hole in one at the end.

 

In early October Pigeon Forge was totally packed as well as our campground. We thought it was because of hurricane Matthew in Florida. There were many Florida people around Pigeon Forge and in our campground. On top of that there were families camping during fall break. There was so much traffic and all the campgrounds around us looked full. We heard from locals that fall and Christmas were usually the busiest times for the area. The convention center has been bringing more people to the area as well. For instance, there was a five day convention for quartets the first week in October and the convention center was really packed. Anyway, you do learn to maneuver around the traffic by finding backroads and shortcuts. While Ben was working I had plenty of time to venture out and explore shops and eateries. I took advantage of that!

During our visit Ben and I saw Darren Romeo’s magic show (he trained with Siegfried and Roy) and the Comedy Barn (pretty decent but really a couple of politically incorrect jokes). We had more picnics. We explored the artist community and Gatlinburg further and tried an English Pub. We drove through the mountains into Cherokee, North Carolina to see the fall colors and visit the Cherokee Indian museum. We went to Ober Gatlinburg to check out Octoberfest. The next-to-last night we went back to the Island and show the fountain show after dark. And then the last night we were there we visited Dollywood’s Dream More resort and ate pizza. We were actually sad to leave the area.