Leaving Charlotte meant we were leaving the state of North Carolina and moving on to South Carolina. Our next stop was 103 miles away at Sesquicentennial State Park near Columbia. It was a fairly easy drive to the state park until we actually arrived. The final stretch in the park was on a short dirt road which was rutted and wound tightly through the wooded campground. Many of the sites are unlevel but fortunately for us ours was not one of them.
Once we set up, we realized that we were actually in a scenic site for the next few days. The campground was a short walkable distance to a nearby lake. While here we did take the opportunity to hike around the lake which was about 2.5 miles of rolling hills. The weather was perfect and walking the trail through the heavily wooded terrain was a nice respite.
Upon leaving Columbia, South Carolina we knew we would eventually have to travel through the area hurricane Helene had just passed through. Therfore, we were careful by making reservations and double checking our route. On October 9th we left Columbia South Carolina and drove a long way to Lake Tobesofkee's Arrowhead Campground. The total drive was 219 miles. Why did we end up having to drive so far?
Well, as it turned out we had reservations at Diamond Lakes Regional Park near Macon, Georgia only a 100 miles away. As we were driving through Macon, we noticed it had been hit hard by hurricane Helene. There were lots of trees down all along our route. Once we arrived at Diamond Lakes Regional Park, we were a bit worried because there were trees down all along the roadsides. As we entered the park and found our site, it was quite obvious we were not going to be able to stay there as our site (26) had several trees which had fallen across the back of our site making the it unusable.
We called the park to see if anything else was available and of course nothing was open so we had to move on. Since this three day stay wouldn't happen we just continued to our next stop because a quick look at the campground online showed plenty of sites available.
We continued driving toward Lake Tobesofkee's Arrowhead Park in Lizella, Georgia. More damage was evident along the route there as well. Once we pulled up to the entry gate we asked about availability for the night and we were told that there were none because of the Florida refugees from hurricane Helene we're using the park as shelter. After begging for a site, we were lucky to be assigned one since it was late in the day. As we pulled into the campground it was indeed filled with tents from people who had run away from hurricane Helene. After being grudgingly allowed to stay one night, we were sure grateful for that.
It was a really interesting day on the Road of Retirement and now we are curious to see what our next day brings.
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