Talladega Alabama and Fort Yargo State Park in Georgia…

With a weekend approaching we had to leave Deerlick Park and move on down the road. Since we are booking sites only a few weeks in advance prime locations like Deerlick Park are nearly impossible to score on a weekend. As a result our next planned stop was north of the Talladega Speedway. We found a nice Passport America park off the beaten path and spent the weekend at Talladega Pit Stop RV Park & Campground in Lincoln, AL.

There is not a lot to do or see in or around this park so we we used our time doing a little more future planning. We also drove over to the nearby town of Oxford to pick up some groceries. We shop for groceries frequently to take advantage of loss leaders and to ensure we always have fresh fruits and veggies.

  

The University of Georgia was not as impressive a campus as was the University of Alabama. However, unlike U of A, Georgia’s campus is more land locked by the city of Athens. Unfortunately for us it was raining a lot in the area so we only had time for a short stroll through campus and downtown Athens.

Afterward we had to stop by Terrapin Brewing for happy hour. What luck! They were running a 20-year anniversary special so we were able to try six beers for 10 bucks! This allowed us to try some exotic beers we would otherwise bypass and was a great way to end the day in Athens.

Back at Fort Yargo SP Sharon set up her outside gym in our spacious site for a long workout. While she was working out I unloaded my mountain bike and thought it would be fun to ride the 6 mile trail around the park. I hadn’t ridden any serious single track trails for a while so I figured 6 miles would be a good and fun ride.

Once the weekend ended we moved over to Fort Yargo State Park in the state of Georgia. This park is also off the beaten path but close enough to Athens GA for a day trip to explore the college town and University.

Well, unfortunately I wandered off trail multiple times and encountered such trail segments as Monster Mile and Heart Attack Hill. I bit off a bit more than I had expected but when I was finally done I felt great and really enjoyed the strenuous ride. I probably rode closer to 9 miles and was hopeful I would be sore the next day, luckily I wasn’t.

As we slowly make our way over to North Carolina to visit our daughter we have been carefully eyeing places posing the question, could we live here? So far we haven’t answered yes unanimously...

Left Key Largo and a Tropical Depression is Altering our Plans…

Wow! We got caught up in all the election results and forgot about blogging. That and there is a tropical depression out in the gulf we have been monitoring as well. When our time was up in Key Largo we drove 81 miles over to Midway Campground in the Everglades National Park near Ochopee, FL.  We planned to spend more time there but with the depression brewing up we decided to only stay two nights.

That did give us time to check out one of our favorite bike trails in Shark Valley. We used our National Parks Senior pass for entry and rode our bikes about 12 miles on the trail. My first impression was we have never seen as much water in the everglades in all our visits until this year. There was water everywhere as we noticed immediately as the water had risen so much as to cover the road in places.

As a result we saw way less wildlife as the critters chose plenty of places to hang out rather than in the deeper waters near the visitor center. We were still able to see some alligators and a few birds while on our the bike ride. At one point I was looking out over the swamp when I suddenly saw a water snake right in front of me. If I hadn’t seen him when I did I would have surely run the poor snake over.

The highlight was seeing a hawk making a kill on the trail beside us. We aren’t exactly sure what it was but my guess was a mouse from the distress calls it was making. We took a few photos zooming in on its talons but still couldn't tell what it captured.

The next day we hiked a few of the boardwalks in the area and spotted a few more gators some of which were quite large.  After our two nights we drove on up to the WP Franklin Locks campground, a COE park. We love this park and this time scored a great waterfront site. Again our plan was to stay longer but it was now becoming apparent that the tropical storm going through Central America was going to come our direction for sure.

Knowing we would be making a mad dash out of the storm path we decided to stock up on groceries and made a long loop drive to include a Trader Joe’s to pick up some favorite items there as well. I also snuck in a quick visit to Bonita Beach (one of our favorite beaches in the USA) just for memories sake. We had originally planned to winter there but alas, Covid changed our minds. I’m glad we made the quick stop.

We are now sitting in Inglis, Florida still watching the depression and altering our plans as we get more info on its track.

Enjoying Time with Katie and Brooks in SD, CA…

One thing we were looking forward to during our stay here in San Diego was that our daughter Katie and her husband Brooks would be flying in to visit. They came to San Diego for two weeks and arrived on Thanksgiving day.

Since they would have a long travel day we thought it best to wait until the day after to cook up our Thanksgiving feast. We decided on the traditional turkey but without a turkey roaster to cook the bird we were going to find a smaller bird (less than 12 pounds) which would fit into our RV convection/microwave. Following the directions I left in previous blog when we succeeded in cooking a turkey we ended up with a fabulous looking turkey that was moist and delicious.

Since Katie and Brooks came in from North Carolina they stayed the first four nights at an Air BnB to get used to the three hour time change. Then they moved over into our RV making it quite cozy for their last ten days. During these ten days we tried to cram in a lot of San Diego sightseeing…

We made a trip over to Balboa Park for a walk around the park . Christmas decorations were beginning to go up and the large tree in the park was being erected for the park’s big Christmas ceremony. There was also a cool display of hand made ornaments on display in one of the museums there. We always enjoy a good hike around such a beautiful city park.

Of course there were many bike rides around beautiful Mission Bay where there are now many migrating birds calling the bay waters home. Seeing the birds, the bay and palm trees makes the ride very enjoyable and it becomes quite easy to ride many miles without realizing how far we went because of the scenery around us.

While the weather hasn’t been perfect we still managed to squeeze in a little cornhole over at nearby Campland. We also enjoyed walking along the boardwalks at Mission and Ocean Beaches. We were lucky enough to have gotten to photograph several wonderful sunsets and of course enjoyed a few happy hours.

On bad weather days when we were cooped up we enjoyed each others company chatting, watching football and playing mind games on the computer. It was wonderful having them here and sharing what we love in San Diego.

NOTE: We are currently in San Diego CA until Dec. 28th before spending the rest of the winter in Arizona…

In San Diego, The Bikes are Ready…

We made it to San Diego California and we will stay until just after Christmas. We have spent a lot of time here over the years so we will re-visit a lot of favorite places we have been to before. We also have some things to repair and items to order now that we have an address to send things to.

When we settle in for longer stays we take our bikes off the bike rack and then take our bike rack off too. We love our car’s 3-bike rack but it kind of gets in the way when we want to access the back of the car.

With our bikes off the first order of business was to get our bicycles back in shape. Since we keep them on our bike rack with no protection they have gotten quite weathered. We don’t have high quality bikes for just that reason but we still need them to get around smoothly especially at our site here in San Diego. From our park we can easily bike to beaches or we have miles of trails all around the bayfront.

Our first repair was to replace some of the sticking/rusted cables on the bikes for the shifter and the brakes. There is a big difference between shifter cables and brake cables but a simple way to tell the difference is to simply look at the size of the “bead” on the end of the cable. Large beaded cables are brake cables and small beaded cables are shifter cables.

I used a little Finish Line DRY Teflon Bicycle Chain Lube on the new cables and reinserted them in their appropriate sleeves. Next up was to lube the chain. I decided against taking the chains and soaking them in oil even though I know that that is really just what they needed. Instead I opted for the same Teflon based lubricant spray and got the chains and gears all lubed up.

Perfect… now all we needed was a good test ride. Our park here at Mission Bay RV park is the perfect park to bike from so our first ride was over to Mission Beach to enjoy the boardwalk and ocean views. Now that our bikes are all  prepped up we look forward to using them everyday on the Mission Bay Trails during our stay here…

NOTE: We are currently in San Diego CA until Dec. 28th before spending the rest of the winter in Arizona…

Rabbit Mountain Hike and St Vrain Greenway CO…

Since we are going to be in Longmont Colorado for a while as we await our appointment with a freightliner dealer to once again look at our failing gauges we have made ourselves comfortable in our tight site at the fairgrounds. One great thing about the fairgrounds is that it is located adjacent to the Boulder County Open Space which has lots of hike and bike trails around small lakes. The trails also connect to the St Vrain Greenway bike trails.

We have walked around the small lakes several times and also rode our bikes along the bike trails one afternoon. There are still some parts of the trails system under repair from some devastating flooding which occurred in Longmont in 2013. Another nice thing about the bike trails is that they go right by Left Hand Brewing where we stopped one day for happy hour and tasted some might fine brews.

Another great thing about our location is we are close to lots of hiking opportunities. One nice area we discovered was the Rabbit Mountain Open Space. There are several nice shorter hikes available there in the easternmost point of the foothills of the Rockies. The hikes are easy to moderate since they do take on some elevation but the trails are in excellent condition for hiking.

We opted to hike the Little Thompson Overlook trail which was a little over 3 miles in and out. There was about 380 feet of elevation gain over the 1.5 miles to the overlook. Since we aren’t yet used to the altitude this was a great hike to get us acclimated as we did huff and puff our way to the top. There are some rocky outcrops which drop straight down the hillside at the end which offer great views toward the mountains and over the towns below in the valley.

Its a great place to hike and one we will revisit. Also close by are the towns of Denver, Fort Collins and Boulder which we will likely visit while here. For better hiking we also plan to visit Rocky Mountain National Park when the temperatures warm up. So waiting for our repair is not such a chore since we are in a great location with a lot to do.

NOTE: We are now in the Boulder County Fairgrounds in Longmont Colorado until, well, who knows when…

In Search of Lobstah in Portland Maine…

Our quest while in southern Maine was to find some delicious lobstah! Just up the road from our park in Saco is Portland Maine which of course we had to visit as well. Portland is a large city with a very popular waterfront. It felt very touristy along the waterfront and as such parking was $5 per hour but just a few blocks removed from the waterfront we found free two hour parking.

Since Sharon and I were mostly interested in a good urban hike parking away from the waterfront was no problem. We were also in search of some lobster to take home. First up was a visit to the Visitors Center on the waterfront where a nice gentleman guided us to a few places to see such as the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow house built in the 1780’s and he pointed out a fish market where we could purchase some lobstah!

Portland is a very walkable city with a nice vibe and some interesting architecture. We wish the visitor center would have had a self guided walking tour but since they didn't we took it upon ourselves to walk all over Portland. We did find the local fish market in town but these lobster come from a different socioeconomic class than we do. So we finished up our walk and on our way home we discovered Allagash Brewery which luckily for us actually gives away four free samples of their beer since they don’ t sell it by the glass. Score!!!

After enjoying some tasty samples we drove home along the coastline via Old Orchard Beach still a little disappointed at the price we found lobster to be back in the city.  Old Orchard Beach was quite the touristy town which surprised me as I was hoping to find a nice and quiet little Maine town full of fishermen. No Lobstah here!  Happily, though as we were driving home Sharon spotted a small sign that said Sam's Lobster so we turned down the small side road where in about a block or two we saw a guy sitting in his yard next to a his small shop.

Here we met Sam who is the owner/fisherman who told us all about the lobstah around here. Inside the shop were large tanks containing all sizes of live lobster! He was very friendly and helped us pick out a couple of beauties to take home. Once home the poor soles took their last swim in our lobster pot and became a real Road Treat and a very tasty dinner for the two of us. YUM YUM!!!

Our last day we spent some time bike riding on the Eastern Trail Bike Path which is a 65-mile section of the East Coast Greenway connecting Kittery to South Portland Maine. Of course we didn’t ride all of it but we did enjoy a nice leisurely bike ride along a beautiful and well laid out trail. Afterward we visited another local brewery thus calling our visit to southern Maine a wrap…

NOTE: We are still in Exeter NH and will head south in a few days…