You’re Not Going to Believe What Happened to us…

The time came for us to leave our sunset paradise in Keaton Beach so we readied the RV and hit the road about 10:00 am. All was going well on the drive as we passed through the town of Perry Florida. However, heading west on a nice two lane road,something caught my eye.

NOTE: What occurred next  felt like it happened in slow motion –  almost as if I was in a Sam Peckinpah slow motion movie scene.

So what was it that caught my eye? It soon became obvious what it was… a wild turkey! How cool was that? As it started in flight I could see it was a large,beautiful wild bird. Its wings were beating slowly as it lifted its mass off the ground and became airborne. Oddly this turkey was flying toward the road instead of toward the woods as most do. I was watching it take flight and was in wonder of it when I suddenly realized that if the turkey didn’t fly a bit higher I might hit it. With no time for action (only thoughts) the bird suddenly struck the top of our RV on the windshield !

Back at real time…. we heard a BOOOM! The loud noise startled Sharon as she was looking down at her phone. The sound was similar to hearing two cars hitting each other. A shower of very small glass particles littered our dash board and the windshield itself was shattered with cracks going from the top tot the bottom. Less than 40% of the windshield had no cracks after striking the bird.

Being on a two-lane road gave us no choice but to continue down the road until we could find a suitable space to pull over. Before pulling over we called our insurance company to start a claim. Sharon searched the internet to see if we should worry about the windshield caving in on us if we drove any further with it as cracked as it was. Feeling as if we could safely drive it I put duct tape over the cracks on the top and bottom of the glass to hopefully secure it. We also put in a call to Tiffin Motorhomes who suggested we use clear packing tape to tape all the cracks as soon as we could.

We drove slowly over to Mexico Beach and checked into our park. I immediately went and bought a roll of packing tape to tape all the cracks to keep it intact in case we had to drive any further. It took the whole roll! Meanwhile, we have heard tentatively from the insurance company and it looks like we will have to drive on down the road to have it repaired.

It certainly was not an exiting way to spend the day but alas, it is all part of the experience of life. We aren’t particular happy about this event and its future inconvenience.  The thousand dollar deductible will hurt the budget a bit but we came out unharmed so we have simply chalked this one up to bad luck. However, we both can’t help but wonder if this was an omen and if it was we have no idea what it means…

In the meantime life goes on and we have spent our time here in Mexico Beach solving insurance and logistics stuff. Each afternoon we took a walk to the beach and would end the day at our favorite local hangout (Lookout Bar) where there is always another stunning sunset over the ocean for us to forget about that eventful day…

NOTE: We will leave Mexico Beach Florida today and head east to Robertsdale Alabama for a night before continuing on towards Louisiana in hopes of getting our windshield repaired...

Fabulous Sunsets at Keaton Beach Florida…

We left Manatee River State Park and trekked northwest. It was a longer drive than normal for us as we totaled 216 miles before pulling into our site at Keaton Beach Florida. The Old Pavillion RV park was a new stop for us and what a wonderful site we were given just feet from the ocean’s edge. The owner is a very nice lady and although this campground is mostly a fishing camp it offers solitude and fabulous views of the Gulf Coast.

I say it offers solitude since it is at least a half hour to any sized town so we made sure we had the groceries we needed before arriving here. This will be only a three night stay. Our first day we took the short walk the small beach known as Keaton Beach. It reminded me of the beaches in the Keys in that it is very small but otherwise a nice little beach.

The next day we set out to hike at the nearby Big Bend Wildlife Management Area at Hagen’s Cove. We parked beside the viewing tower which overlooks an expansive marsh. After climbing to the top of the tower we had great views of the marsh below. We could only see a few birds far, far away. Temperatures were chilly in the mid 60’s with about 10 mph winds so we decided to walk the trail a bit.

Most evident on our walk were the zillions of Fiddler Crabs. They were everywhere and we had to watch where we walked or we might have stepped on them. We enjoyed watching them scramble around and tuck into their dugouts surrounded by little balls of excavated sand. Walking further we saw lots of recent activity of feral pigs who had been rooting up the soil in search of a tasty treat.

As we ventured further we saw a few flocks of Short-billed Dowitchers and Sandpipers along with some Curlews but most birds were too far away to identify. As the trail left the coastline and headed inland we were walking through a managed pine area in the tall grass coastal prairie. We stopped to check out a Yellow-Rumped Warbler and it was then we were swarmed by blood thirsty savages! These were viscous mosquitos who took us by surprise and had us scurrying back to the safe confines of our CRV. So much for a long hike there…

Back at the RV I would be remiss in not pointing out the best part of this park… It faces due west and offers some of the best sunsets imaginable. Our first two sunsets while here were fabulous and we won’t likely be able to see the third as rain is in the forecast for our last day We are hoping the rain will hold off long enough for us to take one more scenic drive i mapped out…Nevertheless we will certainly earmark this park as one to come back to as we have really enjoyed our stay so far....

NOTE: We are now in Mexico Beach Florida for a few nights.

Wrapping Up Our Stay in Puerto Penasco, Sonora, Mexico…

As our stay in Puerto Penasco comes to a close I find myself pausing to reflect upon our time spent in Mexico. I have to admit this is one of the friendliest parks we have ever stayed in. It seems to me that the RV’ers we encountered here were more relaxed, open, free spirited and simply happier than many of the folks we have encountered  during our nearly six years of travel. Maybe it is just coincidence or perhaps it is just a bit of the Mexico magic and the laid back culture of the residents rubbing off on all of us. Either way our stay exceeded my expectations...

We ate out in town much more than we normally do but doing so was very inexpensive especially considering we ate seafood everywhere we went. Two places we liked the best (both were real road treats) were Del Capitan on Rocky Point’s highest point. The other is a smaller restaurant in the area called Frenchy’s.

The food and the salsa were excellent at Del Capitan and the view was totally breathtaking.  It would be worth visiting even if the food was terrible! The local tourist newspaper called the Rocky Point News had a coupon in it for 1/2 priced food which meant, for example that a shrimp basket  would be about $5 dollars US. And of course a Mexican Bohemia beer or a margarita  to sip while enjoying the view was absolutely wonderful!

Frenchy’s had the most American food of any restaurant we visited but was very inexpensive  with cold Mexican beer for about $1.50 so we were happy there. Sharon and I shared a blackened grouper plate that they split for the two of us and we swear each "half" could have been a full serving for an average adult. We were stuffed!!!

We made sure to make one last stop at the Malecon (downtown area) to purchase some seafood from “Mr. Fish.” I bought several pounds of colossal shrimp (I mean look just how big they are in the picture below!) and five pounds each of Grouper and Red Snapper fish for a total cost of $58.00.

Of course before leaving our notorious group of 8 had to drive over to what is known as the “dirt mail since all the stores front a dirt road just north of town. There was a lot of really cool stuff we would have liked to have bought but with no where to put anything we only left we a small purchase of pure vanilla.

Playa Bonita RV resort although tight and tricky to navigate is perfectly situated right on the beach. It is filled with friendly, happy people many of whom we feel will become our lifelong friends. We are packing to leave and with the freezer full of seafood all that is left to do is to wander over to the beach to savor our last Playa Bonita sunset…

NOTE: The header picture and several others were taken by MonaLiza of Lowes Travels blogger fame. We are still in Ajo waiting for the rain and colder weather to pass before moving on…

Van Horn Texas and a stay at Monahans State Park…

We enjoyed our first visit to the city of El Paso, the Gateway to Juarez., and will surely return someday. We actually left a few days ago and drove about 130 miles to spend one night at the Desert Willow RV Park in Van Horn, Texas. It is the westernmost town in the U.S. Central Time Zone so it was time to change the clocks.

Since every town, no matter how small or remote, has a story we headed into town and discovered the recently renovated historic hotel called the Hotel El Capitan which was built in the 1930's and designed by famed architect Henry Trost. What a cool place it was with its southwestern decor and charm.  It is a hotel I would love to stay at (if we didn’t have a RV). We walked around the small town and took in the rest of the sights. Van Horn has seen better days but we had a good time there.  The elderly lady who manages the park was a hoot and recommended Papa's Pantry for lunch.  I had a red chili smothered ground beef burrito whereas Sharon had shredded beef and grilled chili, onion and tomato burrito.  Sharon's was better once again (sigh).  Other than a cranky waitress at the restaurant, the townspeople were very friendly and welcoming so we see no reason to pass it by next time we are driving through on Interstate 10.

 

Our next stop was about 160 miles east where we pulled into a pull thru site (number 5) at Monahans State Park, a place we have been to before but simply had to revisit. The weather was about to become stormy and wet so we booked two days to let it all pass through. Our first day at the park the weather was perfect and we thankfully were able to do a lot of hiking in the dunes. The trek over the dunes was lots of work but well  worth the effort for the amazing vistas… Friday the rains came along with some thunder and lightening so we were only able to do short excursions between rain events. This morning it is still raining (with more to come) so we will extend our stay another day before moving on to San Angelo, Texas.

We feel the beauty of this place, come rain or shine, is a perfect place to wait for the weather to clear… I will let the photos speak for themselves…