New adventurer . . .

We came home a little earlier than intended from our South Carolina trip mainly because our 5th wheel was falling apart, but also because our son and daughter-in-law were expecting their first child and our first grandchild.  He was born a few weeks early on April 2nd.  He is just a doll.

River Kenneth

River and mom

The new family all safe at home.

I love his name, River.  He will be a camper for sure.  They are already asking how old does he have to be before they take him out camping.   His middle name is my dad's name. The best dad and grampa in the world.  It will be hard to live up to his example, but we will try.  His Auntie Jill is flying out from South Carolina Tuesday, so we have an excuse to drive back down to see him again after we pick her up from the airport.  

I keep reading my RV blogs and want to go out again, but not quite yet.  We are planning a northern trip across the country to Maine this summer for a couple of months and I know when we come back this little guy will look completely different. I can't wait to take him on trips with us, but I'm sure we will need to wait a few years and bring his parents along.

More pictures . . .

Apparently you can only upload so many pictures, so here are more that are relative to the prior post.  lol

I love the site BBQs here.

This is the bathhouse.  Nice and clean

This is Palmetto State park in Texas.  I really liked this park.  It only 18 spaces with water and electric.  There is another section that doesn't have that and a place to rent kayaks and paddleboats.  They also have really nice trails that have signs along the way to give info about the plants and wildlife.  We came across a snapping turtle ambling down the trail.

The next day we stayed at the Caverns of Sonorna, still in Texas.  The campground is nothing to write home about, but the caverns are awesome!

Gotta have some roadside tchotchke along the way.
Further down the road in West Texas, still, where there aren't a whole lot of campgrounds, we stayed at Balmorhea State Park.  It had cute little covers for the outdoor tables on most sites.  There is also a natural spring that goes down 25 ft. in spots.  It's really nice.  We swam, then snorkeled.  Gotta snorkel it!

This was one of the custom campers there, love it!

Of course to keep with the theme of this trip, "shit happens"  We had a blow out on one of the new tires we put on before we left.  Got it changed, went to our friends and booked it home.  

We had a road angel stop behind us to help with airwash when trucks and cars drove by.

Yep, that's a big mess of wires.

It's nice to come home and plan the next trip.  

Westward hooo . . .

Daphne Island, AL

My big little brother and MDH

The one and only time Jay is bigger than Ronnie!

Every house is built on stilts, hurricanes anyone?

Extraordinarily large gulf oysters.

Pub grub anyone?

We stopped in Mobile to visit my brother and finally meet his daughter.  The park we stayed at was really nice on Mobile bay, beautiful sunset and the sunrise greeted us with fog coming off the causeway.  My brother was the tour

The view from the back of our 5th wheel onto Mobile Bay.  The morning fog rolling in.

guide elite.  He took us to Pensacola, FL to Lulu's  (Jimmy Buffet's sister) diner, across a ferry to Daphane Island, kinda all over the place.  His baby girl had the flu, so we had to wait to meet her.  She is as outgoing as her daddy.  She even climbed on the roof of our 5th wheel within 10 minutes of meeting us.  What?  There's a ladder, it needs to be climbed.  LOL

When we left Mobile we started shooting west.  The landing gear of the 5th wheel was again giving us grief, so we didn't want to put it down.  The first night we stayed at Sam Houston Jones State park.  It was a bit off I-10, but worth the drive. We met a very nice couple from Canada, which wasn't too far from where I was born.  The campground was in a bayou.  The morning walk led us to discover a few turtles and a baby alligator.  Someone had thrown marshmallows into the water and they were dining on them for breakfast. On the way back to the interstate we stopped and had a shrimp Po-bo and a BBQ brisket po-bo.  Too damn good, especially the shrimp!

The following day we stayed at Palmetto  (a lot of things have the word Palmetto in them).  The park had only 18 sites and we were there early enough to snag a spot.  There were some really nice trails to follow.  We even stumbled upon a snapping turtle that was taking a morning stroll.  It had a water tower that apparently was a hangout for local vultures.

The next night we went to The Caverns of Sonora.  The RV sites are nothing to write home about, but the caverns were amazing!  It was an hour and 45 minute tour.  You ended up 155 ft below the surface of the earth and the great state of Texas.  I am convinced that this part of Texas is just one big geode.  There are caverns everywhere.

Today we stopped at Balmorhea State Park, (still in Texas)  It has a natural spring.  We swam in it first, yeah, yeah, okay.  Then had a few cocktails and busted out the snorkeling gear.  Wowza!  So glad we did.   It was amazing.  Catfish kicking it at the bottom of the spring (25ft. down) little pupfish and ducks diving to the bottom to feed.

Don't know where we will end up tomorrow, but it will be an adventure.  Sure wish we felt comfortable enough to unhook the 5th wheel.  Oh well.

And then there were three . . .

We are still at Crystal River at Rockcrusher RV.  We got up early, 6:00 (which cracks me up cuz I woke up at 5 when I was working), had our coffee and slogged off to Riverventures to see the manatees.  BUT, before we left I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I thought, "Great now I'm seeing things!"  But fortunately, I saw it again.  It was Ralph, the mouse, peeking out under our bathroom door.  Great, I will never be able to "take care of business" with a stinking mouse in the restroom.  We jammed a towel under the door and MDH found an old mousetrap, but it didn't work.  After the manatee adventure, we went to the local hardware store and bought a real mousetrap.  Sorry my gentle friends, but I am a farmgirl and the mouse must go!
The manatee adventure was awesome.  When we rounded the pier where the manatee was sleeping, I just about lost it.  That thing is HUGE!  It was sleeping and yes, I did listen to the captain who said they are herbivores and they won't hurt you, but really?!  My heart finally quit pounding and I finally got up the courage to get closer and take a look.  Wow.  So now I have a sweatshirt and a couple of stuffed toys for my niece, Chloe, and little man Lockwood.
We are having fun and moving west to Mobile tomorrow.  Sorry no pics of the manatee, but we have one of Ralph.  Thank you Beverly Cleary.
Oh yeah, MDH went golfing while we were in Charleston, SC and thought the alligators on the course were planted statues, guess what, they weren't.  He just realized he needed to be careful stepping out of the cart.  Again, no pictures.  I guess we need to work on that.

Up way too early now that we are retired, but the manatee await.

Grampa bought something for Littleman Lockwood.

Our Lemonade flavored vodka is now gone.  Soo sad.

Ralph the mouse is gone too, not so sad.

Eventually you have to leave . . .

We had a great time visiting with Jill.  We went to a four performer theater group and saw a great little production with 60's music. We went to an oysterfest with Jeremy and prior to that we went to a vodka distillery.  Yeah!  But alas we had to start going home.  Stella girl and her new sister Kona Lou are getting to know each other.  Kona wants to be her bestie, Stella is slowly warming to the idea. We stayed at O'Leno State Park in Florida and are in Rock Crusher RV park now.  Funny name, don't know where it came from.  We know that we are really campers, not RVers, but this is the only place available and we were really lucky to get a spot. 360 spots here and they are all filled with over 55 snowbirds.

The food truck at the distillery served up fried shrimp, crab cakes, oysters and okra.

Jilly Bean and her daddy.

Only the coolest places have a Lockwood Dr.

Bushed after a full day of sightseeing and maybe a little vodka drinking.

The oysterfest, $5 a bucket. 

One of the dog parks we went to,  This one is The Barrell.  It has a band, beer and a food truck.  

The foodtruck served up South American food.

This is the stage for 34 West Theater.  Great show. Just tables scattered around the room. 

Kona Lou and Stella Girl

We had a great time!

Charleston, SC

The menu at Hometeam on Sullivan's Island where Jill works.

Our server for the morning, Jilly Bean

Happy campers

Jay flying a jet on the Yorktown

We toured the Yorktown, a battleship and a submarine that are permanently docked near Charleston.

The sub.  It was crazy cramped in it and it held 75 crew members.  They had to rotate shifts so everyone could share beds.

A view of the Ravenall Bridge from the Yorktown.

We went to Pearlz so Jay could have his very own platter of oysters.

This is our campsite at James Island County Park.  It's really nice and has a dog park, splash town, trails that go around it.  We've been to the dogpark a lot.  LOL

Jill and I got manicures while Jay went golfing.  He said there were alligators just  chillin' on the course.  He thought they were statues until he was told they were live. 

Jill and I had lunch at this cute place that was an old autoshop turned hipster place to eat, Leon's oyster and something.

Couldn't resist.  Love the sink.

Here it is Leon's poultry and oyster shop.

Stella is slowly learning dog park manners.  It kinda freaks her out when dogs say hello by sniffing her behind.

They sail remote controlled sailboats in the the lake at the campsite.