Alabama and the Panhandle

It’s Friday morning so it would be hard to find space at a campground, but that doesn’t bother us. We are heading east to spend Easter weekend with Helen, an old friend of Jean’s. Being basically a travel day, we get on I-10. We pass through New Orleans (again), Biloxi, and Mobile. We cross Mississippi at its narrowest point and head into Alabama. It is pretty much flat country. By late afternoon we are driving down string-straight county roads past widespread farms. We see mostly cattle, ‘since the fields haven’t been planted yet.

Helen and her extended family live on five acres way out in the country. It is very quiet at night, no trains rushing by. The only sound is an unhappy cow off in the distance somewhere. Saturday turns out to be a busy day. We get an early start, since Helen has to take her grandson, who is in the high school band, to town. The band is playing in the Sausage Festival. This is apparently an area settled by German immigrants, and the Sausage Festival is a big event.

We walked up and down the rows of vendors, peddling just about everything imaginable. There was even someone grinding corn meal on a 1920’s one-lung grist mill.

There was a small oom-pa band (drums, accordion, and euphonium) that took Gene back to his childhood amongst the Germans in south-central Wisconsin. He even sang along a little bit in German. Later, the high school band came on. It was a jazz band and it was their first public performance. They acquitted themselves well, playing a wide range of songs from Glen Miller (Pennsylvania 6-500), to Weather Report (The In Crowd), to Cab Calloway (The Mooch — without the Heidie-Hi’s). It was impressive.

We had breakfast before we came, which was probably a mistake. When they started serving sausages and sauerkraut we weren’t hungry yet. When we were hungry, the lines were way too long. The festival had a bit of a country fair feel, with a display of old tractors.

We left the festival and got a delicious lunch in a fish place. Gene needed some supplies from a drug store, so that was the next stop. We both had gotten pretty shaggy, so Helen took us to a Quick Clips where we were made presentable. Finally, the errands were done and we headed for the beach. Being a holiday Saturday, it was not as crowded as one might expect; we walked out and enjoyed it for a while.

A lot of family showed up on Sunday, and we all enjoyed a delicious meal. Afterward, Helen’s great-granddaughter, Scarlet, ran around the yard eagerly finding eggs.

Monday, everyone was all business, so we headed east for the Florida panhandle, one of our favorite places. By now our water tank was almost empty and the holding tanks full. In fact, there was water sloshing around in the galley sink. We definitely needed a campground with facilities. That could prove to be a problem. The western end of the panhandle is a heavy tourist area, and we were in the middle of Spring Break. We checked in with some of our favorite state parks, but they were all full. Gene finally found one quite a way further east that had two campsites available. They couldn’t be reserved, strictly first-come-first-served. The problem was that they were at least a three-hour drive away.

Touching base with the park two hours later we were told that there was now one site available and two other rigs headed for the park. The race was on. When we finally got to the office, after passing two “Campground full” signs we saw one motorhome with Ontario tags already there. We went in anyway and learned that there were actually two spaces left. He took one and we took the other, for three nights. First stop was the dump station, where I could almost hear the motorhome breathe a sigh of relief. Then on to our site, where we filled the water tank. That done, and hooked up to electricity, we were home free for the next couple of days.

Next morning, we headed to the beach. The park was doing a controlled burn, but the wind blew the smoke away from us.

The tide was high but dropping, and we walked along the tide line looking for shells. Jean found a satisfying number. We watched a kite surfer set up his rig and launch. His board had a foil on it, the first one we had seen. The wind was strong enough to give him about two feet of lift. He was moving so fast it was hard to keep him in frame.

We talked with a couple of fishermen, then headed back to the rig. We took naps (life is tough) and headed out in search of groceries (and flip-flops for Gene). We ended up in Port St. Joe. This is a nice-looking town. We had a delicious lunch in downtown St. Joe and went to a big Piggly Wiggly. It looked familiar, and we realized we had shopped there on a previous trip. After restocking what we needed, Gene went next door and bought some expensive flip-flops (is that a contradiction in terms?). At the waterfront there is an open frame lighthouse. It being broad daylight, we couldn’t determine if it is active or not.

Next morning, we woke to overcast and light rain. Not much beach crawling today. Since we were there for the day, we decided it was a good time to do laundry. Apparently, so did everyone else. There is one coin-operated washer and dryer, which was doing a booming business. Finally, about 4:00 we got a load in the washer. A little later the sun came out, so we had one more walk on the beach.

All told, it was a pleasant and restful two days. But it is time to get moving again.