Tuesday, 5 March
Maxwell AFB FamCamp — Montgomery, Alabama
Temps: Lo 39F / Hi 71F (4C / 22C)
This review comes early since we will be leaving for greener pastures (so to speak) on Thursday.
If the first few days of March have anything in common, it’s that they were cold. With a brisk breeze cutting to the bone, we really had no wish to go out and explore Montgomery and its environs. Instead, we used the time to catch up on indoor projects at home, and Mui did some preventive maintenance on the steps outside when the temp sort of warmed up on Saturday.
Friday (March 1), we tested renting movies from iTunes. Users can buy or rent. In the latter case, you have 30 days to watch the movie and once you click the play button, you must finish watching within 24 hours before the download disappears in a virtual puff of smoke. We rented Argo for $3.99; a good price for a recent award-winning movie … sure beats the price of theater tickets. iTunes rentals look to be a good alternative to Netflix, which we subscribed to while we were living in a stix & bricks. We have started a list of movies to download when we’re in campgrounds where we have free wi-fi to supplement our own internet data package.
Saturday, I attempted to go for a walk around the lake near the campground. The chill quickly drove me back home, but not before I captured a photo of the resident great blue heron in its breeding plumage. How do I know? Check out the lore (area between the base of the bill and the eyes) … it’s blue.
Sunday dawned overcast and we were resigned to another gloomy day. But then, Mother Nature smiled on us. By mid-morning, the sun was out and the sky was a brilliant blue. Even though it was only about 48F (9C), we decided it was time to get out before cabin fever set in permanently. The short stroll we embarked on turned into a 6½-mile (10½ km) walk around the perimeter of the Maxwell airfield. A detour along the way uncovered an interesting marker that we would have otherwise missed.
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Today’s military passenger terminal and base operations stand where
the hangar of the Wright Brothers’ flying school was once located.
Since it was Sunday, we didn’t expect to see any action on the runway, but we were wrong … and this time I was prepared to take pictures of the two C-130 Hercules being put through their paces.
With a day of sunshine and warm temps forecasted for Monday (the 4th), we knew we couldn’t waste it. What to do? We considered Selma, but decided we weren’t up to doing a 100-mile (160 km) roundtrip drive. So, we hopped in the car and went to the Montgomery Zoo to get our “wildlife” fix. We had a wonderful day; one that deserves a separate post (or two).
Parakeet Cove, a free-flight aviary, was our first stop at the Montgomery Zoo.
Moving on to the end of our day. We wrapped up our zoo outing with dinner at John “Big Daddy” Bishop’s Dreamland BBQ, which has been serving ribs since 1958 under the slogan “Ain’t nothing like ‘em nowhere!”
Several of the murals decorating the walls of Dreamland BBQ were painted by
Roscoe Hall II, John "Big Daddy" Bishop's grandson; the mural on the bottom left
is of the original Dreamland location in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
We can’t vouch for the ribs — I’m not a ribs person, so I got the chopped chicken plate; Mui forgot to order the ribs and got the chopped pork plate. Both meats were pit-cooked and came with a side of Dreamland Sauce, which is “rumored to have moonshine as a key ingredient,” two sides, and the ubiquitous slice of Wonder bread. It was a lot of food; half of my chopped chicken came home with us and made for tasty sandwich fixings today. We topped off our meal with Dreamland’s signature dessert — banana pudding. We were good and ordered the small portion of this yummy dessert; might have to get the double portion next time!
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Mui’s chopped pork plate didn’t look much different from my chopped chicken …
just a different meat and coleslaw instead of mac & cheese.
And finally, today (the 5th). It was the warmest day we’ve had since the beginning of the month, but it was overcast and gloomy all day. And windy, too. The high wind alert was on target and we felt the gusts rocking the Phaeton until shortly after 8:00p. Mid-afternoon, a squall came through the area. Short in duration, it dumped quite a bit of rain. We happened to be inside at the time, but those who were caught unawares got a good soaking for sure.
We had a very full day in preparation for our move to a COE (Corps of Engineers) campground south of Montgomery on Thursday. Mui shopped to fill the larder, and cooked a few meals to reduce the number of pots and pans that will need to be washed while we’re at a water/electric site. I threw in a couple loads of laundry, and started processing photos for our zoo outing … blog post(s) coming soon.
I might like BBQ if it didn't have that smokey flavor and they left off the sauce. ;)
ReplyDeleteI don't much care for the smokey flavor either ... which is why I liked the chopped chicken plate ... that the BBQ sauce came on the side was a definite plus.
DeleteBoy if that's the small portion of the pudding, you might need my help eating the bigger one.
ReplyDeleteInteresting info about the Wright Brothers flying school. I had no idea it was in Alabama. I was born in their home town of Dayton, Ohio.
Trust me, the picture of the pudding is misleading ... it really was small and we shared it.
DeleteNormalcy, an underappreciated blessing.
ReplyDeleteAs a wee youngster my parakeet’s name was Haji-Baba. (Actually, it was a series of identical parakeets, a fact discovered much later in life ;)
Looking forward to wildlife day. Have an uneventful move.
Too much of that Dreamland Sauce and you could get a EUI (eating under the influence).
ReplyDeleteNice pictures of those birds in flight (C-130s). A great aircraft. :c)
Gosh, why didn't I think of that -- cook a few meals in advance when you know you'll be without full hookups. Thanks for the tip!
ReplyDeleteI love watching those big planes. No matter how much I learn about them, I just think it is such a miracle that they can fly at all. Awesome pictures.
ReplyDeleteMui were you trying to eat Erin's dessert again?
ReplyDeleteErin, just a thought on your downloading movies using campground WiFi...we usually use the campground WiFi, otherwise we have to tether the phone. Campgrounds really don't like you to use the WiFi for big streaming because it real slows the internet for everyone else. Many have turned to using Tengo which automatically slows the individual users service so you can't stream. A better idea for you to download movies at a much faster rate would be to stop in Starbucks or a McDonald's and use their fast, free internet. You'll have your movies in no time. We sometimes have to resort to this just to publish our blog.
ReplyDeleteJust thought I would share.
Rest assured that we do not stream with the campground wi-fi; we use our own 20GB internet package, which is almost always much faster than any other connections we have access to because we are able to boost the cell signal with our trucker's antenna. The standard def version of Argo, for example, took all of 5 minutes to download. It's good to have the campground wi-fi to supplement our regular internet browsing when we are using our own GB for downloading. That said, this campground has no restrictions on streaming and downloading ... this is because many of the campers here are students at the Air University, OTS, etc. and the wi-fi is designed accordingly. The only restriction is for "questionable content" ... and we have to sign a statement that we won't be visiting or downloading from such websites.
DeleteI am waiting to try out iTunes movies, so appreciated the discussion. And I love BBQ and smoke, the more the better! And Wonder Bread?? I didn't know it was still around, but it probably goes great with southern sweet tea.
ReplyDeleteGorgeous bird shots - both live and metal. That banana pudding looks yummy.
ReplyDelete