And So Our 2nd Year of Fulltiming Begins

Thursday, 12 December
Oak Grove park — NAS Pensacola, Florida
Temps: Lo 38F (3C) / Hi 61F (16C)

Had we not pulled in headfirst to the back-in waterfront site we snagged when we arrived at Oak Grove Park yesterday, we likely would have missed the brilliant red sunrise belt that trimmed the horizon at dawn this morning.

Definitely worth the hassle of connecting the hook-ups on the wrong side of the coach!

It was only 6:30a, and it was still a quite chilly 45F (7C), but we quickly bundled up and made our way to the sugar white beach a short distance from our site to enjoy a few quiet moments.  Alas, it wasn’t long before the breeze drove us back to the cozy shelter of the Phaeton.  Beach walks are going to have to wait until later in the day until the temps warm up!

Our day was otherwise uneventful.  We came to Pensacola to do some chores and provision the coach after being away from our “condo on wheels” for 3½ months.  The story of those months away is yet to be told.  In the meantime, it’s time to begin the story of another year of fulltiming.

When we put the Phaeton in storage on 24 August, we knew that the rest of our first year of fulltiming would be spent away from the motorhome.  At the time, the map of our travels to date looked like this …

Our Phaeton Journeys … at the point when we called a temporary halt to our
days on the road, we had traveled 4,710 miles (7,536 km) in our home on wheels.

When we disembarked Celebrity Constellation following the TransAtlantic cruise that returned us to the US on 9 December, we wiped the miles-driven-slate clean to begin our second year on the road.  An easy drive brought us from Fort Lauderdale to Orlando.  We picked up the Phaeton from storage, stayed overnight at the Orlando Winter Garden RV Resort, and turned our wheels north and then west on 10 December.

As a side note, I should mention that we were very happy to find that no uninvited guests — I speak of the 4-legged critters known as mice — had visited the Phaeton during her incarceration at the storage facility.  As well, the solar panels had done a great job of keeping all the batteries charged up and the coach purred to life as soon as Mui switched the ignition on.  The toad’s battery didn’t fare as well, I’m afraid.  Mui had installed a solar panel to charge the CR-V’s battery, but somehow the connection got loose.  In short, the car was dead as a doornail.  Still, it wasn’t a huge problem as the storage facility had the means to give us a jump and the short drive to the campground in Orlando was sufficient to bring the battery back to full charge.

The only problem we had with the coach was a minor one — the doorsteps refused to extend.  Mui was all set to check that out in Pensacola, but a miracle happened at the end of our first full day on the road — I opened the door when we arrived at the campground and the steps extended of their own volition.  Ours is not to question why, but to accept when such gremlins work themselves out ;-)

OK … back to the story of these past few days.

Whereas our first year of fulltiming started in Virginia, our second year starts in Florida.

We split the 444-mile (710 km) drive from Orlando to Pensacola into two days, driving a little more than half the way on Tuesday.  We stayed at the Beaver Lake Campground in Quincy, Florida that night.  As we had stayed at this campground when we made the trek from Jacksonville to Pensacola in January of this year, we knew not to expect much.  In fact, this Passport America campground is little more than a big grass field with pull-through FHU sites ($20/night with the PA discount).  This time we were in site 4, which was identical to the site we had stayed in the first time around.  The campground served as a convenient overnight stop and we got a good night’s rest with no traffic noise despite our close proximity to I-10.

In her infinite wisdom, The campground manager bunched together the five rigs that are here.
No big deal; it’s for one night only and our neighbors are as quiet as church mice.

Wednesday morning we were up at 5:30a with plans to be on the road by 8:00a — wanted to give the 39F (4C) temperature to which we woke up a chance to warm up before we had to go outside to break camp!  We would have met that timelime if not for a stubborn jack that refused to retract.  No matter, going through the troubleshooting steps, we re-programmed the “home” position for that leg and were on the road after a mere 30-minute delay.

We drove the remaining 176 miles (282 km) to Pensacola in good time, arriving at the Oak Grove Park at NAS (Naval Air Station) Pensacola in time for lunch.  And who should welcome us but the Navy’s elite Blue Angels.  I had heard that they were grounded due to the sequestration, so seeing them whizzing about was a delightful surprise.  Alas, no photos as we were in the midst of setting up, but here’s a link to a blog post from September 2012 when we were lucky enough to catch another practice session.  One of these years we’ll time it right to see an actual show!

Site 50 has plenty of space separating it from 49 (left) and 51 (right).

We’re in site 50, which is described as a “waterfront” site.  Since we pulled in headfirst, we do have a glimpse of Pensacola Bay through the trees and brush that separate the campground from the beach, but the water is several hundred yards away.  No matter, the beach access is just steps away, and we’ve already walked out that way a couple of times.

Glimpse of Pensacola Bay through the Phaeton’s windshield.

The waterfront FHU sites are $27/night.  At first we debated paying the $4 surcharge over the daily rate for the standard FHU sites, but after this morning’s beautiful sunrise, we’re agreed that we made the right decision.

Left: The beach access is just steps away from the sugar white sands and the bay.

Right: Can you see the Phaeton in site 50 in the top photo?  If not, I’ve included a
close up of her to prove that she is indeed hidden back there amongst the trees.

Ah yes … this is the beach we remember from September 2012.  It was hot then and Mui
delighted in swimming in the bay.  With the temp much colder now, he has no plans for a dip.

White sand … tall trees … puffy clouds … blue skies … sunshine …
and a campground nestled behind the treeline.

Once we were settled into our site, we ran over to Walmart for a few essentials, then returned to the coach to tackle the chores awaiting us after being away from home for such a long time.  Today was similarly taken up with chores.  Mui drove to our Pensacola-based mail service to pick up 3½-month’s worth of mail and the boxes of Arctic gear we shipped back from Iceland in early October.  Next he finished provisioning the Phaeton with a much-anticipated trip to the commissary.  I got a head start on the laundry and the household bookkeeping.  When Mui returned to the Phaeton, we took a break for a short walk on the beach.  It felt good to be out there in the sunshine even if we did have to bundle up.

My first shorebird photograph as we begin year two of fulltiming is of a willet
on the beach at Oak Grove Park.  Hopefully many more will follow!

We’ll be in Pensacola a few more days before we continue west to Texas, where we plan to spend the winter.  Not sure if we’ll be doing much of anything fun during our remaining time here.  I’m nursing a cold and Mui’s battling a sinus infection, so it’s probably best we take it easy before we embark on our week-long drive on Sunday.

Dinner & A Cinema … and Lunch with New Friends

Wednesday, 16 January
Fort Pickens Campground — Gulf Islands National Seashore (GINS), Florida
Temps: Lo TBD / Hi 71F (TBD / 22C)

The cold front that kept the area to our west 20 degrees cooler yesterday has arrived here.  The day’s high of 71F (22C) was back in the wee hours of the morning.  The temp has been falling since then.  At 8:00p, we’re already down to 50F (10C); we’ll see where it stops.  I guess mother nature is preparing us for our trek north from here.

This cold front came with plenty of rain to give us a good soaking.  I was about to step out for a walk while Mui was off running errands this morning when the skies opened up in a downpour.  That was about 8:00a.  Except for a few short breaks, the rain hasn’t stopped since.  The direction and strength of the rain even caused our first leak — seepage really — in the motorhome.  Looks like the water found a miniscule opening in the slide seals.  Nothing serious; the carpet is already drying out.

Before you ask, the sunrise above is not from this morning; those gorgeous colors were what we woke up to yesterday, so let me go back to …

Tuesday, 15 January

Although we had a very colorful sunrise, the sun didn’t grace Mui’s birthday!  Yup; he has turned a year older.  I won’t say how old, but there is a 5 and a 7 involved … you figure it out.  In the meantime, the beautiful sunrise we enjoyed from our campsite deserves some more recognition … they do say that a picture is worth a thousand words.

With our departure from here just days away, we wanted to get in one more trike ride.  Gearing up, we cycled over to Fort Pickens, wandered around the fortifications for a bit, and chatted at length with one of the rangers.  (By the way, she confirmed that the bunker we came across on the Gulf-side beach is indeed from the coastal artillery system; probably for ammo storage.)

We spent much of the afternoon at home, just relaxing and doing some road-prep chores.  Around 3:30p, we left to celebrate Mui’s birthday with an early dinner and a movie.  I’d made a promise to myself not to take any more bird photos.  I did OK until I spied a nesting pair of great blue herons in the trees as we were exiting the campground.  Then, all bets were off.  The bonus — we got to see a bit of blue skies and sunshine at that moment too.

The Great Blue Heron on the nest was displaying to the one on the branch.

Wouldn’t it be great to see the whole cycle from courting to the hatching of the eggs?

I could have stayed there watching the herons for hours, but we had other plans in the works, so after about 15 minutes we moved on.

First on the agenda was dinner at a restaurant to which Chuck and Anneke introduced us in September — McGuire’s Irish Pub.  We had so enjoyed our meal there that when I asked Mui where he wanted to go for his birthday dinner, he had no doubts in his mind about returning to this eatery, which is located inside Pensacola’s original 1927 Old Firehouse.

McGuire’s bills itself as a “turn of the century New York Irish Saloon.”
[photo on the left is a screenshot from the website]

This double-decker bus sits in the parking lot;
no way you can miss it when you turn onto East Gregory Street!

The early hour meant that we did not have to wait to be seated.  In fact, we had the Irish Whiskey Dining Room entirely to ourselves.

Here’s the Birthday boy, sitting beneath …

… just some of the over $1 million in dollar bills signed by Irishmen of all nationalities.
(We’ll have to go back to add our dollar to the collection!)

Can’t say that our meal was healthy, but it sure was good.  Since this was a celebratory meal, we threw caution to the wind and ordered separate main courses.  In the absence of “naked” fish and chips, I opted for the regular kind (the dory was so flaky that I didn’t need a knife); Mui got McGuire’s ale battered shrimp, which came with a large Caesar salad and a choice of sides … the homemade garlic mashed potatoes was so good that we had to bring the leftovers home with us.  Of course, we got the 18¢ bowl of Senate bean soup to start — so much better than the bean soup served in the Senate cafeteria in DC.  When we asked our server for a dessert recommendation, Jerri suggested the Irish Bash Cream Pie — think along the lines of a very light cheesecake with chocolate mousse and chocolate cake crumbles … she definitely did not steer us wrong.

Top left: fresh-from the oven honey glazed bread
Bottom left: fish and chips
top Right: Senate bean soup
Bottom Right: Ale battered shrimp

The deceptively light Irish bash cream pie was so good that it deserves to stand alone.

Next up … the movies.  It’s been ages since we’ve been to a movie theater.  I think I boycotted them when the price of a ticket topped $10.  When we lived in a stix & brix, we had Netflix and got our movie-fix that way, but we canceled the service when we got on the road.  We’d been wanting to see the latest Bond movie since it came out, so we decided to break our boycott.  The decision was made easy because of our access to Portside Cinema, the theater at NAS Pensacola.  At $3/person going to a show there is a deal to be sure.  Yes, the prices are subsidized by tax payers, but considering the pay our men and women in uniform get, I think it is well-deserved.

My favorite Bond is still Sir Sean Connery, but Daniel Craig played the role well in Skyfall.

We left the movie theater in the rain, drove home with the windshield wipers working overtime, went to bed to the pitter patter of heavy drops on the roof, and woke up to pretty much nonstop rain …

Today

We did nothing special today … EXCEPT at lunch time.

Today was our day to meet Karen and Steve, fellow Phaeton owners and bloggers (Gone by RV), who first reached out to us while we were all still in Virginia.  Having sold their stix & brix, they were already living in their home on wheels, but they had to wait to get on the road at the end of December, which is when Steve retired.

When Karen sent me an email that they were coming up from Panama City Beach to visit the Camping World in Gulf Breeze, we suggested meeting at Niki’s, where we had lunch with Chuck and Anneke last week.  They may have regretted leaving the great weather in PCB for the soggy weather they found here, but we’re glad they came.  We had a very nice time getting acquainted, and enjoyed hearing their Red Bay stories since we’ll be going there at the beginning of February.  They’ll be heading up to Red Bay in late February; hope we won’t still be there, but if we are, we’ll be consoled by their good company.

I thought I was going to end the post with our luncheon date, but I have one more photo to share … this one from dinner at home.

Sharing a meal … or … two halves make one meal!
Not only are we splitting a V8 and a Panini, we’re splitting a plate too!

Tomorrow we get back on the road!

Walking, Exploring, Picnicking

Monday, 14 January
Fort Pickens Campground — Gulf Islands National Seashore (GINS), Florida
Temps: Lo 67F / Hi 73F (19C / 23C)

We woke up to so much fog in the campground that we thought for sure the day was going to be a bust.  Hah!  An hour later, the sun had burned off the fog and was peeking through the mostly-cloudy skies.  Of course that meant we just had to go out and explore — despite the 100% humidity (ugh!).

We decided to walk a bit down the way to explore one of the coastal artillery fortifications overlooking the Gulf of Mexico — Battery Langdon (1923; casemated 1943).  As we wandered up and over the battery, the clouds provided welcome filtering of the strong sun; and the breeze cooled us down while we sat a while … enjoying the view and our snacks.

(The light was sort of blah most of the day … and it shows in the photos.)

I catch Mui atop Battery Langdon …

… he catches me with his camera as I come up to join him.

When the sun comes out briefly, the scenery is visibly brightened.

Two to Travel at Battery Langdon.

From Battery Langdon, we walked back to the campground, got on the short trail from Loop B, and went to explore Battery Worth (1899).  I’m going to write about these fortifications in a later post, so just a photo for now.

Visitors are allowed to wander freely on the fortifications.

By the time we returned to the coach, we were drained from the humid heat.  What to do?  Easy solution for Mui was to go for another dip in the ocean.  So, we grabbed some snacks and drove over to Langdon Beach.  The water temp was 62F (17C) — just a degree or two warmer than when he went for a dip a few days ago.  He doubled up on his snorkeling skin layer and felt more comfortable in the water this time.  So much so that he didn’t want to come out until I finally prevailed.

33 seconds in the water!

Happy Crazy Man!

The rain threatened all day, but not a drop fell.

When we eventually returned home we had just enough time to shower, get changed, and get over to Fort Pickens for the only program they offer this time of the year — an hour-long ranger-led tour.  Describing herself as a “baby ranger,” Elizabeth enthusiastically launched into the program, which included a 10-minute lecture about the history of the fort and a 65-minute tour.  Yes, that adds up to more than 60 minutes!

Ranger Elizabeth and one of the few cannons remaining at Fort Pickens.

I’m going to post about Fort Pickens separately, so for now … moving on.  Mui was ready to call it quits after the tour, but I wasn’t ready to head home yet.  So, we compromised — he went home, promising to come and get me when I was ready; I headed over to the museum, which reopened last spring after having been closed for nearly eight years following storm surge damage from Hurricane Ivan.  More on that when I post about Fort Pickens.

Climbing atop the seawall that was built to protect Fort Pickens from storms, I wandered along the perimeter of the grounds, eventually ending up at the beach.  Spotting a Great Blue Heron standing statue-still as some fisher people went about their business nearby, I hopped down the wall and quietly approached it.  This bird could have cared less about my presence.  I sat down on a toppled tree for a while before inching my way across the sand to spend some quality time with the heron … a very special experience.  And yes … lots of photos.

Noticing that this Great Blue Heron is missing a foot, I wonder how that impacts its life.
(I didn’t have to wonder long; after about 30 minutes, it hopped a little ways,
picked up a twig in its beak, and flew off to its nest.  It returned before I left
the beach and started fishing further down the beach … it has adapted.)

(That’s a double-crested cormorant in the background.)

There were other birds around as well, but not many — a pelican, a willet, a loon.  Of course I got pictures of them as well, but I’ll spare you and skip to the end of our day.

After the heron flew off to his nest, I called Mui and suggested he make a couple of sandwiches and join me to watch the sunset.  When he arrived, we put our chairs atop Battery Payne — not another soul around — and settled down to enjoy the scenery as the setting sun changed the colors of the sky and the landscape.

A nice ending to the day ...

Birds (Again) and Dinner with Friends

Sunday, 13 January
Fort Pickens Campground — Gulf Islands National Seashore (GINS), Florida
Temps: Lo 65F / Hi 74F (18C / 23C)

It was another day that was a mix of clouds and sunshine.  But no one’s complaining.  Not even about the humidity, which was up there again.  As long as there’s a breeze to keep us from overheating, we’re good.

We started our day off with what turned out to be a two hour walk.  For a change of pace, we reversed our usual walking routine this time.  Instead of starting out on the beach along Pensacola Bay, we started out by going east along the Gulf of Mexico.  We had the beach to ourselves and kept up a pretty good pace to our Pensacola Bay cutover point at the campground registration building.  Then it was a slow stroll with frequent stops going west along the bay to the campground.

Anyone home?
We think this is a Remnant of the coastal artillery system built to protect the area in
the early 1900s.  No signage, so we’ll have to remember to ask a ranger about it.

Lifeguard station aground; it’s too far from the beach to do swimmers any good.

The boat pier is a popular perch for pelicans and gulls.

I see one cormorant amongst the penguins Pelicans.
[Yes … I do know the difference between the species … wink, wink]

The gull and merganser convention was still going on off-shore, but the birds were very quiet this morning.  As a bonus, a small bunch of the gulls were resting at the edge of the beach, giving me a better opportunity to get acquainted.  They tolerated my presence well, flying off every once in a while, but returning immediately to the spot across from where I sat watching them.

Bonaparte’s Gulls is my best guess.

Bonaparte’s Gull

Even when most of the gulls took off for a short flight …

… A couple of them always remained behind to babysit the Sanderlings.

Sanderlings

The gull and merganser convention broke up …

… when this fisherman got too close for comfort.

Proof that Judy was right when she identified the waterfowl
amongst the gulls as Mergansers in the Saturday post.

After returning home we relaxed for a bit before the afternoon portion of our day — which was easier on the feet as we drove to Navarre to check out a few campgrounds.  We especially liked the waterfront sites at the St Rosa Sound RV Park and Emerald Beach RV Park.  The former has monthly rates for these premium sites; the latter doesn’t — but they have small decks overlooking the water.  We might treat ourselves to a stay at one of them one of these years — and a treat it would be considering their hefty pricing!

The best part of our day, though, was yet to come — dinner with Chuck and Anneke at their home.  Those of you who follow their blog know that they came off the road mid-year in 2012, bought a house in Florida so they can spend more time with family, and shrunk their 39-foot motorhome to a smaller View and became any-timers.  They have a lovely home, and we enjoyed a very nice seafood meal with them there last night.  Thanks for the invite guys!  Have fun in Freeport — and remember to blog about it ;-)

(Alas — no photos from dinner.  Chalk it up to having too much fun to remember to take out the camera.)