May 15, 2013 - Pirates, Planes and Fort Pickens

Made our splash back in Florida at the Blue Angels Naval Recreation Park in Pensacola, FL. Great campground close to our main reason for stopping - the National Naval Aviation Museum located on Naval Air Station, Pensacola, FL. What an inspiring collection of aircraft and memorabilia representing the beginning of flight to present day aviation technology. Of course, being the home of the Blue Angels Flight Demonstration Squadron, the Angels are well represented here. Although currently "grounded" due to the Sequester, the aircraft are still...

Apr 26, 2013 - N.A.S. Pensacola

The next leg of our drive was 255 miles straight west on I-10 to the FAMCAMP at Naval Air Station Pensacola. We are going to spend one week here. Dave used to live near here and wants to show Miss Rebecca all about that time in his life. We quickly setup our coach and went to explore the beach which is about 100 yards away.

Apr 5, 2013 - Day 1 Thru 2

Left Safety Harbor on cloudy day and drove up the Peninsula parallel with I-75 to I-10. Not very scenic, but better than the Interstate with some lovely old oak trees. Miles of pine forests along I-10 which was edged with wildflowers and flowering dogwoods peeping through the trees. Drove through steady drizzle to Pensacola (420 miles) where we stayed at the Stay America Inn... rudimentary but clean. Ate at Cheddars, new and popular locally with an eclectic menu. Slept well and then continued on to New Orleans and the O'Malley House...

Mar 29, 2013 - Pine Lake RV Park

Drove down from Tallahassee, the capital of Fla having spent a couple of nights there. We had traveled the Panhandle Coast last yr, but never visited the capital. We stayed at the Tallahassee RV Park...very pretty, lots of flowers, esp azaleas. It was a short trip to the places we wanted to see & managed to put extra miles circling & circling the car, while each of us were shouting & shaking our heads in despair. Finally we got the 4 sets of directions from 4 different folks & realised we were more or less back where we had started!!! Why...

Mar 23, 2013 - Pensacola (Blue Angels)

3/23/13, Saturday Early this morning, we moved over to the Blue Angels Naval Recreation Area. As the crow flies, it is 8 miles from Ft. Pickens, (across the water). But by road it is 29 miles!! We were fortunate to find a site where we have a view from our front window of the water. This is a nice RV park with full facilities. We were able to get all set up before it started raining this morning. We will be here for at least four nights. 3/24/13, Sunday We tried to go to Pensacola Beach today. But this was the first really nice, sunny,...

Mar 21, 2013 - Pensacola, FL (Ft. Pickens)

3/21/13, Thursday After leaving the gator farm, we passed through Alabama. We went through Mobile and saw the USS Alabama, at rest in Mobile Bay, a large battleship, now a "park". We crossed the Florida border and came to Pensacola. Through town, across a long bridge to Gulf Breeze, FL, across another bridge to Pensacola Beach and down a 7 mile narrow beach (on both sides of the road) arriving at Fort Pickens, part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore. The road to it has warnings about flooding and sand blowing on the road and that you...

Mar 9, 2013 - Pensacola, FL

We took off again across the terrible Louisiana highways heading for Florida traveling through Mississippi and Alabama. In Mobile, AL we had a terrible traffic tie up, but were able to see the disabled Carnival cruise ship that was stuck at sea for so long. They were obviously working on it as several bigs cranes were visible. We arrived about 10 miles out of Pensacola at Pensacola RV Park and will be staying for 5 nights at a rate of $34.00/night. Nice quiet campground and wonderful hosts/owners. Our first adventure was to take a drive out...

Feb 20, 2013 - Ok, so we only made it 100 miles today

Hellooooo Eveybody, Well, we did not leave Jelly Stone Park until noon. It had a great laundry that we did not find until the way out. So while our clothes were washing, Jocelyn spent 1 hour on the phone with Direct TV arguing about her bill. I felt sorry for the poor people with whom she was dealing. She won the battle though and they did not raise her bill by $20 a month for the same amount of service. While she was doing that, I took a walk and found two different sandals that someone had lost and they were both left feet. One was too...

Feb 15, 2013 - Beautiful water!

It was pretty chilly this morning, but the sun was out and by the time we got across the causeway to Navarre Beach, I had to stop at the Stroom (see photo) and get rid of some layers of clothing. Then we stopped at the beach in the Gulf Shores National Seashore and talked to some people from Alberta there. Without our asking, they suggested riding the Icefields Parkway, since they live in that area. They also mentioned the Numtijah Lodge and the bike tour around Lake Pend Oreille in Idaho. What do you think of that Deb and Ian? ;-) We have...

Feb 4, 2013 - first day on the road

We left Orlando this morning {yes this MORNING} and traveled northwest thru Ocala and along route 27 to Chiefland then route 19 to Salem, Perry & Lamont. This area seems very depressed. Closed motels and restaurants everywhere. The highway was 2 lanes in each direction and well maintained but overkill for the amount of traffic.This area is much poorer than the rest of Florida . We are spending the night in Marianna FL. Tomorrow we are off to Panama City and the Gulf coast ps today we crossed the Suwannee and the Tallahatchie rivers. someone...

Jan 30, 2013 - Stormy weather

Yesterday we started off through Gulf State Park. Very cool area, with ospreys and their nests, and other birds. Some impressive viewing platforms are being built for birders. Then we rode over to the beach. We did not go out on the pier. They wanted $2 each for that and we are cheap. But the beach was beautiful, with fair surf and pretty clear water. Lots more brown pelicans. From the top of one of the two bridges we climbed, we watched a man fishing while a great blue heron stood a few feet away. The man offered the bird a fish and after...

Nov 29, 2012 - Naval Air Museum visit.

PENSACOLA RV PARK, PENSACOLA,FL......THURSDAY It was close to 0900 when we got to stirring today. After breakfast and coffee I re-installed the running light lens on the coach. Edie did the housekeeping and we were ready to visit the National Naval Air Museum at the Pensacola Naval Air Station. It's about 9 miles from our park, so we were there and inside by 1045. Had to go through the military gate to get to it, but it was a quick check. I have posted a record number of pictures today, because they do the best job of describing the...