Outbound trip complete!

Oops, gotta get the blog caught up!

On Wednesday morning, August 19, we played at the beach in our RV park for as long as we could. 

Check-out was at 11, so we left then and decided to drive to Pensacola Beach (which, interestingly, is not in Pensacola but rather on Santa Rosa Island). I wasn't familiar with the geography before we got here, so I have included a map to make it easier to understand:

The red arrows are the route we took to get to our RV park on Tuesday. We crossed Pensacola Bay on a causeway and drove down the peninsula to Navarre, where we camped for the night at Emerald Beach RV park. The green arrows show the route we took on Wednesday, after we left the park. We crossed Santa Rosa Sound on another causeway and then drove west along Santa Rosa Island, a long, skinny barrier island between the peninsula where stayed and the Gulf of Mexico. It was a beautiful drive, unlike anything I have seen before. The island is so skinny you could see the Sound out the right window and the Gulf out the left window as we drove. I have never seen such white sand!

(These pictures are all of the Gulf side.) It was strange to see something white drifted across the road that wasn't snow!

We found a place to park the RV for a few minutes and got out to dip our toes in the Gulf of Mexico waters:

(Please excuse my very unattractive legs...)

The water was lovely and warm, the beaches were practically empty, and I could have stayed there forever! But we had a long haul to get to Athens, so we left after a few minutes. We drove back across the causeway to Pensacola and then continued on up through the Florida panhandle, through Alabama, across Georgia through Atlanta, and finally (after countless rounds of Heads Up) arrived in Athens about 9:00 that night. 

Is it weird to say that the temperatures of Georgia are a relief? We are lucky enough to be experiencing cooler, rainy weather here, and it feels soooo nice!

Debbie had a lovely dinner waiting for us when we arrived, so we ate, and chatted, and worked on Debbie's jigsaw puzzle. Then LaMar and Scott got the motorhome parked in Scott's horse pasture, and we went to bed.We only awoke to the loud crash of thunder once in the middle of the night, and LaMar and Sierra traded beds so Sierra could sleep with me where I could "protect" her from the thunder.

We spent the day yesterday visiting family. LaMar's mom lives with his sister ViAnn in a beautiful place in Winder, Georgia, and I have decided I need a woodland  in my yard like she has:

It was so peaceful and calming just to sit on her covered porch, feel the cool breeze, and gaze at the woods! 

We got some authentic southern BBQ takeout (complete with pulled pork, baked beans, and fried okra) and sat and visited for a long time, while the kids explored the woods and played with all the entertainment ViAnn and Currie have in their basement (ping pong, foozball, darts, etc.). Then we came back to Scott and Debbie's house, and I cracked the whip on everyone to get the motorhome cleaned up a bit. It looks muuch better now.

Today, we are thinking of going to Helen, in the "mountains" of Georgia. We were going to tube the Chatahoochie River, but the weather is not looking like it is going to cooperate, so we will just do touristy stuff in the all the shops. Hope to see more family this evening. It's nice to stay in one place for a few days!