Week In Review

We've been busy this past week with visiting family and doing a little shopping.  We celebrated granddaughter Stephanie's birthday this past Sunday with dinner at a nice Mexican restaurant in Concord, NC.  Her siblings were all there to help her celebrate.  One of her brothers informed the waiters at the restaurant that it was her birthday and they had a special treat for her.  They sang a modified happy birthday to her after they put a huge sombrero on her head.  They beat on the sombrero with paper napkins and made a lot of noise.  Then they put some whipped cream on a napkin and smeared it on her face.  Now Stephanie is the princess of the family and everyone was waiting to see how she took it.  She came through in the clutch and was a good sport about it.

Shawn & Stephanie in front and Griffin & Ryan in back.

 Our great grandson Griffin is 22 months old and wasn't too happy about them treating Stephanie like they did and started shaking and crying.  It took a while for him to calm down and when he saw she wasn't crying also, he calmed down.  He is a very sensitive little fellow.

Monday grandson Jared and Hannah came to our motor home for a homemade Chili dinner.  This was in the works for a couple visits here, but one thing or another kept it from happening.  Well, we finally worked it out and had a very nice time.

We visited with Larry Jr. and family and had dinner with them on Tuesday and Wednesday.  One night it was great steaks and the next time it was vegetarian burritos and a great dessert.  I think they are trying to fatten me up for something.  

Today the crew all gathered at Barbara & Henry's for Thanksgiving and everyone brought something for the meal.  There sure wasn't a shortage of great food for all of us.  We all managed to stuff ourselves and then waddle back to the couch for some football.

Ryan, Grant and Barbara

Barbara, Larry Jr., Jane and Sean

Panoramic view of table and family.

The kitchen table had been moved into the dining room to extend the tables.  Afterward the younger members of the family moved the table back to the kitchen.  Henry always looks forward to removing the leaves in the table and putting them away after a large gathering.  He is one happy fellow now that the table is back in the right place and back to it's normal size.

We have a lot to be thankful for and were able to enjoy the day with people we love.  It's hard to top a day like today and only the fact that Cassie & Family, Jared & Hannah,  plus Tom & Darlene were unable to join us kept it from being perfect.  Maybe next year we can all be there together enjoying Thanksgiving.

I hope all our family and friends had a Happy Thanksgiving like us and were able to enjoy it with ones they love.

Gone Girl & P F Chang

Friday

Barbara & Henry invited us out for dinner and a movie and treated us as an anniversary present.  I am beginning to enjoy these birthday and anniversary presents and can see where it would be great to have each year.  Thanks you two for the past couple days.  It's been great.

We started off by going to an early dinner at P F Chang's restaurant and were seated very quickly.  The last time we tried a movie and Chang's we did it with the movie first and then the restaurant.  That didn't work out since we had over an hour wait to get seated in the restaurant.  This time we each ordered different meals and then shared them among the 4 of us.  Actually, two Mongolian Beef dinners were ordered, but the other meals were Sesame Chicken and Sweet & Sour Pork.  All the entrees were great and we had a great time.

The girls went birthday shopping after dinner and we stopped by the theater to purchase the tickets for Gone Girl.  Henry and I then sat around the food court and waited for the girls to come back from spreading the money around.  Then it was on to see the movie.

The movie is about a modern marriage and the problems that come up in it.  I won't go into any details, but it was an interesting plot and we enjoyed seeing how the plot unveiled as the movie went along.  It's worth seeing if you like dramas and many different twists as it progresses to it's conclusion.  See it if you get a chance.



Saturday

We stopped by Larry & Jane's to pick up Grant for an overnight with us in the motor home.  Then we went to Barb & Henry's for the girls to work on Christmas cards and the guys to watch some football.  A lot of football!  Great grandson Griffin was there and he and Grant played together and had a great time.  

It was a good football weekend for me since the three college teams I follow all won.  Maryland won over Michigan, Illinois over Penn State and Arizona put a hurting on Utah.  It is rare for all three to win since Illinois is in a down year for the team.  I'll take these days whenever I can.

We had a late dinner and then returned to the motor home for the night.  Quiet day, but welcome since we are worn out from the previous days.  

Our friend Judy Randol is celebrating a birthday today and we wish her a happy birthday.  I won't tell you how old she is, but it's over 39 and holding.  

That was our last couple days, how were yours?

Trans Siberian Orchestra (TSO)

TSO is one of Gerry's favorite groups and has been trying to attend one of their concerts for years.  It seems that we were always on the wrong side of the US when their tour came through an area.  This year she lucked out and they are in Charlotte the same time as we are.  Our daughter Barbara knows how Gerry enjoys the group, so she and Henry bought tickets to the concert for our birthdays.  Now that is a real birthday gift and we loved the concert.  They also are fans and we met for dinner before the concert.

Our first stop was at Ri Ra Irish Pub for an early dinner and happy hour.  The Pub is just a few blocks from the Time Warner Arena where the concert was being held, so it was very convenient.  We managed to snag a table even though the place was packed.  The food was good, service fine and the place had a great atmosphere.  

Henry & Barb

Ri Ra bar area

 After fortifying ourselves with adult beverages and good food we headed for the Arena in time to be seated.  As you can see by our being bundled up, it was a little chilly out there.

 

Henry, Barb, Gerry & Me.

I made the mistake of pointing out the souvenir stand to Barbara & Gerry and they made a beeline for it.  They had a nice grey hoody and Barbara bought it for Gerry.  You can see them near the post with Gerry having on an aqua jacket.

 

 Henry mentioned to me to bring ear plugs since the group would be loud, very loud.  Since my hearing isn't the greatest, I decided to skip the ear plugs.  I do like my rock music loud and the louder the better.  TSO didn't disappoint me on this issue.

We had great seats next to the stage and had an unobstructed view of the show.  As a matter of fact, when they shot off their flames on stage we could feel the heat.  It's been a while since Gerry and I went to a live concert and the music almost seems secondary to all the lights, fog and fire going off.  It was great!

The bars over the stage all went up once the concert began and even the stage went up and out over the audience.  The photo below shows the guitarists being elevated over the audience.
 

I'm glad we weren't sitting under that giant boom with the fiddle player standing above us.  It looked like an accident waiting to happen, but it worked great.

 Did I mention laser lights, strobes, flashing lights all going off at the same time.  No?  Well they did and it was a sensory overload with the music coming out at 140 decibels.  Great!

 All the musicians seemed to have very long hair and flicking their head back and forth seemed to be an integral part of their act.  It was hard to get a picture of them without hair covering their faces.  They sure could play their guitars and instruments though.

 The theme of the concert was about someone reading letters in the attic about Christmas and the gentleman on stage read passages throughout the concert.  He had a deep voice and did a great job.

The TSO played non-stop for 2 1/2 hours and gave an outstanding concert.  If you haven't ever heard/seen them, I would highly recommend attending one of their concerts.  I know we will be on the lookout in the future for them and put them back on our bucket list of things to do.

TSO donates $1.00 for each ticket to a local charity and a hospital was the recipient for this concert.  They also recruit local musicians to play with them and had 4-5 of them from the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra.  They took a bow at the concert end.  The music was so loud and booming out there, so it was impossible to pick them out, but I imagine they did a great job.

We reluctantly left our seats at the concert end and made our way back to the parking garage where we paid our $16.00 to park and exited by a rear entrance.  The front entrance was a mess with all the people walking on the street and we quickly made it out the back way.  Then it was a short ride back to the motor home and some relaxation.  I was too tired to blog last night, so this is coming to you a day later.

That was our big adventure for the day. 

Goodbye Hollywood

We extended a day at the park in Hollywood, SC to avoid arriving in the Charlotte, NC area in time for a 14 degree night.  That is colder than I want to subject ourselves and the motor home to.  Good move on our part.

We did leave today (Wednesday) for Charlotte and had an easy drive once we got by a traffic jam where I-526 & I-26 meet north of Charleston.  As far as we could tell it was about a broken down car on the entrance ramp to I-26.  I guess they pushed it off the roadway and traffic began to move after 20-25 minutes.  Smooth sailing from that point on.  We did follow an 18 wheeler for a few miles since the truck was going on and off the interstate at 62 mph.  I was concerned that the driver was falling asleep or having some kind of medical problem and didn't want them to rear end us if it got worse, so I was reluctant to pass the truck.  Finally, I passed the truck and the woman driver could barely see over or thru the steering wheel.  She must have gotten her CDL in Illinois a few years ago when you could just buy one without the proper qualifications.

Tom Johnson Campground near the Lowes Speedway was our destination and we arrived before rush hour and that made for a less stressful drive.  Once we got settled in I sent directions to our campsite to the kids since this is a departure from the park we've been staying in the past 3-4 years.  The previous park has gone more to being full of pipeline workers and some rather seedy looking characters.  Plus, they have been parking us in a very narrow site with limited parking.  

After a quick dinner we went over to Barb & Henry's for a card crafting party.  I went, but Gerry was the participant.  I find it easier to just buy a card when I need one, assuming I remember the occasion.  There were 3 mother/daughter combinations and one mother/daughter in law combo.  They started working on the cards at 6:30 PM and worked until after 11:00 PM.  All seemed to have a great time and declared the party a success.

In the meantime, Henry and I went over to grandson Sean's home anf visited with him.  Sean is a sports fanatic and I knew we could watch some basketball or something interesting. We wound up watching the Charlotte Hornets play the Indiana Pacers in a rather lackluster game that ended with a tip in the last .1 second by a Pacers player.  It was a stunning finish to the game and reminded Sean and me of the NC State National Championship game many years ago that was decided on a last minute tip in.  

We left Sean and it was back to Barb's to watch some more tv and the Arizona-UC Irvine game on tv.  They have a great tv package and receive 100s of channels including the PAC-12 transmission.  We can't get the Arizona game in Tucson most of the time due to it being blacked out locally, even though they have sellouts.  Arizona has two 7'0" players and a 6'11" player so you would think their height alone would be enough.  However, UC-Irvine has a 7'6" and a 7'3" player to match AZs height.  Thankfully they weren't of the same caliber as the AZ players so it wasn't a BIG problem. 

Arizona looked terrible and were losing 46-43 when they went on a great run and wound up winning 71-54.  UC-Irvine sort of fell apart when Arizona turned up the pressure on them.  After seeing them in action, I am not sure Arizona is the #2 team in the nation.  Hopefully they will improve by years end.

The ladies left and then it was clean up time at Barb's.  We finally left after midnight and made the drive back to the motor home.  It was cold here so I turned on the Aqua Hot heater and warmed the unit up quickly.  Finally we turned down the temp and went to bed.  I can just barely remember my head hitting the pillow and slept 7 hours straight.  That doesn't happen very often.

We got some bad news that our friends Linda & Sherwin had to return to Maine for the winter.  Now that my knees are in better shape we had plans to do more things with them this season.  Hope they don't get any of the 5' snow storms up there this winter to contend with.  See you guys somewhere down the road.

Gerry's sister Darlene & BIL Tom had a sad Sunday with their beloved dog Kokee who went to doggy heaven.  She had a good 12 1/2 years with people who loved her and that is all you can ask for.  I still remember the first time we met the dog when we were still living in our house in Maryland.  LOL  (Inside joke)

Just another sunny day on the road.  

Geocaching Day At The Beach

The weather forecast for today was rain, wind and tornado warnings.  Just your typical day in the Charleston area.  I checked a couple forecasts and decided it wasn't going to be that bad and we made our plans accordingly.

We were drawn to Edisto Beach once again today to take advantage of a semi-nice day with warm temperatures.  It was in the mid 70s and nice except that it was windy and rained a little while we were there.  That didn't stop us for searching for some geocaches in between the rain drops.  There was a beach series of caches that we were searching for and they usually aren't that difficult.  These proved to be more difficult than the ratings assigned to them, but we managed to find a number of them.

It was lunch time and we stopped at Whaley's, a local bar/restaurant for a bite to eat.  For a change, Gerry ordered a flounder sandwich and I went with a prime rib sandwich.   It was good, but was the strangest prime rib that I've ever eaten.  The eatery had a unique feature about it that you don't see very often.  The bathroom was outside and it was raining so you got wet if you used it.  At least they had a bathroom.

The highlight of the day was a walk on the beach around sunset and taking a number of photos.  The surf was up and eating away at the sand with steep drop offs.  We had the beach to ourselves and Gerry managed to pick up some shells.  I imagine the beach will be littered with shells in the morning after the surf settles down, but a trip down for this isn't in our plans.

It was interesting to see the contrast between Tybee Island with all their $2.00/hour parking signs all over the place and then to visit Edisto Beach and find 38 beach access points with free parking.  Of course Hilton Head Island has about 2-3 access points and no parking in the area.  All within 90 miles of each other and which one do you think we felt most welcome at and visited a couple times while we were here.

The remainder of the blog will be dedicated to displaying some of the photos we took while we were there.  I hope you enjoy them.

No money trees, but they do have wine trees.

It turned out to be a nice day after all and we didn't have a tornado so that made it perfect.  Now we have a cold weather forecast to deal with, but hopefully it won't get down as low as forecasted.

That was our day, how was yours?

Lazy Days Around Here

Gerry and I have been asked many times if we are on a vacation when we stop in restaurants or touristy place.  We always say we live full time in our motor home and almost everyone expresses a desire to do the same when they retire.  While it isn't for everyone, it is a lifestyle that we prefer at the present time.  One day we will have to hang up the keys and settle down, but we don't want to do that until we grow old.  LOL

Most people compare our lifestyle to a vacation, however we don't consider it that way.  We do tour new places when we get a chance, but many times it is like living in a house.  There are chores to be done, repairs to be made and some days when we just sit around and do nothing all day.  Today was such a day for us.  It was raining for a good part of the day and chilly, so geocaching was out for the day.  Gerry read on her Kindle and I watched some football and worked on organizing our 65,000+ digital photos.  Exciting stuff!  

We are planning on driving back to the Charlotte, NC area on Wed or Thursday.  Barb & Henry picked up tickets to the Trans Siberian Orchestra for them and also us and we are going see the group on  Thursday night.  We'd like to drive back a little sooner, but they are calling for temps in the low 20s and I don't like to be in weather that cold.  We can keep the inside of the motor home comfy with no problem, but some of the outside water pipes are a little exposed.  We've never had a problem and want to keep it that way.  The outside water hose from the spigot has frozen a few times, but hasn't ever broken. 

That was our exciting weekend and hopefully Monday will be more interesting.  It's either visit Charleston downtown or possibly do some geocaching in the area.  We've been to Charleston a number of times and love the area, but have run out of new things to see around here.  At least they have cold beer and good seafood.

With that, I will close for now.  Hope you all had a great weekend.

TOOGOODOO Road

One thing that we notice in our travels is all the hard to pronounce names for towns and streets.  We came across one of the strangest names on our way to Edisto Island, SC today.  We weren't searching for the road, but it just cropped up and grabbed us.  Yes, that is the correct spelling for the road.  I wasn't able to find out what it means other than it may be an Indian term.  Try saying that word real fast five times. 

The weather forecast for today was highs in the mid 70s and Friday it is going to be a high of 53.  Brrrrrrr.  Of course. it is always relative when you talk about weather and Gerry's cousin Joanne in the Cleveland, OH area would be happy with these temps.  They are calling for temps down to the low 30s in a couple days, but we can handle that fine in the motor home.  I'm glad we aren't in the Cleveland area with this weather forecast and that our home has wheels.

Our destination was lunch at a seafood restaurant about 15 miles from here on the way to Edisto Island.  They have a short time period for lunch and we didn't want to hurry our lunch so we continued on to Edisto Island.  We drove through Edisto Island State Park to look at the campground.  The campground off the beach had some nice large sites that we could fit into nicely.  They are heavily wooded right along a marsh area.  The sites on the Atlantic Ocean aren't as nice, but they did have a number there also that were large enough for us.

The no-see-ums were terrible on the ocean side and they were chewing us up big time.  Once the tide goes out in the marshes, the no-see-ums come looking for food and that meant us.  I rate them up there with ticks and mosquitos as being the most hated insects.  That is one nice thing about Tucson, they don't have 2 of the three above pests and very few mosquitos.  Love it!

I tried out the new smartphone using my Geocaching.com app and found out there were about 40 geocaches in that small area.  We looked for one and weren't able to find it, but when I got back to the motor home I found that we were right on top of the cache.  Now we have to go back and find some of them.

We stopped at Captain Jimmy Bell's seafood restaurant on the way back and found out they didn't open until 5:00PM and it was only 4:30PM when we arrived in their vacant parking lot.  Oh Oh!  We decided to wait until they opened and sat on a bench in front of the restaurant.  

 

We only sat there a few minutes and one of the owners came out and invited us to wait inside.  We didn't want to be rude, so we accepted her invitation and went inside.  She said to pick out a table and asked if we wanted something to drink and we had a couple Landshark Lagers to help pass the time.  Captain Jimmy came out a couple times to make sure we were settled in and to talk with us.  Very friendly couple and the time went by quickly.

Gerry had a crab platter and since the only fish they had was flounder and I had that yesterday, I ordered the closet thing to a fish that I could find.  The hamburger was very tasty and the vegetable salad was great.  Gerry enjoyed her meal and said she would order it again if we return to the restaurant.  The waitress was very friendly and talked about her family and their life down in the Lowcountry of South Carolina.  We enjoyed the food and the attention we received from the three of them.  Highly recommended if you are in the area.

The men's room had an interesting sign on the wall pointing toward the urinal.  I tried to get a picture of the sign and urinal but wasn't able to fit it all in.  So, here is the sign.

I don't have any idea what all this was about, but thought it was interesting.  I will tell you that the sign in the urinal was a red target.  Let your imagination fill in the details.

Edisto Beach is quite long with a number of vacation homes for rent.  It seemed that every house on the beach was for sale or rent.  There weren't a lot of businesses on the Island so I imagine everyone brought in their own food, drinks and entertainment.

That was our day, how was yours? 

  

We Are Camping In Hollywood

Hollywood, South Carolina that is.  Hollywood is on the outskirts of Charleston, SC.  We made the long journey of 90 miles yesterday from our location near Savannah, GA to here.  It was an easy drive and we didn't run into any traffic problems.  Well, I did have to make a sudden stop to turn into the campground, but the driver behind me was alert and all is well.

We are camped at Lake-Aire RV park here in Hollywood in a Passport America park.  It is ok for the short term, but we don't think we'd like to spend a lot of time here.  The sites are narrow and either grass covered or in the case of ours, sand covered.  There seems to be a number of long term campers here, but overall it is fine for our immediate needs.

Our destination for today was Folly Beach and we picked it since it was a beautiful sunny and warm day.  We have one more day before the weather turns colder, but not bad.  No freezing weather in the forecast so that is good.

The traffic on the way to the beach was quite heavy and that was a surprise since it wasn't rush hour.  There was some new bridge construction, however that didn't slow us down.  Gerry went for a walk on the beach and found a few nice shells including a sand dollar in great shape.  The tide was out and she had a lot of sand to cover.

 We stopped at the nice County Park on the west end of the island and took advantage of the free parking there.  It was an easy walk from the parking lot to the water's edge.  I took a couple chairs out and we planned on sitting there a while and enjoying the views.  The no-see-ums were out in force and put an end to that idea.

Me in our nice chairs

Folly Beach

I heard some racket and turned around to find this kite sailing rig flying down the beach.  They had a gas powered engine and a small place to sit and seemed to be very maneuverable and the two flyers were zooming along and then shooting up in the air and turning in circles.

This flyer was more daring than the other one and was doing loops and flying very fast.  Now I have something else to add to my "bucket list" if I can find a kite big enough to keep me in the air.

Another reason for taking the trip to Folly Beach was to enjoy some great seafood.  We've been to Folly Beach before and ate at a restaurant on main street and thought it was ok, but nothing special.  This time we asked a man walking his dog where a nice seafood place was.  He lives there and said the best one was the Loggerhead Restaurant, so off we went to search for the place.  It was easy to find and we managed to find a parking space right next to the restaurant.

They had an outside deck about 18ft off the ground and we headed there.  It was somewhat like the Tiki Bars in the Florida Keys, but we weren't on the water.  That was ok, since it was happy hour and we managed to snare a couple adult drinks and had a great meal.  I had the flounder dinner (which was almost as good as grouper) and Gerry had a delicious seafood trio with shrimp, lobster ravioli and blue crab alfredo sauce covering the meal.  She loved it and said it was a meal to come back to in the future.

Loggerhead Tiki Bar & Restaurant

As usual, there were a large number of beach houses for sale along the side roads.  Some of them were huge and looked like small hotels.  They would be great for large families to congregate during the summer.  

The drive back to the motorhome went quicker since we were going against the traffic for half of the trip and then US 17 for the remainder.  Lots of traffic lights, but we made good time there, also.  All in all it was a nice afternoon on the beach and great food.  Life is good.

That was our day, how was yours?

Good Bye Savannah & US Marine Corp Birthday

We came to Savannah with the intention of staying 5-6 days and then moving on further south.  Well, we've been here 12 days and are heading north in the morning.  We've had such a good time exploring Savannah and the Lowcountry of South Carolina that we hate to leave.  I think we may come back next year and spend a month or two in the area and really check it out.

Today was  a R&R day and we worked on getting some small chores finished so we can get an early start in the morning.  Not too early, but sometime before noon.  It will be a short 90 mile drive up to Charleston, SC for a week and then back to Concord, NC for almost two weeks.  I hope the cold weather moves out of Concord before it is time to drive there.  In any case we will be fine since we have two heat pumps, a diesel aqua hot heater, fireplace and a space heater.  As long as we have electricity, we will stay warm.

Yesterday we visited with Don & Sharon Del Rosario for "Happy Hour" at their unit.  We started out in bright warm sunshine and wound up in the dark and cold.  We enjoyed hearing about their trip to the Canadian maritime provinces.  They had a great time and it sounds like they want to go back and that is a good sign. Gypsy & The Mariner   It is on our bucket list for the future if we can work it out.

The Hardeeville RV park in Levy, SC has been a great spot to hang around these past few days.  It doesn't have a pool, no shower & bath house, and doesn't have a rec center, but it suited us fine for our stay here.  It is convenient to Savannah, Hilton Head Island and Beaufort, SC.  If you are a Passport America member, then this is the place to stay in the Savannah area.

Our daughter in law Jane is the Executive Director for the Center for Prevention Services in Charlotte, NC and they are set up on Amazon.com/Amazon Smile to receive a small portion of purchases made though Amazon. If you use Amazon for shopping and would like to help out (at no cost to you - other than what you were going to purchase anyway), please choose her agency - Center for Prevention Services in Charlotte, NC - as your desired charity.

Gerry and I had the honor of attending a number of Marine Corp Birthday celebrations while I was in the Foreign Service overseas.  Today we celebrate the 239th birthday of the Marine Corp and wish we had an opportunity to attend the ball.

The last Ball we attended was in Costa Rica in 1991 prior to our leaving there in 1992.  The Ball was held at the Hotel Cariari Country Club in San Jose and we shared a table with Fernando & Helen Giacomin.  Fernando convinced (not hard to do) Gerry to dance with him and they cut a mean rug.

The ceremony was great as always and we had a ringside seat for the event.  It was impressive to see these young Marines in their dress uniforms marching in so proudly.  Semper Fi

 

That was our day and time in Levy, SC.  How was your day?       

The Pink Pig & Savannah National Wildlife Refuge

We've heard of the Pink Pig BBQ & Seafood restaurant and were surprised to see it was about a half mile from the campground.  They are known for their pork bbq, seafood and have a great reputation.  We decided to put their reputation to the test today and had lunch there.  One good sign was there were a lot of cars and trucks in the parking lot and almost all the tables were taken when we got there. 

The service was great and the staff was friendly and outgoing.  No grouchy people were there as far as we could see.  The outside isn't that impressive, but the inside was decorated with pink pigs, grey pigs and even a turkey.  If you like bbq, then this is the place to eat if you are in the Levy, SC area.  We will go back to this restaurant when we get a chance.

Gobble gobble!

 We ordered the pork bbq platter with coleslaw and brunswick stew and everything was great.  They serve a very large plateful of food and have a nice assortment of sauce for the bbq.  Gerry went traditional and I had a Gullah spice sauce which was great. 

Gerry couldn't finish her lunch and we took the leftovers back to the motor home and then went geocaching for a while.  We wound up at the Savannah Nat'l Wildlife Refuge and took the 4 mile drive through the marsh and low country and managed to see some gators and birds.  It was an interesting drive and we turned on our radio to AM 1610 to listen to a broadcast about the refuge and what was at each of the 4 audio spots.

"Savannah NWR, which lies on both the South Carolina and Georgia sides of the Savannah River just upriver from the city of Savannah, Georgia, was established April 6, 1927. The refuge 28,168 acres include bottomland hardwoods and tidal freshwater marsh. A 3,000 acre fringe area of upland hardwoods exists along the eastern boundary. An additional 3,000 acres forming an impoundment system are managed for migratory wading birds and waterfowl. These freshwater impoundments were formerly the rice fields of plantations dating back to the mid or late 1700's. Many of the dikes enclosing these pools were originally built during the rice culture era.

The refuge is home to a large variety of wildlife including: ducks, geese, wading birds, shorebirds and several endangered and/or threatened species including bald eagles, wood storks, manatees and shortnose sturgeon. The refuge also provides nesting areas for wood ducks, great horned owls, bald eagles, osprey and swallow-tailed kites among others."

Spanish Moss covering old trees.

Old cistern from long gone Plantation house.

Prime gator spot

Rice field trunks were used to control the level of water when the area was a rice plantation.  There were notches in the post where they could vary the amount of water coming into the rice field.  There are still a few of the old controls still left in the marsh.

We managed to claim an earthcache today during our drive through the marsh.  Caches have been banned from most National Parks, Refuges, etc for some reason.  At one time virtual caches could be placed but they are banned also.  Earthcaches are like virtual caches in that you have to answer questions about the cache, but there isn't a physical cache at the location.  This cache had a few questions and also accepted photos of the cachers at the location.  Here I am below with proof of me finding the cache along with answering the questions. 

After the drive thru the refuge we decided to head back to the motor home and relax for a while.  Gerry wanted to read and I wanted to watch some football.  I haven't seen a complete game all year and high scores seem to be the norm for now.

That was our day, how was yours?