Dang RV

Off to another Coast to Coast campground, Indian Cove. It is very clearly a membership campground, especially on the weekends when the staff start towing lots of trailers and golf carts out of storage and set them up on sites for their owners to whip in for the weekend. The facilities are very nice with 3 large outdoor pools, adult lounge, gym, lots of group picnic shelters, wifi at an extra charge, 24 hour security gate, playgrounds, organized activities, boat launch, and canals weaving through the campground that lead to the James River. If you like kayaks and canoes, or even small boats the place is wonderful! I met one lady who said she lives nearby and I didn’t understand why she would spend so much money to be a member of a park but after a week there, it makes perfect sense. The pools, gym, and boating are certainly worth it.

Nearby is the boardwalk, the excellent ocean beach area, lots of museums, even more shopping and food, bridge/tunnels such as the Chesapeake Bay bridge/tunnel which takes you underwater, and the naval air station. You have to LOVE the Navy to live in Virginia Beach. They fly sooo many sorties with take-offs and landings nearly every minute during the day that it is very noisy in town. The campground was much quieter.

I didn’t do the Chesapeake bridge which charges a huge toll but I did go over/through another which was a lot of fun to get to Yorktown and Jamestown for a day of siteseeing. Another cool thing to do is take a boat tour of the harbor to see all the Navy ships and other ships since this is near the port of Norfolk.

No tour of North Carolina would be complete without seeing the Outer Banks or the OBX as the locals call it. The Outer Banks is the home of legends; Kittyhawk and the Wright Brothers who first proved man could fly, the Atlantic ocean and the Intercoastal Waterway, so many shipwrecks they are nearly on top of each other, the famous Cape Hatteras lighthouse, Uboats, Blackbeard the pirate, Albermarle historic highway, the lost colony of Roanoke and Virgina Dare the first English child born in the new world, the wreck of the ironclad The Monitor. It is also the home of fun where water sports abound, tour boats, fishing, camping, kite flying, etc.

Getting out onto the islands is a bit scary. Following my GPS, I drove out there on Highway 64. It brings you up to a 2 lane bridge that rises up a bit so you can’t see what is over the top. As soon as you get over the top, you find yourself driving on a bridge that goes on forever over water with no land in sight! Even my GPS screen was solid blue (water). You are left to hope there actually is land out there somewhere, that the bridge is fully intact all the way over, that a storm will not suddenly pop up. This is the Intercoastal Waterway. When you have a 7,000 pound trailer attached to you that is sure to drag you to the bottom in the water, it is a very sobering experience but one I would not have wanted to miss.

When you finally reach Roanoke, stop at the visitor’s center on the right. They have all the info you could possibly want on the area. Grab lots of brochures and coupons there before proceeding.

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Waited a long time for this one. I’ve always heard it was quite a great seaside community and playground. It IS! If you ever get the chance to vacation here, take it. You will not be disappointed. There is plenty to do and see for both adults and the wee ones with watersports such as parasailing and wave runner rentals, boat tours, the beach, bunches of dinner shows and other shows, Broadway on the Beach, plenty of camping, miniature golf places on every block, beachwear and souvenir stores, great places to dine, 2 state parks, etc.

Camping here can be pretty expensive especially with an accomodation tax on all camp sites and hotel rooms which is very high. I stayed at the Myrtle Beach State Park which was the cheapest at $28/night total. It is a forest on the beach. Great combination! I went without reservations but I highly recommend not doing as I do, call first or book online. At least one of the restrooms was still the old state park community shower type which I detest but others were more modern and they do have a laundromat. No wifi there but my Sprint aircard worked perfectly even among all the trees. There are some sites where a satellite TV dish will work. Don’t ask them. They don’t know which. I got it to work on the back row of sites. Watch your stuff in the park. Someone stole my yellow wheel chalks when I was moving from one site to another.

If you are only going for a weekend, then you might also consider the other area RV parks which have indoor and outdoor swimming pools, a lazy river at Pirateland, ponds, golf cart rentals, etc. I believe there is a golf cart rental service that will deliver to the state park as well. Another great choice, if you can get an open date, is the Coast to Coast park there for only $10/night if you are a member of C2C.

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I belong to a group for single RVers to talk and enjoy each other’s company without spouses getting uptight or anyone looking for a date. It is not a dating group. We have a chatroom and MSN group online where we exchange info, issues, and solutions about RVing alone. Now and then someone plans a GTG (get together) somewhere and anyone who can attends the week long event. Since I happened to be in the area this year, I joined the East Coast GTG this week.

One thing you need to know, there is lots and lots of food at these so bring food that can be shared. If you can cook and barbecue, great! If not, bring what you can for someone else to cook. Dinner last night was made up of leftovers and I will take their leftovers anytime. It was delicious. The people are very genial and even went so far as to run out during dinner to offer help to a woman who was just coming into the park alone and trying to get her huge Class A into a spot. Of course they also made sure to invite her to dinner and chat her up to get her home state, etc. LOL

They actually have a banner they send to each GTG to be signed by all the attendees. They add little decorations for each GTG as well to it.

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Another day I went to see the Ocmulgee National Monument. Here, the Creek Indians once made their home hundreds of years ago. They used earthen mounds for their earth lodge where it is believed meetings were held, for their temple (no structure on top now)which is still holy ground to Indians today, and for their funeral services. Under another mound furrowed rows were found possibly corn rows.

The museum houses many artifacts and tools from the site and some evidence of their culture. There may not be a lot here to look at but it was still interesting to go in the earth lodge and see the seats built into an earthen shelf that runs around the outer edge of the room, the fire pit, and what actually looks like a stage. The entrance is very small so be sure to hunch down.

I couldn’t stand being so close to the Andersonville Confederate war prison site without checking it out. While the structures were gone long ago, archaeologists have mapped out the site and partial replicas and markers are in place to show a taste of it. The National Prisoners of War museum there fills in the rest. Keep in mind, that while this prison may be the most notorius during the Civil War, that is not to say that Union prisons were that much better. Neither side made any preparations for POWs before running off to war.

The prison was built to house 10,000. It began filling up even before it was finished. They did add more space eventually though still not enough for the 45,000 prisoners there at the end of the war. No housing or bedding was provided. The food was scarce. Water came in through a small stream which was downhill from the guards camp (a poor layout) and full of pestilence. Despite pleas from both commandants, supplies were channeled to fighting soldiers and not to enemy captives.

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Yep. I found the town where the movie was shot and the actual Whistle Stop Cafe. The Rally was offering a tour which did not fit into my schedule so I drove up to Juliette on my own. It is a very tiny spot in the road next to several train tracks. While I was there, at least 5 trains passed by.

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Ahhh. My very first rally. I have heard about these for years but this is the first one I attended. I wasn’t sure what to expect. I was hoping it wasn’t just another RV show as I have attended numerous of those and I truly love living in my current trailer with no desire to change. Happily it wasn’t.

First thing I learned was that when they say just follow the signs, don’t count on it. They did have signs at the freeway exits and turns from there but if you come in another way, no signs at all. I managed to find my way in any way. Muwahaha.

Registration was very well laid out and handled. I got my packet full of goodies and a new lanyard to keep with a badge hanging from it that tells everyone my name, state, and emergency info if I decided to drop dead while walking around the enormous fairgrounds. They also had free open computer terminals setup in there if you needed to check your email or browse something. For fun, another station was giving out stackable ribbons to add to your badge to show what groups you belong so such as Good Sam, Coast to Coast, Camping World President’s Club, Trailer Life Magazine, etc. They made it pretty easy to get to know one another fast.

They had seminars scheduled all day every day which is what I was looking for. Experts, including people who have been full-timing for 45 years, came in to teach us the basics like maintaining tires and tank systems and how to handle banking and mail on the road as well as more interesting subjects such as how to travel Canada and Alaska and what to expect, what Tracks tours are like, and so on. I believe I saw an RV cooking class and arts and crafts class on the schedule as well. The speakers were excellent and backed up their presentations with books (many of which they had written) and DVDs which you could purchase afterward.

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