Our Travel Blog

Blue skies and 61°F at wake up time, which may have been later than usual due to the clocks going forward! By mid afternoon we were up to to 72°F.

After breakfast Lyn headed over to do the laundry, but returned in a couple of minutes because all the machines were in use. I decided to give the truck a once over to make sure all the fluids were present and correct.

Just before lunch Lyn tried a second attempt at the laundry and managed to get a machine. It was ideal weather for lunch outside, the wind had swung round to the south which meant that it was warm and also it didn’t bring the smell of the paper mill with it.

After lunch Lyn headed back to the laundry to move stuff into the dryer and we headed out for our walk. We met another Ontario couple, they live in Kemptville. This is second couple from there that we have met at this campground. We finally broke the 1.5 mile mark today.

After we got back Lyn headed out to pick up the laundry, and I started doing something I had wanted to complete before we left; an inventory of tools, cables and other electronic gizmo’s that reside in the trailer. Hopefully by doing this, and not losing the list like I did last year, I won’t finish up bringing stuff down from home that is already here!

With the change to daylight savings time it was nice to be able to BBQ in daylight, rather than under the lights from the trailer. It wasn’t quite warm enough to eat outside, but hopefully that will change before we leave.

Another warm morning with clear blue skies to start off the weekend. We managed to get into the low 60’s by mid-afternoon.

After breakfast and the mandatory check of our computers I decided to do some more waxing and polishing of the trailer. The weather was ideal, warm sunshine but a cool breeze to stop me from overheating. With a mixture of working and nattering with the neighbour I finally finished the whole trailer; completed almost two weeks ahead of schedule and under budget. Projects are easy to manage when you can set your own time lines and budget, bit like being back at work really.

After talking and working I took a well deserved break, after all it is the week-end.

After lunch we took our daily walk and dropped into the office to check for mail, yes I know it is Saturday, but unlike Canada Post, the US postal service have a Saturday delivery. A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that I had ordered something from e-Bay that had been sent to our previous campground, this package was forwarded to me 10 days ago from Alabama but had not arrived. Well it was in the office today; when I got back to the trailer I ran the tracking number through the computer and it turns out that the package had been mailed out from Foley, got as far as Mobile, was delivered back to the old campground at Foley where it was once again redirected to us in Georgia! Anyway, all that counts is that it made it before we left here. Talking of leaving we will be home in two weeks, please arrange it so there is no more snow and cold weather after our arrival.

A blue skied sunny day again. Still not the warmest, but dry and sunny. We made it up to 60°F.

One more part of the trailer got waxed and polished today. Two more parts to go, then the truck may even get a coat of wax!

After lunch we headed out to Jekyll Island again. This time we went to a small exhibit run by the University of Georgia. On display was some wildlife that had made the shoreline its home. There was a mix of turtles, terrapins, snakes and fish including small shark.

After visiting the exhibit we headed over to the beach for our daily walk. The wind was doing its thing off the ocean making it a cool and bracing exercise. Next we drove up to the far end of the island to buy something that Lyn had seen previously for Noah. The store was at driftwood beach, where we visited a couple of weeks ago. At that time we walked through all the driftwood that had washed up on the beach, today we got there at high-tide, there was no beach to be seen, just the tops of the larger pieces of driftwood showing through the water.

On the way back we stopped off at the art gallery on the island so Lyn could go to look at an art and craft show. I was surprised when Lyn returned just a few minutes later. Evidently all she saw there was art but no craft.

Back at the campsite we were sitting outside drinking coffee when one of the craft group members came over to talk about the crafts at the art and craft show! Turns out the crafts were all upstairs in the gallery, an area that was closed last time we visited.

Later in the afternoon I got an e-Mail from one of my loyal readers(!) saying there was an issue with the site and the blog was not readable. Sure enough when I logged in the page was a jumbled mess of code. I did some snooping around, but could not find anything obviously wrong. As a final move I phoned my web-hosting company, fearing the worst. Twenty minutes later we were back in business, the support I got was great which is unusual these days. It turns out one of the control files for the blog had got hacked into earlier in the afternoon. For those of you prone to internet paranoia, logging into this blog when it was “misbehaving” would pose no threat to your computer!

I really can’t keep up with the weather, we climbed up to the mid 60’s today and by by mid  afternoon it was very pleasant sitting out in the sun.

Thursday, as usual, is shopping day so we went to the local supermarket this morning. The only problem with shopping is the fact that once we put all the goodies in the fridge and freezer they are both absolutely full for the next couple of days. Oh the hardships of camping with a small fridge!

After lunch we managed our longest walk yet at around 1.4 miles. At least walking up and down all the lanes in the park we get to see all the big RV’s and where they come from. There is a reasonable spread of states and provinces represented here. On the Canadian front we have rigs from BC, ON, NB and NS.

Following the walk we sat around outside in the warmth, content as usual in doing very little!

The furnace came back to life last night. A cold front went through which gave us a little rain and a lot of wind. Wake up temperature was 45°F with a high of 54°F. The sky was clear and sunny, but the main factor was the wind, it was gusting above 40mph / 65 kph for most of the day, which puts it well into gale force territory.

Figuring it was too cold to wax, polish or walk I decided the truck needed some TLC (it kept sending me messages saying “Change Engine Oil”), so I headed off to the local mechanics to get an oil and filter change. Now that the Canadian and US dollars are fairly close in value, it is obvious that a number of items are cheaper down here. The oil change would have cost  $110 at home, it was $79 here. Before any one has a heart attack over $100 oil changes, the truck tales 2.5 gallons (11 litres) of oil!

The other thing I did while I was out was to sort out storage for the trailer. We have decided to leave the trailer down here rather than drag it back up north with us. This came about after a lot of discussion and research on our planned Alaska trip next year. In the end, we decide we will not take the trailer up to Alaska; however we will still go there. A couple of major factors featured in the decision. As usual money reared its ugly head, and a little calculating showed that for the price of the diesel fuel alone that would be needed for the trip we could:

1. Fly to Vancouver
2. Take a cruise to Alaska
3. Rent a Car for 2 weeks in Alaska
4. Fly back to Ottawa

As we had always wanted to do the cruise, this caught our attention. Once we got talking about the trip, neither of us were overly keen on the long drive involved to get there (about 12 days straight driving). We’d also heard from a number of people that the roads weren’t the best, and in many places were gravel which could be pretty taxing on the truck, trailer and driver. So, the decision was made.

Woke up to 65°F temperatures, things are looking up. We reached 80°F by mid afternoon, unfortunately the forecast suggests it back to the mid 50’s tomorrow. Much of the morning was spent trying to sort out an odd but not too pleasant problem. In a nutshell gas was building up in the black water tank and only vented when the toilet was flushed (if I had to suffer fixing this, you can suffer by reading it!). Everything else was working properly so I figured the problem had to be a blocked vent pipe. Unfortunately there is no access to the vent pipe other than from the roof, so up I went armed with a hosepipe and pointed it down the pipe, and turned on the water. After many such flushings success was indicated by the vent pipe venting.  I still don’t know how the pipe got blocked because I am sure it must enter at the top of the tank, another of life’s little mysteries.

Lyn  went off to her craft group in the afternoon, and I got back to waxing and polishing the trailer, only two more sessions required and it should be finished. I took advantage of the warm weather by sitting outside trying to complete one of the more difficult Sudoku puzzles yet. The puzzle is still winning.

We celebrated the return of the warm weather with a barbecue this evening.

We woke up to silence, there was no furnace running. The outside air was 47°F and indoors was a toasty 67°F. Yesterday we decided that, regardless of the weather we were going to get out today. The clear blue skies and warmer temperatures made this a pleasure. By mid-afternoon we were up to 61°F.

We decided to head north to the town of Waycross, about 50 miles from here. The reason for doing so was that it was the only major town in the local area that we hadn’t been to. We headed out on a 4 lane divided highway, which is pretty much the norm around here, it doesn’t seem to matter that only about 10 vehicles were seen in the first 45 minutes, a 4 lane road was required! For the most part the trip was pretty boring, towns were few and far between and the whole area was flat and given over to forestry.

Closer to Waycroft the land was flat and low-lying and the river has burst it’s banks causing quite deep flooding for a couple of miles either side of the banks.

Once we arrived in Waycross we parked the car and went walking in search of lunch. I suspect the town got its name as it is at the crossroads of a number of State highways and a  couple of railway lines. In fact it is home to a very large computerised rail switching yard, but unfortunately we couldn’t get close enough to see it in action.

We found a nice little cafe on the main street of the old town where we had an excellent  lunch. We then wandered around the old town in an effort to rid some of the recently acquired calories. Believe it or not, the old town reminded of some of the towns we visited in New Zealand. Below are some of the buildings.

Waycross Bank

City Hall Waycross

Ceramic Mural

Ceramic Mural Close-Up

Building Mural

After wandering around the old town, we went off to see if we could see the rail yards in action, but there was no way we could get near to them.

Rather than retrace our route back, we headed further to the east before turning south, this took us out of the forestry area and through the start of some farmland. Again on the way back there were signs of flooding from last week’s rains. If ever the ice caps ever decide to melt, I am sure that large hunks of Georgia will quickly disappear under water.

Well the cold snap is still snapping. Today’s high managed to scrape up to 6°C, and now it is down to ZERO. So much for global-warming, I think I believe more in the term climate change.

We braved a walk over to the office so Lyn could get some change for the laundry, and that was the highlight of the day.

There’s not much else to write other than to say happy ?0^th  birthday to Barbara. Have a great day.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Another cold snap on its way through. High today was just about 10°C, with below zero temperatures forecast for tonight and tomorrow night.

We put off our walk until the afternoon in the hope that the temperature would warm up a little. While Lyn did some house cleaning inside, I went out and worked up a sweat waxing and polishing the back of the trailer, only one side left now!

After lunch we headed out for the walk; walking one way the sun was really warm….. very pleasant. Walking the other way into wind, not so.

After getting back and sitting in the trailer for a couple of hours restlessness set in. I decided to go outside and do a simple job – replace the leaky water coupling on the city water hose into the trailer. This was a mistake for many reasons, first and foremost was the fact I was on the windswept side of the trailer. The connector was awkward to reach and I could not get any tools in to unscrew it, so I tool the whole connection panel out to work on it inside where it was much warmer. Even with the whole panel out I could not unscrew the offending part, I had one adjustable pipe wrench, but needed a second to get a firm grip. By now there was no way I could put it all back together and not flood the place, so off to the hardware store for the wrench. Hardware store was closed, not looking good, no wrench = no water. Next stop the supermarket, sometimes they have a small tool section, but not this one. Last chance stop was the dollar store, after a bit of hunting I found what I was looking for.

Back to the trailer, but even with two sets of wrenches it was still difficult to separate the connector, but finally it gave in. I connected the new piece in and quickly connected the hose up and it worked. Tomorrow I’ll put it all back together “properly”

A rude awakening this morning as the outside temperature was around 5°C, it barely made it into double digits by mid afternoon.

After breakfast we headed out for the daily walk and managed to increase the distance to 1¼ miles today, a 2 mile  walk seems a reasonable goal to meet before we leave! The park is really filling up again prior to the weekend, not sure whether there is something on sports wise or whether it is just the week-end crowds invading.

After lunch we headed out to visit the historical area of Brunswick, although there are signs to point you in the right direction, it is still not the easiest of places to find. We eventually found a number of the old large houses, but today they are mixed in with small bungalows, and in some case almost shacks in the less salubrious areas of the town. Here are some of the better kept houses

Brunswick House

Brunswick House

Brunswick House

We then wen down to the water front where there are some modern condo’s and a fishing wharf, but a cool breeze off the water cut short any thoughts of walking along the river.

We had a Skype session with Paul. Amanda and Noah before dinner. It seems Noah is quite used to this way of communicating with his grandparents. Evidently he now recognises the Skype ringtone on the computer and looks at the screen waiting for us to appear.

Despite the cooler temperature we managed our 3rd BBQ in a row tonight. Now the week-end is here we can look forward to a couple of days relaxation.