October 18,2015-Sunday

HOME!! Well another trip has ended. We thank God it was a safe and healthy one! We enjoyed our time in FLorida, especially the beaches, but as I have said in the past,... There is no place like home with family and friends. Again we thank you for being with us via our journal/blog. Until Pauper's Pride is back on the road....we are signing off. Rich & Audrey

October 17,2015-Saturday

Another great travel day on our second day of our journey home. Oh we did see the Oscar Meier Weener-mobile on the road! By the time I got the camera tho, it passed us (see pic) we did have a slight incident well on the road. As we were driving, we heard a loud noise, we thought something must have fallen in the RV, but it sounded more like a gunshot! A few seconds later we saw that our windshield had a slight moon shaped crack. Evidently a rock or something hit it, there was a truck carrying gravel that passed us. We stopped at a rest area and Richard checked it, luckily it is only a surface crack, but a crack nonetheless, but it could have been worse. We drove about 200 miles, around 5 hrs. We had reservations at Wolf Creek State Park in Windsor,IL, in southern Illinois on Lake Shelbyville. That leaves about 180 miles tomorrow to home!

October 15 & 16 - Thursday & Friday

Well our time in Florida has come to an end! We have started our journey north, HOME! So far we have had good travel weather, clear & sunny skies. After over 300 miles and about 7 hours of driving we spent the night in Cullman, AL at Cullman Çampground, a nice small park, but no cable or wi-if. We did get a few TV channels. We took the car off the tow dolly and went into the town and treated ourselves to a good dinner at a Cracker Barrel. We came back & played cards.

Friday we got an early start and drove 280 miles ..about 6 hours. We made the rest of the length of AL, the width of TN and most of KY, another  clear day. We spent the night at Victory RVPark, in Paducah KY,a  nice family owned park where we have stayed other years. But again no cable or wi-fi.

October 12,13,14 - Monday,Tuesday,Wednesday

Well our vacation is winding down. These last few days we spent a lot of time at the beach. The weather was beautiful, sunny and warm with a slight light breeze. Green flags were flying which means calm conditions. No jellyfish. Monday the beach was pretty packed being that it was Columbus Day, so kids had no school. There were a lot of "shore birds" . They are cute , they fly down right on the shoreline and stare at the water. When a wave rolls in, they run up on the sand. They have little babies also.. The RV park we are staying in is full. "Snow Birds" (RVers who come down to Florida for the winter months)  are arriving. Wewill be leaving here Thursday morning.

October 10 & 11 - Saturday & Sunday

Saturday morning we did some supply shopping and then went to a fest for breast cancer awareness. There were food and craft booths and there was a band playing on a stage by the water. We had planned to go to 4:00 mass, so there wasn't enough time to go to the beach, so we went to the pool here in the park. The water was very refreshing. After church at St Sylvestor's, we went out for dinner at this little bar & grill right on the Main Street about 2blocks from the park. We had gone up and down that street every day and saw that it was always busy, they had an outdoor eating area which was always occupied...that was where we ate and the food was good.

Sunday..Well the time has come, this is our last weekend here. We went to a large flea market nearby for a couple of hours. It was a nice sunny, warm day so we went to the beach. Again the waves were calm, so Richard was on his air mattress. I love to enjoy the waves and people watch. It occurred to me that the child in all of us seems to come at the beach...I see adults, all ages "playing in the sand"  with a shovel  or just making sand "sculptures " with their feet. It is a place to let go and just relax. The beach was  very busy. There were kayakers, scuba divers, board surfers and a lot of people enjoying the water. I saw no jellyfish today even tho the purple flag was flying, but a large dead fish washed ashore...uggggly! Everyone was walking over to see it. It was cute to watch the little kids, they were fascinated by it. Richard took a picture of it. We ended the day relaxing, watching TV.

October 9, 2015 - Friday

It was an overcast morning, so we decided to go out for breakfast somewhere we haven't been. We took a ride to Fort Walton Beach, about 45 min away. We saw a little restaurant called Joe & Ed's which had several cars in the parking lot, so we figured it must be a local spot with good food...and that is what it was, the waitress called several customers by name. Afterwards  we did a little sight seeing around the area. The sun came out and it warmed up, typical Florida weather. So we came back and went to the beach. The waves were fairly calm, so Richard enjoyed laying on his raft. When the waves are strong, he can't use the raft because it is too hard to get on and try to stay on. I enjoyed sitting at the shoreline We stayed there until late afternoon.

October 8,2015-Thursday

Today was cleaning day, to freshen up the motorhome I did the inside and Richard got on a ladder and cleaned the outside and the awning. I got done and wanted to go to the beach since it was a nice warm,sunny day. Richard wanted to finish brush cleaning the big outside awning. He also wanted to stay at the park because the people across from us in a big new motorhome had their refrigerator go out on them and they were putting in a new one, Rchard told him that he would help him if he needed  a hand. So he took me to the beach and said he would come later. About 1 1/2 hrs later he called and told me about an accident near the entrance to the park. A huge new motorhome was going to pull into the park and he missed the entrance, so he tried to make a u-turn and slid off the road (and he was towing a car behind)! Richard was watching the tow trucks trying to get it out. He took some good pictures. It took about 4 hours to get it out! Thank goodness the police and firemen were able to get the people out safety. It's just a miracle that it didn't roll completely over. Surprisingly there was no damage to it, but it cost about $3,000 to get it out. One of the tow truck drivers told Richard they charge $500 an hour (they are huge special tow trucks) I stayed at the beach all the while.

October 7,2015-Wednesday

Woke to slightly overcast sky. Today is liver & onions day at the little family restaurant....Richard's favorite so of course we went for dinner. By then the sun came out and it turned out to be a great beach day. We spent the rest of the day there. The beach flags were yellow and purple which meant caution there could be rip tides and marine life could be present. And there sure was ....jellyfish. I saw several small ones in the waves, but they didn't make it to shore. Then I saw a HUGE one coming right to shore. No kidding it was bigger than a basketball!! Uggggggly!!! Everyone was coming down by the shore to see it. Luckily everyone was smart enough not to get too close. Unfortunately I didn't have the camera down by the shore and I knew by the time I would have walked up the sand to get it, it would have been gone so I was not able to get a picture. I sure wish I could have, I don't think I'll ever see another one that big. Richard was in the water, but he was able to get there to see it before it drifted away. He also did some metal detecting, but all he found was one bottle cap. They do keep the beaches clean here.

October 6,2015-Tuesday

Another overcast day, so we decided to go golfing. Well we get out to the golf course, got our clubs on the cart and got to tee off for hole 1 and the sky cleared, the sun came out...a beautiful blue sky!! Perfect for the beach. But we had a good time anyway. I think my golf swing is improving. I actually hit the ball in the air a few times.....I usually just have grounders. Richard had a pretty good game. When we got back to the park, we went down to the beach to watch the sunset. The water was calm and we got some good pictures. We tried to get one of Richard "holding the sun" like we did a few years ago, but it looks like he is under arrest,kneeling with his hands in the air. HaHa 

Sept. 5,2015. - Monday

A chilly, overcast day. Richard made breakfast out on the griddle. It was too chilly for the beach. We were going to the golf course, but they had leagues in the morning. So We went to the Emeral Coast, about 1/2 hr away, there is what is called Harbor Walk Village. It is kinda like  back home,Navy Pier in Chicago there are little shops and food places all along  the waterway. It was decorated for Halloween.it started drizzling, so we made it back to the car and did some sightseeing. 

Sept 3,Saturday & 4, Sunday,2015

Today was too chilly for the beach, so being Sat. Richard wanted to go to garage sales to look for tools etc.in the process we get to do sight seeing. They do have a lot of garage sales here. We didn't find anything interesting. We ended up in Fort Walton, so we did some shopping. We took a different route back and saw more parts of Florida we never saw. When we got back we went to church. Then we went to a restaurant called the Shrimp Basket which we had a coupon for from the RV park we are staying at. It was super crowded so we figured it must be good food, which it was. And a lot of it. We had take home left over for another meal!

Sunday another chilly day. We went from hot,humid to jacket weather in the blink of an eye! A happy medium would be nice. So we went to a huge flea market, didn't find anything interesting. We went back to the park. Richard wanted to listen to the NASCAR race on the radio, it wasn't on a channel that we got on the tv.. So I decided to do the laundry...... What fun! But a necessary chore. The laundry room is right next to the pool, so I was able to relax by the pool while waiting for the laundry to dry. Later we went for ice cream at a Tasty Freeze in Milton which we saw near the golf course we went to the other day. Hopefully the weather will warm up soon so we can enjoy beach time, which is the reason we came to Florida!

October 2, 2015-Friday

A very Happy "50th" Birthday to our son-in -law, Chris. Last night was the first time since we arrived here that we were able to have the air conditioner off and sleep with the windows open for fresh air, it felt so good. We woke to a very cool, crisp morning, certainly not a beach day again. After all the hot, humid days we have had, this sure was a change! I hope we will be able to have more beach time these next two weeks we will be here. I know, I know, I complained about the humidity and now about the cool air... There's just no pleasing me...ha-ha! Sooooo, we decided to go golfing again. Not a beach day but a perfect golf day. We had a good time. This time we played the course the right way! Afterward we ate at a little mom/pop restaurant, very good food. On the way back we saw an antique shop we stopped at and browsed around. We took a different way back to the park for a change of scenery. Where was a sign that said there was a toll booth 1mile up. So we got out a dollar to pay, but when we got up to the booth, it was $3.75!!! And we thought Illinois tolls were high!!! Needless to say we won't be taking that road again!! Later we took a ride back to Opal Beach, where the little sand crab/moles were.. We wanted to try and get a picture of them since we were told that they usually come out  at dusk. It was really chilly, we had jackets on. The water was surprisingly pretty calm, almost a little eerie, but we didn't see one crab! Maybe it was too chilly for them. So instead we took a selfie!!

October 1,2015-Thursday

First of all, a very Super Happy "16th" Birthday to our grandson, Matthew!! What a difference a day makes, we woke to a much, much cooler morning. We actually were able to shut off the air conditioner and open the windows on our RV. It felt  so good to let fresh air in!! We have had the air conditioner on constantly since we arrived here. We decided to go out for breakfast. When we got back, it was still cool and a little overcast. We decided to go golfing. It was a perfect golf day. We went to a golf course we had played on when we were here in April. It is in a little town of Milton about 1/2 hr away. We had a great day. Not a lot of people there, so we were able to take our time. We did get a little mixed up on the course. We went the wrong way and played what we thought was hole 4, but it was really hole 8! We realized it when we got to the next hole which we thought was hole 5, but we saw was hole 9. We had to backtrack and finally found hole 4. It was a good thing the course wasn't busy! We had planned on going to the beach when we got back, but the sun never made an appearance. 

Sept 30,2015-Wednesday

Another hot,humid day. The heat wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the humidity. We heard about another beach nearby called Opal Beach. It's between Navarre (which is where we are) and Pensicola. It is another beautiful white sugar sand & Aqua water. It is not a highly occupied beach because it is located in a national park and there is a fee to use it. We have a senior pass for all national parks, so we don't have to pay. The best thing is that the parking lot is just a short distance from the shore line, so it is not a very hard walk in the sand. There were only a few other people on the beach. We thought this is great! The water was refreshing. We set up our chairs and umbrella  and were relaxing when I noticed something move in the sand. Then a few more "things" moved in the sand! Well low and behold they wrere tiny creatures called sand moles. They look like the sand crab we saw the other day, but very small, about maybe 2 inches. They had tiny bulging eyes and kinda skitted on the sand sideways Ike a spider. If you got anywhere close to them (like Richard tried to do) they would what I would call "fly jumped" into a hole in the sand. Richard thought they were cute, but I thought they were creepy I don't like any kind of critters!  They were so fast he couldn't get a picture of them. I could not relax. Thank goodness a short time after we were there the sky really got dark so we loaded up our gear and left just in time because it started pouring. We found out later that those little critters are harmless and are afraid of people. They sense vibration on the sand when someone gets near & go into the holes in the sand for protection. They say they usually are not out in the daytime, but come out in the evening when the beach is empty. I DONT LIKE THEM!!! Needless to say, as pretty as the beach was,I told Richard I don't want to go back there. 

Sept 29,2015-Tuesday

Another cloudy,  overcast day! So it was a good day to get the laundry done. : ( . Then we went supply shopping. Around 4:00 the sun actually made an appearance! It was really humid so we went to the pool. The water was really refreshing. We spent the evening watching tv... Real exciting day!!

Sept 28, 2015 - Monday

A Happy Heavenly birthday to my mom who would have been 91 today! Well it started storming last night and continued all day! I mean really down pouring with no let up all day. We could not even get out of the motor home to our car without getting drenched. So we just stayed in and played cards. Finally around 3:00 it seemed to ease up a little, so we decided to go to a mall in Destin. There was a lot of flooding on the streets and it started pouring hard again and we had only been out about 20 min so we thought it best to turn around. We did not want to chance getting stalled out on a flooded street. The news was reporting flooding all around the area. Later in the early evening there was a beautiful rainbow.

Sept 27,2015-Sunday

We went to a "seafood Festival" in Pensicola. There were signs all over advertising it all week. We found out that it is an annual event. When we finally found out where in Pensicola it was, we had to find a parking place. That was a chore! All the parking lots were full as well as the parking places along the streets. We were ready to give up when we found a lot with spaces available. It cost  $10 and we had to walk about 4 blocks to the festival. It was very crowded. There were a lot of seafood booths (hence seafood festival), and a lot of craft booths. It reminded me of the Frankfort fest back home. A LOT of walking and all we bought were root beer floats. It started to get a little overcast and we had to walk back to our car, so we started back. Richard saw a guy on a bike with a cart & a sign saying rides for tips, so he asked the guy to give me a ride. The guy said he could take both of us, so we took him up on it. I felt sorry for him at first, but he said he made over $300 the day before (the festival was a weekend event) we gave him $10, it was worth it not to have to walk that distance back. We just made it to the car and it started to rain. 

Sept 26,2015 - Saturday

Another hot, humid day. We went to the beach of course. The beach flags for the day were yellow,caution rip tides may be present & purple, marine life may be present. Well the rip tides really don't effect us because I just stay at the shoreline and Richard don't go that far out. But there were jellyfish in the water. You could see them floating on top of the waves. In the water they look like a clump of seeweed.they say they don't harm you unless you get too close then they will give you a very painful sting. If someone sees one they usually point it out to other people in the area. A few might get washed on shore (see picture) they are ugly! Those are the only ones we saw on shore. Being the weekend, the beach was pretty full, a lot of kids. Thankfully we didn't hear of anyone being stung. We only stayed at the beach for a few hours because we were going to church at 4:00. After church the Knights of Columbus were holding a spaghetti dinner in the church hall which we went to. It was very good. Bread, salad, spaghetti & meatballs and beverage & dessert. There was bingo afterward. Six games were played with a win of $20 each.the last was a coverall with a win of $50. We didn't win any, but we were sitting at a table with two other couples our age, so it was a good evening. 

Sept 25,2015 - Friday

We have been RVing to Florida for five years now and have been on a lot of beaches, but today we saw our first sand crab! You know the ones with the big eyes that walk sideways. He was by himself and would pop out of a hole in the sand, then "skitter jump" back in. I Don't like them or any other little critters, so I'll be glad not see another one! He was too fast to get his picture.We did see another interesting item. We saw what we called  the "leather lady" her skin was so dark tanned that it was all wrinkled , just like leather. On top of that she looked like a skeleton with a thin layer of leather, really!! We have never seen anyone like that! We thought she must be in her 80's, but her sister said she was just 65, unbelievable!!! We had a nice afternoon , but we left the beach early because they were setting up for a huge concert on the beach tonight. The police were blocking off the parking lot. We showered, changed and went out for pizza.

Sept 24, 2015 - Thursday

We heard about Pensicola Beach  which is only about 40 min away, so we decided to check it out. We weren't quite sure exactly where it was, but every morning on the weather station they would show a picture of the beach with a water tower painted like a beach ball. I really wanted to see that. First the GPS took us downtown Pensicola. We took a different route and it took us to the  entrance of the Pensicola Naval Base. I kept looking for that water tower. Finally after going over a huge bridge (there are a lot of bridges in Florida) I spotted the tower in a distance! We found a pretty close parking place. It also is a white sand beach with Aqua water. Very well maintained. But one problem was that the walk from the parking lot to the water was a very long walk on sand. White sand beaches are pretty, but it is very hard to walk on that fine sand. It is a more popular beach so it was fairly crowded even for a week day. We spent the afternoon there, the water was great, but there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the sun was extremely hot. We sat under an umbrella when not in the water. We had a nice afternoon, but we like "our beach" Navarre Beach which is  five min from the RV park better.

Sept 22, Tuesday & 23, Wednesday (2015)

I've been a little lax in my writing. Tuesday morning Richard again made breakfast out on the griddle, bacon & eggs. It tastes so good outside! We did a little shopping. It again was hot & humid, so of course we went off to the beach. We carried our beach gear down and got all settled. We weren't there but about 1/2 hr when it started to get overcast and we heard thunder. We thought it would pass over (we saw other people coming on to the beach). But then we saw lightning! We knew it was time to pack it up and leave.  So we decided to go to a show. We saw "Everest" in IMAX. It was pretty good except that we had to park a distance & walk in the rain. At least we had an umbrella. 

Wednesday  - Another hot, humid day. We were told that usually this time of the year it is not so humid, but of course because we decided to come in Sept....it's a hot, humid Sept. We spent the day at the beach. There was a nice light breeze by the water and no flies! It was a typical vacation day, just relaxing by the water. The waves weren't very strong, so Richard was able to try out his new raft, the one picture of the truck....a fellow hand made that wooden boat on top!