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.