"You're not from around here"

We stayed at the Naval Sub Base at Kings Bay, GA for 2 nights.    It is a great military FamCamp "Eagle Hammock" located close to I-95 and was just the ticket for our first stop on the way home.  



Entry Gate NSB Kings Bay





Stategic Weapons Display





Eagle Hammock FamCamp Office





Silent Service




 We were set up for an overflow site as they were full when I made reservations.  They parked us on the grass next to the Camp Host and we had to share the water & electric hookups with him.   Across the way from our site, lo & behold, was another HitchHiker, a 2012 Discover America.  We were anxious to meet the owners as HH brand RVs are few and far between on the east coast.   After getting set up on our site we took a walk around the loop to check out the recreation building, showers and laundry.   They have a very large community room with kitchen and TV area.   The laundry was excellent with 6 washers and dryers and the best part: they were FREE.

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Meeting Room TV area

  As we were returning to our rig we saw our neighbor HH owners had returned to their rig and were unloading their truck.   Ginny shouted "Hey HitchHikers!"   ....and that's how we met  Rick and Janice Pringle.  (They are the Illiana Duo on the HH owners forum).    Well, we chatted with them about our rigs and discussed their intention to having a generator put in at the factory.  Then they showed us the inside of their rig.  It is absolutely beautiful,   has a great layout  and a lot of custom features.   We loved it!   Rick and Janice stopped by our rig that evening and the next and we talked non-stop.   We mentioned that we were headed to the HitchHiker rally in Branson, MO in Sept and by the end of our conversations they were also planning to attend.  Till we meet again! 
   
Our last day there was filled with getting ready for the road.  We filled up with diesel at the Exchange   gas station, stopped by the Exchange and Commissary for a few things.    Then we headed off base to get propane because the campground propane tank was empty.   We found a campground just off base that sold propane.  A guy filled my tank and gave me a ticket to give to the office.  The gal in the office took one glance at me and exclaimed:  "You're not from around here!   ....you are wearing shorts!"   Well, come to find out that because the temps were below 70 the bugs were not out, but if temps were higher and if I were "from around here"  I'd have been wearing long pants and plenty of bug repellent!   Duly noted for our next trip to Kings Bay.

Our site on the grass at Eagle Hammock

 

Florida 2013

We had a late start heading to Florida this year.  After several brief snowstorms in Maryland,  we finally got on the road on Friday,  Feb 16.    The plan was to split the trip into 4 driving days to end up at KARS Park on Merritt Island, FL  on Monday (President's Day).    We had overnight stops at  Roanoke Rapids, NC, Florence, SC , and, Townsend, GA.    Started to get the feeling that the Gods were against us making this trip:  Day 2 we had rain /snow mix north of Fayetteville and snow through Lumberton in NC;  woke up Day 3 in Florence SC with 1.5" snow.   What a drag it was to have to shovel off the slides and sweep the roof of the RV (didn't even have the right equipment for the job).  Thought we were safe when we reached Townsend GA but a cold snap surprised us with a frozen water hose.  We were happy to reach Florida!


Our rush to get here was so we could attend the Florida HitchHikers of America International  (HHAI) Luncheon in Plant City, FL.     We were glad we could go as we enjoy meeting fellow HH owners.  The group was half the size of last years group, but for us it was an opportunity to  talk more at length with several folks.   We even met fellow Marylanders  Tom and Glee McMahon,  from Davidsonville, MD,  only about 10 miles away from us back home!

Back at KARS Park for the second year, we have a  water view site at the northern end of the park.  We were anxious to see our Florida friends,  the Manatees at the marina and the Alligators along the entrance road.  This is such a relaxing place.  We have been taking several walks a day and I have finally assembled the bikes so we can take longer excursions in the area.

We are finally getting more familiar with the area.   Last week we went across the bridge to Cocoa Beach  to  go to the Pier.   It was a beautiful day and  the beach-goers were out sunning themselves with a few brave ones and kids swimming (water temp hi 60's?).  of course the surfers were there, but not much surf  action  so I'm not sure what the attraction was.  But the pier had quite a few fishermen and they attracted the Brown Pelicans.    It was fun to see them, ever observant,  checking for throw-aways from the fish cleaning station or trying to steal bait from the fishermen's buckets!  Several decades ago the brown pelicans were endangered from pesticides, now they are plentiful.   We even have one visiting the marina at KARS Park.    

One of the main outdoors attractions in the area is the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge.  We  drove over there on Sunday and checked out the visitor's center.  Our main interest was to drive through the wildlife loop, which is a self-guided tour of the marshes and wetlands on the refuge.  We saw lots of birds, but did not see the Bald Eagles nesting as we had last year.  We did, however, see a humungous alligator sunning itself!

We were talking with one of the guards at the gate and mentioned how we liked the golf course community located next to KARS Park.   He mentioned several other communities on Merritt Island that he thought  had similar houses  that we should look at.  He also mentioned a bike trail in a neighborhood park area that is close by.   We realized we were driving by the entrance to the trail without even knowing it was there.   So yesterday we brought our bikes  and  rode on the trail to the main entrance of Kings Park.  Along the way we saw several alligators in the ponds adjacent to the trail.   It was a short ride back to the truck so we loaded up and then drove to several developments to check out the houses.   We really like the style of the houses and the ones along the water were especially nice!

We are now on the downhill side of our 3 weeks at KARS Park so we are planning ahead.   Its like a puzzle to plot out our stops on our journey.  We wanted to stop at the Stephen Foster Folk Cultural Center in White Springs FL on our way back north, but there was no sites available for the week after we leave here.   We were able to reserve a site at Huntington Beach State Park in SC  for the 17-22 March.

We thought we would try for a  a couple nights at a military FamCamp in Kings
Bay, GA  

First Year

After buying the HitchHiker and the truck (GMC 3500HD Denali) we faced what is known as the "Maryland RV License Dilemma".      Its the equivalent of  "you can't get there from here"   directions advice  and caused a several month delay in getting on the road.  

We drove the truck to Canada for our family's annual get-together in June 2011 at Clear Lake near Elgin, ON.    It was a smooth ride, about 1,000 miles round trip, and a good break in run for the DuraMax diesel engine.    The truck was affectionately named  "Truckasauros" by our son.   We got 17mpg for the trip (all non towing highway miles).   Fun in Canada includes fishing (of course), sightseeing and boating along the Rideau waterway,  and our Kids Fishing Contest.

 

Our first "trial run" camping trip with the RV was to Elk Neck State Park in North East, MD.    We stayed in site 11 of the North East loop.  This loop is open year-round and has full hookups.    We took advantage of  Maryland's Golden Age Pass  which offers 50% off of camping fees from Sun - Thurs nights.  While most of our attention was directed at getting to know the RV, we did take a several mile hike to the Turkey Point Lighthouse and met a nice couple from PA, who also camped in our same loop, on the walk back from the lighthouse.    

In late October we traveled to northern PA to see Pennsylvania's Elk herd.   My Dad used to subscribe to the PA Game News magazine and I recall reading about the Elk that PA re-introduced to the reclaimed strip mining areas near the Allegheny National Forest.   We stayed a couple of nights at  Rocky Gap State Park in western MD,  then drove north through central PA to  the small town of Benezette (pop.227) in Cameron county.  Benezette  is the location of the Elk Country Visitor's Center, a beautiful facility that has displays and a media presentation chronicaling the reintroduction of Elk to the area.  We were surprised by the draw that this has created in this remote area of the state as we saw busloads of people stop at the visitors center then head out to elk viewing overlook sites along the ridges in the area.   We camped at the Benezette Store campsite just off of  Rt 555 and a block away from the store/restaurant.   We registered for our site at the store and took a quick loop through the town.  Ginny was impressed at how realistic the elk lawn ornaments looked ...until one turned its head and looked straight at her!   We got back to camp only to find a small herd of elk grazing right in our campground.  People traveling the road saw them and were detouring right through the camp roads to stop and take pictures.   The Elk were nonplused by all this attention and kept on grazing.    We did not like that anyone traveling the road could roam through the camp scouting for elk, so we will not go back to this campground.   This area of PA also did not have viable cellular coverage.  We asked at the store and were told we could possibly get cell coverage at the visitors center or at one of the elk viewing areas on top of the ridges,  which is where we had to go to connect.

 

 

 

On our way back from northern Pennsylvania we stopped at Raystown Lake.  This is a great COE Lake in central PA, and seems to be a very busy place during the Summer season.   We were here in late Fall and nearly had the place to ourselves.   This suited me fine as I was able to make a routine back-in look extremely hard.  None-the-less we really enjoyed the site we were in as we had panoramic water views thru the trees.  This was just the type of camping experience we needed to round out 2011.  We will be back!