Sunday October 17th 2021

It was cold in my RV home this morning. The thermometer read fifty at 7:30AM. The outside temperature was probably in the low forties. If I didn’t need to get an early start on today’s long travel day, I would have rolled over and stayed in the warmth of my bed. The high temperature for the day was in the mid sixties.

I pulled out of the RV park for my three hundred twenty mile journey shortly after 9AM. My first and only stop was for gas a couple of miles down the road. The price per gallon at the same station I bought gas in 8 days ago was twenty cents a gallon higher. I put in forty gallons before the first credit card pass maxed out. Rather than doing a second authorization, I decided to wait until I got to Georgia. Fuel prices are usually lower in Georgia and forty gallons along with what was already in the tank would easily get me to my destination for the day. Gas prices turned out to be a cent or two higher once I got to Georgia.

The drive was easy until I reached the Atlanta area. Traffic got very heavy. I saw more accidents on the roads around Atlanta than I’ve seen on any single trip. The first couple were on the opposite side of the highway, but I was soon slowed to a crawl with stop and go progress. An accident had occurred in front of my direction of travel. I suffered through three slow downs for accidents on Interstate 75 south of Atlanta and passed an additional two on the opposite side. Overall I was probably delayed by about an hour.

The terrain in Alabama and eastern Georgia was very hilly. On reflection, I knew I was crossing the southern end of the Appalachian mountains, but in my head Georgia and Alabama are flat states. My first exposure to both states was along the coastal plain. In my mind I visualize the entire state like the area I first experienced. Even the hills in the Florida panhandle surprise me every time I pass through the area.

With the time change as I returned to the Eastern Time Zone and the traffic caused delays, I arrived at my destination shortly after 4PM. Overall I was on the road about six hours. I am at the Forsyth KOA along the side of Interstate 75 in Forsyth Georgia for two nights. I’ve stayed here three times before. The first time when I evacuated from Florida for Hurricane Mathew in 2016 and later when traveling along Interstate 75. It is a good location for timing travel through the Atlanta area. Prior to today’s experience traveling through Atlanta on a Sunday was easy.

Saturday October 16th 2021

The cold front passed through this area just before midnight without any real dramatic weather. There was heavy rain for about an hour, but no severe winds or other dangerous weather elements. On the back side of the front today’s weather has been very fall like. The high temperature for the day was in the low sixties and there was a very strong north wind under a bright blue sky. Unlike the wind earlier in the week this time I was oriented in a better direction and location. The wind was mostly blocked by my neighbors trailer.

I didn’t do much today. It was a day for relaxing between two travel days. I watched college football and the baseball postseason game between the Redsox and the Astros. It was nice to see the Redsox tie the series at a game apiece. After last nights contest, I thought they would go down in four straight games.

The RV park is full this weekend. There are also a lot more kids around than there were during my last stay. It probably is because this is the end of the fall school break week in this area. I can see the playground from my RV home. It has been very busy all day. The trailer beside me has three or four little kids and a least three adults. Their site is overflowing with three vehicles in addition to the fifth wheel trailer. The inside must be just as packed with seven plus occupants.

I’m moving on in the morning as I put on miles to catch up with my fall and winter plans. I’ve chosen a route for tomorrow that is about 320 miles. It is a compromise between the roads I know along a longer path and the secondary roads I don’t know along the shortest path. I will square out a couple of corners using the interstate highway system. My plan is to get an early start so I don’t arrive too late at my destination. I lose an hour when I enter Georgia in the Eastern time zone.

Friday October 15th 2021

It rain steadily for about five hours last night. When I got up this morning there were many big puddles and the grass was a soggy mess. Last nights storm was a very slow moving line of storms moving southwest to northeast. This morning the line of storms was to the east with another west to east line of storms due late in the day.

I completed my travel preparations at a steady pace. In was about 10:30AM when I pulled out of the Sam’s Town Casino RV park heading east. The journey came in three parts. The first third was on dry roads with the sun attempting to break through the clouds. During the second part I caught up with the storms from last night. It was difficult driving in the limited visibility caused by the rain. For the last third of my travel day I was in the area where the storm hadn’t arrived. Blue sky with big white fluffy clouds was a welcome sight.

It was about 1:30PM when I arrived at the Heritage Acres RV Park in Tuscumbia Alabama. This is the same park I stayed at for a week or so at the end of September. I was able to setup in dry, warm and humid conditions. About an hour and a half later the rain caught up again. It has been raining off and on ever since. The main line of the cold front is still to come. It produced a tornado warning in the area I departed this morning. In this area a severe thunderstorm watch is in place until midnight. The high temperature tomorrow is forecast to be in the mid sixties.

Thursday October 14th 2021

Today was my last full day in Mississippi. Tomorrow I resume my travels to the east. Sam’s Town Casino RV park provided a good place to wait out the week of low campsite availability along my travel route. There isn’t a lot to do in the immediate area if you aren’t into gambling at one of the hand full of casinos, but the RV park is nice and it is reasonably priced.

Tomorrow I’m traveling east 165 miles to the Mussel Shores Alabama area. I’ll be staying at the same place I stopped at more than two weeks ago. Once I get there, I will have recovered most of the 200 mile detour I took to find a place for this past week. The original plan to stay in the Chattanooga Tennessee area for a week has been abandoned. On Sunday I have a long travel day planned to get back on track. The goal is to get through the Atlanta Georgia area on the slow Sunday traffic day. The plan is to travel between 300 and 360 miles to Forsyth Georgia south of Atlanta. The large variation in distance is driven by the route I take. I’ve traveled the roads on the long route, but not the roads on the shorter path. A little more research is in order before I commit to the shorter route.

After two nights in Forsyth I’ll travel down Interstate 75 to Florida. I’ll stay just over the state line for three nights before moving east to Jacksonville Florida. I have a travel breather booked starting Friday the 22nd. I’ll be in one place for thirty seven nights before moving again.

My last two travel legs getting to Jacksonville are more manageable distances. The first leg is 185 miles and the last is 115 miles. Two hundred miles is my target distance when looking for my next stop. When I need to cover distance, longer travel days are possible. Crossing Texas, for instance, I routinely have at least one close to four hundred mile travel day. That is about my max for safety as a solo traveler behind the wheel. After a long travel day I try to stop for at least two nights to recover.

It was a cloudy day from sunrise to sunset. I was not able to continue my pictures of the growing moon. The rain due tomorrow will probably not allow a picture tomorrow either. Maybe I can get another one on Saturday evening.

Wednesday October 13th 2021

Today’s weather was a nice, but windy day. There is another storm front approaching from the west. The harbinger of the bad weather is the strong wind out of the south. The front is due in this area tomorrow night into Friday. Even with the wind it was a nice day with a high temperature in the low to mid eighties.

This was a stay at home day. It was about fifty fifty chores and relaxing. On the chores side of things I locked in my reservations for my next week of travel. I now have every night from now through the middle of April next year booked. The majority of the nights are even by necessity paid for.

Getting reservations in Florida during the winter takes early planning and flexibility. Reservations at the state parks open eleven months out and many fill up in the first few seconds of the reservation window. The federal parks behave similarly on a six month reservation window. Sites in commercial parks in popular areas often never get to the open market. They are swallowed up by returning visitors year after year. Commercial parks away from the coast and the theme parks don’t fill up as quickly. Last year there was a little more availability because the Canadian US boarder was closed. The US government announced today that the boarder for Canadians to enter the US by land is opening next month, so I would imagine the large number of Canadian Snowbirds will be back.

I took two walks around the RV park and over to the casino today. It is good exercise, but not very scenic. I think I’ve exhausted the good photo opportunities. The pictures in this blog entry were taken at sunset, almost as pictures of last resort.

Tuesday October 12th 2021

The temperature reached the low eighties again today. This high temperature is considered high for this area in the middle of October. The low to mid seventies is the average high. The remainder of my stay here the temperature is forecast above normal. Another front is due on Friday which is my travel day. This area may have high temperatures in the sixties this weekend. Who knows what I’ll see back in northern Alabama.

My day began early again this morning. It wasn’t the wind that woke me like Monday, but rather the departure noise of some of my neighbors. The people from the trailer in for the night at the site next door were particularly noisy starting around 7AM. Between the clutch on the electric drill they used to raise and lower their jacks to the sound of the “gentleman” yelling at his dogs to be quiet it was a rather rude start to the day. The dog noise didn’t bother me, but his shouting sure did.

This RV park has a much higher level of activity this month than it did in late July and August. Many nights during my summer stay there were only four or five sites in use. This month there seems to be around twenty every night and the weekend was even busier. The other difference is where they are from. During my summer stays the RVs were mostly from nearby states. This time many of the RVs are from more distant states. Over the weekend one of my neighbors was from New York and another was from Wisconsin.

Other than a drive around the area, today was pretty much a day of rest. I did some reading, a little bit of internet research and some TV watching. My drive was in search of the cotton harvest. I wanted to get a picture of the massive machines used in the harvest, but unfortunately I didn’t look in the right places. Maybe tomorrow will be more successful. The roads in this area are easy to drive around on. Most of the roads are multiple lanes and many are divided highways. All of the infrastructure seems to have been built to support the casino industry. The community really had high hopes of turning the area into an entertainment destination to rival Las Vegas. It has been in decline since the development of all of the local and Native American casinos around the country. The 2008 rescission and Mississippi River Floods of 2011 really slowed everything down.

Monday October 11th 2021

Today’s weather forecast called for rain as a cold front passed through the area. The really severe weather along the front was forecast to be well north of here. Instead of waking to rain, I woke up to the sound of wind. The orientation of my RV home to the wind direction was just right for noise. The wind direction caught both of the slide out room toppers end on. They billow with each gust and noisily clatter as the ratchets return the awning taught. The wind was reported at fifteen miles per hour constant with gusts in this area up to forty. It continued until mid afternoon.

This area did not get any significant rain. A few rain drops may have accompanied some of the wind gusts, but not enough to wet the ground. I drove through a couple of very heavy downpours to the east of my RV home while I was out on a grocery run. Visibility was bad and road conditions were hazardous. By mid afternoon the wind let up and the cloudy sky gave way to bright sun for the last couple of hours of daylight. At sunset there weren’t any big clouds to reflect the light of the setting sun. The real trouble with the cold front was well to the north in the Indiana and Illinois area. There are tornadoes in that area.

There is a Piggly Wiggly grocery store a few miles south of here, but grocery stores of any size are about 30 miles away in the town of Hernando Mississippi. I found a Kroger and a Walmart. The Walmart wasn’t the biggest or the best I’ve been in, but the familiarity of products and layout made it my choice. The shelves were well stocked and additional items were located in the bigger aisles. This made it difficult to navigate. It was easier to park my shopping cart at the end of an aisle and wander up and down a couple of aisles picking up the things I needed. The good news was at the checkouts. They had plenty of live people staffing the registers.

Sunday October 10th 2021

Yesterday’s high thin cloud cover was gone today. The sky was clear blue all day. A regular breeze out of the south kept the mid to upper eighties temperature from being oppressive. Overall there was nothing about the weather to complain about.

I am not very good at identifying what is planted in the fields I pass by on my travels. Last summer, when I was in this area, I saw acres and acres of green fields planted with a low bush plant. I didn’t know if it was soybean or cotton. This fall it is obvious. The fields in this area are all covered with dying plants filled with white puffy balls. The primary crop in this area is cotton and it is harvest time.

While I was out driving around this afternoon, I passed cotton fields that had already been harvested. There were huge cylindrical bales of harvested cotton at the ends of the empty field. In one area, a long way from the road across unharvested fields, I could see huge pieces of farm equipment crossing the fields harvesting the cotton. The big cylindrical bales are dumped out the back as they fill up. I wonder how much of the processing is taking place in the machine as it is harvested.

On my drive I found the area a little more active than this summer. The weather is a little more amenable to outdoor activity. There are several golf courses in the area that probably serve to augment the draw of the casinos. Judging mostly by the number of cars in the parking lots, the casinos are fairly busy. I was in the Sam’s Town Casino last night. It had a lot more activity going on than it did during my summer visit.

Friday October 8th 2021

It was another foggy start to the day. Visibility during the first few hours of daylight was very low. I could see the RV across the street, but the ones at the top of the hill less than a couple hundred feet away were hidden in the fog. It took until 9:30 or so for the sun to burns off the morning fog.

The fog slowed my preparation for travel down a little. It created more of a mental slowness rather than an actual obstacle to preparation. I knew I wouldn’t leave until visibility improved. I pull off my site shortly before 10:30am to the boat launch parking lot. I used that space to hook up the car for towing. It was around 10:45 when I pulled out of the campground. That was about forty five minutes later than my plan.

My destination was two hundred miles to the west. The combination of the holiday weekend and school vacations next week made it difficult to find a reservation to the east along my intended direction of travel. I probably checked a dozen places online and two by phone without success. I chose to return to Sam’s Town Casino RV Park in the Tunica Mississippi area along the Mississippi River. It had plenty of space when I stayed during the month of August and it isn’t a place that families with kids are going to be camping. There are more sites occupied tonight than I saw any of the nights I was here in August, but there are still plenty of available sites.

The route to get here was a straight drive across northern Alabama and northern Mississippi. Most of the drive was on US72 a good divided highway with a few traffic lights and a couple of major communities to deal with. Next week I’ll return east on the same road to continue my journey east toward Jacksonville FL.

I had one stop for gas along the way that was relatively easy as gas stops go. I only had to circle the pumps once before I found a nice end island pump available. Gas was a little more expensive than my last fill up at $2.899 a gallon. Two other events highlighted my journey. I passed an accident that had happened a few minutes ahead of my arrival. There was an overturned vehicle in the middle of the road. There were plenty of people stopped to help and it didn’t look like there were any serious injuries. I had to drive partially in the median to safely pass the incident. It is not fun to encounter accidents, but my day wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the people in the overturned vehicle.

The other event was a wrong turn near the end of my journey. I’m going to blame bad signage, because I knew right away that I made a wrong turn when I should have continued straight. The signs indicated that Interstate 269 was ending and Interstate 69 and 55 north exited to the right. I found myself on Interstate 69 north along with 55 north. The road I needed to be on was Interstate 69 south. There were no signs for 69 south or the towns I was heading for. I needed to make a U turn at the next significant exit and backtrack to correct my mistake. Throughout all of this traffic heading north into Memphis was very heavy. Overall it probably added ten to fifteen minutes to my journey.

I arrived at Sam’s Town Casino RV park shortly after 3PM and got checked in at the hotel lobby before continuing on to my site in the RV park.