Arriving Before Dark-Finally!

~Friday, January 1, 2021

Day 201-Part II (Travel Day)

Being at this campground taught us a few lessons (Living and learning all the time!):

#1: When YOU have the option of choosing your site, check for standing water or mud just in case the weather worsens, leaving you unable to get out of your site.

#2: If you arrive in the daylight, check for overhead light poles that will feel more like a UFO coming in for a soft landing. Yuk!

Getting ready to depart Abbeville, LA for Mississippi, things were going smoothly (including the nice weather), until I saw water coming into the trailer from under the fireplace. As we always like to do when we have water hookups, Jeff was flushing the black tank (don’t worry, it was fresh water coming in). The leak was in the same spot we had early on in our travels. But that leak was from the shower. However, with today’s instance, Jeff thinks it’s a loose fitting. When you’re living out of your trailer full-time, and moving as much as we are, things are bound to break or come loose, so we’ve accepted that there will always be a “to do” list. There is one couple that we follow on social media that have a bulletin board in their RV, that is loaded with Post-it’s of their “to do’s”. I guess that’s a little more fun than just making a list. We’d already have 10 Post-it’s up!

Somewhere between Lafayette and Gautier, we heard a loud pop and a slight fizzle sound, immediately thinking it was a rock that hit the windshield, but we couldn’t see any damage. Then, I thought it was something to do with my laptop. That wasn’t it either. Finally, I checked the weather radio that we keep on top of the dashboard while we travel. We were running it on battery power and because of the fizzle sound, thought to check the batteries. Well, there you have it. Sure enough, one of the batteries ruptured and was lightly leaking acid. We’d both never seen anything like that before so we’re assuming it was not the radio, but a bad battery. Will let you know after we troubleshoot a few things.

Along the I-10, we drove over several wetlands, but none as large as Henderson Swamp, a 7,000 acre parcel that is part of the well-known Atchafalaya Swamp. For 20 miles, the elevated Atchafalaya Basin Bridge takes you between Baton Rouge and Lafayette. It is the third longest bridge in the U.S. Maybe next time we won’t only see the swamp in a fleeting glimpse, but by boat. I also noticed that the overpasses in this part of the country appear lower than the West Coast, nor do they post height clearances on them. You would think that’s pretty important.

It was so nice to have only 4 hours of driving today as opposed to 7, but more importantly that we arrived before dark. What a great place….arrived at Shepard State Park in Gautier, Mississippi in the late afternoon where we had a pull-through site (#24). This park is the perfect spot if you want to explore southern Mississippi, New Orleans or if you’re simply on your way to Florida. And, it’s only $18/night for partial hookups (no sewer-but convenient dump station). Since we are so close to the ocean, we thought it would be fun to check out the sunset.

So we dropped what we were doing and drove a short distance to the water. We had an unexpected surprise when we drove down a side street with the most gorgeous waterfront homes placed ever so carefully between 400-year old live oak trees. The area is called Twelve Oaks, a historical land trust area that is also open for public access. Adjacent to that is also another set of gorgeous homes,

one in particular called The Old Place, known for its spectacular wedding venues. It’s amazing that these stunning homes are right on the Mississippi Sound, seemingly so vulnerable to nasty weather. You can tell they had some storm surges from yesterday’s whopper storm.