By 10:00 we were on the road after fueling up near the campground. (It takes a little planning to find a gas station that is RV friendly–meaning, big enough to maneuver the trailer through and have an easy access gas pump. That’s where our “Next Exit” book comes in handy. It shows all the RV friendly gas stations, restaurants, and other services that are available at every exit on the I-system. It’s worth its weight in gold!) We had just a sprinkle of rain last night after lots of thunder and dark clouds overhead, but today the skies were partly cloudy with temps still in the 90s. Traffic was light on I-10, so we spent our time listening to a book on tape to make the drive of 292 miles, with a shortcut via Highway 231, go by faster. We’ve taken this shortcut before. It’s a lightly traveled, very scenic 4 lane wooded boulevard. Crossing into the Central Time Zone, we gained an hour and passed over the Alabama border around 10:30.
We had a slight delay for a serious accident in Troy, AL, but then we were on our way. We stopped once more for gas ($2.46/gal) about 34 miles from our exit. We wanted to start off the day tomorrow with a full tank. We hopped back on I-65 only to get stuck in another traffic slowdown due to people traveling in our direction rubber-necking the construction happening on the other side. Thankfully, it didn’t last long before we were moving again up to speed. We arrived in Pelham, AL at the Birmingham South Campground at 3 PM.
 Easy to find off of I-65. |
It is a very nice campground with beautiful facilities and we got our Good Sam discount besides. We had shady campsite #22 with easy access to the bathrooms/showers. We stayed connected to the truck again so could have a faster exit in the morning.
 Site 22 |
We were already into our groove and got set up in our campsite in no time. Bob has his jobs to do and I have mine. It’s always a team effort. There was plenty of time to enjoy a cocktail before dinner in the shade with a nice breeze. Auggie was anxious to stretch his legs from the drive today and so were we. I wanted to use their laundromat to wash Auggie’s bed, so he could start out the trip with a fresh bed too. It was something I forgot to do before we left home. In the empty campsite next to ours, Bob noticed a mother dove and her baby huddled under the picnic table. I kept hoping that no one would come to use that campsite tonight.
 Momma and baby dove |
We had swordfish for dinner as we heard the rumblings of thunder getting closer and closer and the skies darkening to the south. After dinner, the three of us took a walk around the campground before the rain arrived. The campground had some really cool tent sites built under shelters with a cooking station for each site. This one was circular and contained 6 tent sites radiating out from the center, but divided by fencing.
(I think this used to be a KOA campground at one time.) There was even a dog park, nice pool, and game room. We would definitely come back here again. We were all tired from the drive, so we just relaxed with some TV. It will take us a day or two to acclimate ourselves to the change in time zones, but it was nice to gain that extra hour today. Tomorrow we will travel through Birmingham and Nashville to get to our destination of Kentucky Dam Village State Park–part of the beautiful Land Between the Lakes area of Kentucky near Paducah.
Your journal is fun to read.