Fort Pickens Campground, Florida

We're back at Fort Pickens for a week.  This is one we keep coming back to, both because of the beauty and because of the availability of such great, fresh seafood that we can prepare ourselves in the Airstream.  I'll let the photos speak for themselves.

No dogs permitted on beach, so Murphy can only look from a distance

But he can walk the nature trails with us, and there are many here

Mussels and fresh sourdough rosemary bread for dinner

The little freshwater ponds that dot the dunes are surprising, and critical for their role in providing fresh water for animals living in this area

Sesame seared tuna, pickled ginger and wasabi, a side of thinly sliced cukes.

Next week we move on to Gulf State Park in Alabama.

Florida

We arrived safely at Fort Pickens campground and thoroughly enjoyed our stay, walking the nature trails, the beach, the campground...  Weather was coolish (is that a word?) but warm by Michigan standards for this time of year, and we had a lovely campsite.

One of the major advantages of the Fort Pickens campground, for us, is the proximity to Joe Patti's Seafood store in Pensacola.  AMAZINGLY fresh and varied seafood,  incredible deli with wonderful cheeses, fresh breads, and lunch meats....tho' who wants lunch meats when you have access to this SEAFOOD!?!? (Can you tell we're from mid-Michigan where really fresh seafood is a luxury?) :)

Lovely Ruby Red shrimp - So very good!

The aftermath....

Moved on to St. Joseph Peninsula State Park Campground and got THE best campsite in the whole campground, according to us, and also the ranger who checked us in.  :)

This campground has a lovely beach where you can walk for miles, nature trails and birding opportunities; shelling is ok, but not great, but the sand is the remarkable sugar-colored/textured sand that this area is famous for - I love it here!!!

Although the campground underwent a controlled burn in December, it is still lovely with camp sites that are visually isolated compared to most state parks, and well-maintained facilities.   It's intriguing actually to see how quickly an area that has experienced a burn of this type recovers.  We've experienced no odors from that earlier burn, and given the manner in which they did the burn, there is a remarkable amount of greenery remaining in the area, and particularly surrounding our campsite.  Like a number of other campgrounds, this one has some signs that one can only shake one's head at....and take photographs, of course.

Weather has been good -50's and 60's and dry, calm winds the early days of our stay.  Thursday night a storm moved in which whipped the water into 6-10 foot waves (Neil - you should be here!)  Yesterday was still rainy and foggy all day, so rather than sit in the camper all day, we drove to St. George Island to check out the state park campground there, knowing we could not fit it into our trip this year, but thinking ahead to next year.  That is a lovely campground, very different than the one we are currently occupying, smaller, but with the advantage of fresh seafood within reasonable reach.  We had lunch at a local seafood pub, which was amazing, and thoroughly enjoyable.  Fresh oysters as a starter - SO sweet tasting - followed by fried shrimp and fries that were SO fresh and good!  

Eddie Teach's Raw Bar

2015: On the Road Again...

We got a real Michigan Winter sendoff yesterday as we began our trip south to spend the rest of January and all of February as well as a tiny bit of March in Florida and Alabama along the Gulf Coast.

The temperature has dropped significantly and we had the usual wintery mix of snow, sleet, and more snow, making for pretty scenery but hazardous roads.  Fortunately, now that we're in Kentucky, the roads are dry, though temps are still below 30 degrees Farenheit.

Remarkably, despite the single-digit temperatures, our little Silver Spirit remained cozy and warm while we were packing up, primarily using only the heat from a 30-year old little space heater, with an occasional supportive blast from the Airstream furnace.   These are remarkably well-insulated campers!

Because of the late start yesterday, we were unable to reach our usual first night destination of a KOA campground in Louisville, KY, instead having to bunk down for the night at a Red Roof Inn, where he had the chance to watch the Ohio Buckeyes beat the Oregon Ducks.  Why in a motel rather than our own sweet little home that we're towing behind, you ask? Without a place to plug into electricity, the camper is far too cold to spend time in when the temps are in the single digits as they were.  It stayed cozy while we were packing at home because we were plugged into an outlet in the garage, permitting the space heater to do its thing.

About a day and a half of driving still ahead of us before we reach our first destination campground, Fort Pickens National Park near Pensacola, FL.