Month: March 2016

Out of the Woods

Posted on by taleena4

Well, we made it through the 6 days at Deerlick Creek without any real problems. It was definitely a bit of a challenge with our galley grey tank, since we like to wash dishes fairly frequently, but we could have switched to paper plates or done a couple other things to make it less of an issue. Anyway, neither our black tank nor our bath grey tank was filled to capacity, so it looks like we can pretty easily deal without a sewer hookup for nearly a week without a hassle. Nice to know for the future.

Deerlick Creek itself was absolutely wonderful, and we definitely enjoyed the 6 days in the woods to rest and recharge our mental batteries. Civilization is good and all that, but sometimes you just need to get away from it so you don’t go postal. Of course since Lewis does have to work, we can’t go too far off the grid for too long, but as long as we have a cell phone signal, it’s business as usual. And thankfully we did have very good cell reception at Deerlick Creek. It’s only about 25 minutes outside of the college city of Tuscaloosa, Alabama (Roll Tide!), but feels worlds away. We had a pull-through spot overlooking a branch of Holt Lake and awakened to the pleasant sound of bird song each morning that we were able to have our windows open at night. It was an experience that has hooked us on visiting Army Corps of Engineers parks, and we’ll most likely be doing workcamping at them in the future as well.

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A quiet evening around the campfire at Deerlick Creek Army Corps of Engineers park.

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Part of the view from our campsite at Deerlick Creek, overlooking a portion of Holt Lake.

 

After our time at Deerlick Creek was finished, we headed to the tiny little town of Woodville, Alabama, outside of Huntsville, to stay at Parnell Creek RV Park. This RV park is only a few miles from the first attraction we visited during our stay – Cathedral Caverns. Cathedral Caverns is a must-see destination for cave aficionados, having the world’s widest entrance for a commercial cave (126 feet), and one of the largest stalagmites in the world at 45 feet tall and 243 feet in circumference. It was very interesting to take the guided tour through the caverns, viewing the various stalagmite and stalactite formations, the flowstone “waterfalls”, the Mystery River running through one of the “rooms” and a half-dozen or so eastern pipistrelle (a.k.a. tricolored) bats. There were even a couple of megalodon shark teeth protruding from the ceiling.

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The massive entrance to Cathedral Caverns. So easy even a caveman could do it?

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The flowstone “waterfall” in Cathedral Caverns. Too bad the park service pumps in the water that currently flows over it.

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Part of how Cathedral Caverns got its name – the beautiful formations vaguely reminiscent of a grand cathedral’s pipe organ.

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More of Mother Nature’s hidden underground artwork.

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An eastern pipistrelle, or tricolored, bat (Perimyotis subflavus).

 

The next attraction we visited in the area was the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro, Alabama. It’s a much-hyped tourist destination, having been featured on such TV shows as Good Morning America, The Today Show, and Oprah, as well as in The Wall Street Journal, Southern Living and many others. It’s where lost and/or unclaimed airline baggage and cargo eventually goes for resale to the general public. I can’t say it was a complete waste of our time, as Lewis did pick up a couple pairs of shorts and t-shirts and I scored both a Nikon DSLR camera and a Canon compact point-and-shoot camera at about a third of the price of brand new, but most of what we browsed through was not very exciting to us nor very valuable. I would say that if you’re in the area, it could be worth an hour or two of your time, but don’t bother making a special trip hoping to score a Prada handbag or a Rolex watch for $100 – it’s not going to happen.

We have just over another week here before we continue on to Georgia and Florida, but we still plan to visit the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, and possibly the Huntsville Botanical Garden, before leaving this area if we have time and decent weather. Until next post…

Back Across the River

Posted on by taleena4

We never did make it back into the Paragon Casino before heading off to Vicksburg, Mississippi and the Ameristar Casino and RV Park. We just weren’t really in the mood and we had a few things we needed to do (like catch up on laundry) before moving back across the Mississippi River. All in all, we had a good time in Louisiana, but it was time to get out of the low-lying areas of the state before we got caught by a bunch of very slow-moving thunderstorms that were predicted to head our way. And boy were we glad we did move to the higher side of the Mississippi River! We had one good weather day to tour Vicksburg National Military Park before the skies opened up and dumped on us for five days straight, causing massive flooding in many areas of Louisiana and Mississippi. Thankfully the Ameristar Casino’s RV park is located on the south side of Vicksburg proper, and protected from the Muddy Mississippi by massively tall bluffs.

But back to our day at Vicksburg National Military Park. Vicksburg, like Gettysburg in Pennsylvania or Petersburg in Virginia, was a Civil War battle that drove one of the major nails into the Confederate coffin. It gave the Union complete control of the entire length of the Mississippi River, and prevented the Confederacy from easily moving much-needed supplies and troops from one place to another. It was also one of those battles that could have turned out much differently if competent leadership on the Confederate side had been in place (the Confederate commanding officer of the forces at Vicksburg, John C. Pemberton, resigned his commission as lieutenant general in disgrace afterwards). A string of forts and defenses that could have been an almost impregnable stronghold became, over the course of 47 days, a steel-jawed trap. It also became one of the best-marked Civil War battlefields, due to surviving veterans from both sides being asked to indicate exactly where they were positioned during the siege when the Vicksburg National Memorial Park was created in 1899. Because of this, over 1300 monuments, plaques, and markers dot the battlegrounds and troop positions surrounding Vicksburg and it is very easy to visualize the struggle that engulfed this area during the siege.

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A recreated example of a Confederate defensive line outside the Vicksburg National Military Park Visitor Center.

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A portion of the battlefields of Vicksburg.

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Shirley House, which has been restored to its 1863 appearance. One of the blue Union troop markers can been seen just to the side of the home.

A 20-minute movie is shown in the visitor center and gives an excellent narrative of the siege through the eyes of both citizens and soldiers, while a 16-mile long road tour winds through the park itself. The park also includes 20 miles of trenches and earthworks, the U.S.S. Cairo museum which is home of the first warship sunk by an electronically detonated torpedo (mine), two antebellum homes (the Shirley Home pictured above is one of these), and the Vicksburg National Cemetery, established in 1866. The defensive lines around Vicksburg also continue outside of the park proper, which made staying at the Ameristar Casino RV Park interesting, as it was located right next to the very southern end of the lines. Heck, you can’t even go to Walmart from the RV park without seeing a handful of officer’s busts and troop position plaques along the way!

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A portion of the Wisconsin troop memorial.

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A statue of Major General Ulysses S. Grant, commander of the Union forces at Vicksburg.

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The U.S.S. Cairo, a Union ironclad sunk in the Yazoo River during the preliminary attacks on Vicksburg and rediscovered in 1959.

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The site of the surrender of Vicksburg to Union control.

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One of the officer’s busts on the way to Walmart from the Ameristar Casino and RV Park.

We didn’t do a whole lot of gambling at the Ameristar, only taking the shuttle over to the riverboat twice for about 30 minutes of video poker each time. The gaming simply didn’t feel as good as it had over at the Paragon, despite the machines having a slightly better pay chart at the Ameristar. The weather also didn’t contribute to doing much of anything else, and we were lucky to get enough of a break in the constant downpour to go out to a nice dinner at Walnut Hills Restaurant, an 1880 home turned into a restaurant, on Friday night. Then we were off to Tuscaloosa, Alabama to stay at Deerlick Creek, an Army Corps of Engineers park and campground for 6 nights. It’s our first foray into staying any length of time without a sewer hookup, so hopefully it works out well for us.

Over the River…

Posted on by taleena4

Our time in New Orleans was definitely interesting. It’s a city of so many contrasts – absolutely gorgeous buildings in the French Quarter, but homes and businesses left completely overgrown and in ruins from Hurricane Katrina on the outskirts of the city. Private Leer jets overhead and $1.2 million yachts passing by our RV, but homelessness and panhandling rampant in other areas. It very much put me in mind of a high-priced “lady of the night” whose time has long since passed. Every once in a while you can still catch a glimpse of the beauty underneath, but now she’s mainly just tired, rundown, and tawdry.

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St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans

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LaLaurie House, said by many to be the most haunted place in New Orleans.

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Never let it be said that they don’t have a sense of humor in New Orleans!

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One of the many homes abandoned after Hurricane Katrina that’s visible from I-10.

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Another New Orleans home left to rot away after Hurricane Katrina.

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One of several cemeteries in New Orleans.

From New Orleans, we debated on heading over to eastern Texas for a couple weeks, but decided to stick with our original plans and start making a gradual northern turn in a loop back to Florida. It was still a bit too soon to head right to Vicksburg, MS, and we really wanted a bit of time to relax and let Lewis get some work done, so we took a more scenic route over the Mississippi River and into the middle of Louisiana (also known as Acadiana or Cajun Country) to stay at Paragon Casino RV Park in the small town of Marksville. Boy, were we in for a treat!

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Everyone’s heard of roadside produce stands, but a roadside ammo can stand?

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Over the Mississippi River we go…

We arrived at Paragon Casino and were given our choice of spots in the campground. We requested something near the pet walk area and were assigned slip 51, right on the end of a row across from the pet walk. We hopped back into the truck and proceeded into the campground itself. Wow. It was a stunning place, with fairly wide grassy strips between each campsite, nice concrete pads and patios, a concrete table and benches on each patio, small trees on most sites, and all kept neat as a pin. We later found out the RV park was rated a 10/10*/10 with Good Sam, and we could definitely see why. Even the bathhouse sparkled. Add in the free 60+ channel cable, excellent high-speed Wi-Fi (something we’ve come to find is almost unheard of in an RV park), and the fact that they honor the 50% off Passport America discount for 5 nights out of every 30 and it’s surprising that the place was practically deserted. But then again, it is quite a distance off the beaten path, which was perfect for us.

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Paragon Casino RV Resort, Marksville, Louisiana.

We both seemed to come down with a nasty little cold the next day, feeling all dragged out and with scratchy throats, so we didn’t get over to the casino itself for 4 days. When we did, we chowed down at the very tasty buffet (a good deal for $16.99), then signed up for our Players Club cards and received a $10 cash perk each. Hey, free money for gambling is always a good thing, so we settled at one of the video poker machines and chucked in a $20 to trigger the use of the cash perk (you have to put your own money in to start, but it uses the cash perk before your own cash). Within about 10 minutes, we hit quad jacks for a $31.25 payout. Nice. Added to some of the other small hands we’d won in that 10 minutes, we had already doubled our money. Time to cash out and see what else was around. Lewis was chuckling at my doubling up, so for shits and giggles threw a dollar in one of the penny slots to use his own $10 cash perk. Being a slot machine, we weren’t expecting much. He burned through the $10 cash perk quickly, then hit a nice winning spin to finish the session $5.60 up. Time to head back home.

Another night that we ventured into the casino wasn’t as good, and we both lost our starting $20. Then last night, I doubled up again and Lewis did even better, cashing out over $100 after hitting quads twice. We may hit the video poker machines one more time before we move on to Vicksburg (and another casino RV park), but we have to both be in the mood for it. At least we never plan to come out of the casino as winners, preferring to think of our starting $20s each session as “entertainment money”. But we definitely won’t refuse the wins when we get them!