We rented a Dodge Caravan to carry the stuff we knew we would need just to get the new coach back to South Florida. Driving to Memphis took 2 days, staying in Palm Coast and Pensacola. Driving into Memphis we just had to stop by the dealer to take a peak before our appointment the next day.
We arrived early on Monday for our pre-delivery inspection. Gary spent about an hour and a half running through most of the important subjects and systems. I would guess that other dealers spend more time with PDI, but we were fairly knowledgeable already and we just wanted to get on the road. After completing the financial tasks, we moved everything from the van into the coach, returned the van to the nearby airport and hit the road. Our original plans had been to stay at Jellystone RV Park in Memphis. However, the dealer had not made arrangements in advance and they had no availability. So, we did some quick searches on our route south and found a small RV park just off of I-55.
Actually driving somewhere, parking, and setting up the first time was exciting and nerve-wracking. Sunrise RV Park was quiet, easy to access and the owners were very friendly and helpful. The next day we drove to our first Army Corps of Engineering campground. These campgrounds are well maintained and inexpensive. They are scattered all across the southeast where the ACOE has waterway projects.
Next stop was Biloxi, Mississippi where we were lucky enough to be there the day before an airshow at the beach. Since we were there the day before, not a lot of people were around yet and we got to see aircraft doing practice runs including the Air Force Thunderbirds.
We enjoyed the Majestic Oaks RV Resort in Biloxi. It’s close to the beach, nicely maintained and had good WiFi.
We Ubered to the Beau Rivage Casino for lunch. No, we didn’t win anything…
From there, we traveled to Pensacola, Florida to spend a few days with our daughter and stock up on seafood at Joe Patti’s.
The next leg of our journey taught us some important lessons. So far we had been relying on Apple and Google maps for directions. This led us down a road we didn’t want to be on. The Suwanee State Park campground is not hard to find, but some electronic sources will send you down some roads that don’t go there, including a dead end dirt road that may have gone to the park about 30 years ago, but doesn’t now. We had to back out that dirt road about 100 yards to a place we could turn around. If your GPS tells you to take Myrrh St. for any reason, STOP. The park entrance is directly on Highway 90.
Jetty Park in Cocoa, Florida was our next stop and sits right on Port Canaveral. You can watch cruise ships and other vessels come and go through the channel. It would also be an excellent place to view rocket launches from Cape Canaveral.
We finally reached our temporary home of TY Park in Hollywood, Florida on May 8th. It was a good introduction to life on the road, but now we had to settle in for a long stay and go back to work.
Among our many tasks to complete was cleaning out our storage space and moving completely in to Lola. We found we had to do another whole round of downsizing…
