Irish Rovers - Off on a cloud of heifer dust : April 2016

After departing Florida on April 15th, we stopped at St. Mary's, Georgia, across the water from the Fort Clinch campground and Fernandina Beach, FL. We watched the ferry leave for Cumberland Island and enjoyed another seafood lunch at the water's edge. We had thought about trying to visit Cumberland National Seashore, however, the logistics of RV (no vehicles are allowed on the island) and dogs (allowed on the island, but not the ferry boat) and warm temperatures made even a day trip impossible. Oh well - we can't see everything!

We continued north and stayed at a RV park near Brunswick. It was a great location and allowed us to visit both Jekyll Island and St. Simons Island. Jekyll Island was once privately owned by J.P. Morgan and was dubbed the "Millionaire's Village" (now the historic center of Jekyll Island). They built a huge 'Club' that was essentially a very private, fancy hotel for the very wealthy, and several families built "cottages" (mansions). Jekyll Island is now owned by the State of Georgia and development of the island is very restricted, making it quite a lovely and quiet place to visit. There are a some hotels on the east side of the island, a small residential area and a campground. Unfortunately, while creeping along one of the small roads near the Jekyll Island Club Hotel, with the typical Spanish moss-draped live oak trees, I "bumped" the roof of the RV on a low-hanging branch of one of the huge live oaks. Our roof clearance is 11'1" - and the limb was apparently 11'. It sounded like the roof was being torn off. What an awful moment! When we inspected the damage, it wasn't as bad as we had initially thought, but it still required body repair.

We had already booked a spot at a RV park just outside of Savannah for 2 days and thus began our challenge of dealing with our insurance claim and scheduling the needed body repair. The good thing was that we had already planned to stay in the area until Friday, April 22nd in order to get our satellite TV dish repaired. Long story short, we dealt with the insurance claim, Camping World of Savannah - (who was wonderful), rented a car and stayed in a motel for 2 nights while the body repairs were completed. Camping World wasn't able to complete the repair of the satellite dish (another separate saga), so we found a very nice RV park, enjoyed our exploration of Savannah in the rented car and even managed a day of rest (aka: travel planning & blog writing).

Speaking of Savannah: We loved this city! We were both impressed with the beauty of the city and its architecture, flora and fauna. Our only real challenges in touring was our desire not to leave the dogs too long alone in either the motel room or RV.

In addition to a trolley bus tour of the highlights of Savannah and a two hour walk-about on our own, we also visited the Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum that was very close to our hotel. We drove the rental car to Wormsloe, outside of Savannah. Wormsloe, a state historic site is known for the magnificent long driveway lined with huge old oak trees (no low-hanging branches). Wormsloe was founded by Noble Jones, one of the original settlers who came from England with James Oglethorpe. He built a fortified tabby house around 1737. Some of the original foundation is still at the site. BTW, tabby is a cement the early settlers made using oyster shells and limestone, etc. ) Nobel Jones was an important figure in the development of the colony in Georgia. One of his heirs later built a plantation house in the 1800's, but it remains a private residence, still occupied by members of Jones' descendants.

We then drove to the Bonaventure Cemetery which is noted for its beautiful tombstone architecture and for the many famous and/or historical persons buried there. Additionally, there are lots of old trees, most of which are draped with Spanish moss, making it the perfect cemetery. The Bonaventure Cemetery was made even more popular when the book, "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" featured one of the tombstones on its cover. That tombstone became too popular with some visitors, who began taking parts of it as souvenirs, and the family removed it to the Savannah art museum. We did, however, get a quick peek of it during our trolley tour bus of the city.

Our visit to Georgia will certainly be memorable - and aside from the encounter with the live oak branch, we had a great time. Several people said "Y'all come back, now", and perhaps we will. There is so much more to explore and see in this beautiful city.

Brunswick's old city hall

Latitude 31 restaurant & Jekyll Island Wharf

The Jekyll Island Club & Inn

One of those pesky but beautiful Live Oak trees draped with Spanish moss

Rockefeller's Indian Mount "cottage" on Jekyll Island

Fergus on the beach at Jekyll Island

The damaged roof of Tiny Tin (Jekyll Island souvenir)

Fort Fredrica, St. Simons Island

St. Simons Lighthouse

Mercer House (Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil) - Savannah

Beautiful historic homes of Savannah

The Gordon Low House - first HQ of the Girl Scouts

The Cathedral of St. John the Baptist

The Andrew Low House - first HQ of the Girl Scouts (Juliet Low)

The Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum - Pooler, GA

Entry gate to Wormsloe and the famous oak drive

Bonaventure Cemetery tombstones

Jones Street, Savannah - aka "The Prettiest Street in North America"

Monterrey Square - Savannah

Temple Mickve Israel

Forsythe Fountain - at Forsythe Park, Savannah

On Friday, April 8th, we were thrilled when our visit to the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral coincided with the launch of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and its Dragon spacecraft. We spent the morning touring the space center and then decided to stay for the launch, scheduled for 4:43 p.m. The owners of the RV park where we were staying in Titusville had told us we could easily see the launch from the park across the street from us, however, once out at the Space Center, it was hard to resist the lure of actually being there when the rocket blasted off into space. Fortunately, the Center offered free kennels for pets and we were able to leave the boys in jail, i.e. the kennel, whilst we visited the Center and attended the launch. We did stop by in the early afternoon and walked the boys and reassured them that we would return... several hours later. It took us about 4 hours of waiting in line and on the bleachers to see the launch, but oh my! It was very exciting to see a rocket launch into space in person (vs. TV)! We subsequently learned that the Falcon rocket separated from the Dragon space craft and successfully landed on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean and that the Dragon docked onto the International Space Station. Woohoo! We're sure our presence and cheers (along with thousands of others) contributed to the mission's successful launch.

We returned to Titusville, a delightful little town on the Indian River with Merritt Island and Cape Canaveral to the east, quite pleased with a memorable day. As we departed the next morning, we drove to the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge and stopped at the Manatee Observation deck and were rewarded with seeing at least 15 - 20 manatees in the water. We also saw at least two roseate spoonbills flying by, too. It was icing on the cake to our visit to the Space Coast of Florida.

Next stop was at a nice county park in the 'burbs' of Jacksonville where stayed 3 nights in order to visit an old friend from Italy -- Carol Lucius and her boyfriend Jan Pozin. We also had an appointment to get our satellite TV dish repaired. We had a great visit with Carol and Jan on Sunday - perfect weather as we reminisced about our time together in Aviano, Italy and caught up with current events over wine and snacks outside our RV. On Monday, we inadvertently saw much more of Jacksonville, including the downtown area, on our way to our RV fix-it appointment. Unfortunately, the company was unable to fix our satellite dish, but we managed to return to park on a much less circuitous route.

We then headed to the Fort Clinch State Park on Amelia Island, which involved a very short ride on a ferry boat across the St. Johns River. The ferry was much smaller than Washington State ferries, but fun to say we did it. The state park on Amelia Island is adjacent to Fernandina Beach and near its Victorian, historic downtown area. We meandered around the historic area of Fernandina Beach on our last full day at Fort Clinch, enjoying the architecture of the downtown and the old homes. We also ate an excellent seafood lunch of shrimp and grits - yum! A wonderful way to say 'farewell' to Florida.

View of Cape Canaveral from Titusville, FL