We left Paynes Prairie Preserve State Park at 10 am on March 12th after dumping and flushing for a 205 mile drive to Fort McAllister Historic State Park in RIchmond Hill, Georgia. During our drive on northbound I-95 we saw something we’ve never seen before; wild pigs, a sow and three piglets, rooting in the grass on the side of the road…twice! We saw the first group and were so astounded that when we saw the second group a half mile later we STILL didn’t get a photo.
We stayed at Fort McAllister Historic State Park before from October 26th to November 2nd in 2022 when we were heading back into the State of Florida from our first long trip across the country. We ended up at the same site we had then, a pull-through with water and electric.
The added attraction is that our neighbors on one side have 5 (FIVE!) dogs that bark at the slightest sound or the sight of another dog. Then, the megaphone-mouth woman who owns them screams at the top of her lungs for them to “SHUT UP!!!” or, even better, “GODDAMMIT SHUT THE HELL UP!!!!” We finally had to turn on our air conditioner just to block out the sound.
One of the all-too-frequent downsides to RV camping: neighbors with no sense of common courtesy.
Scheduling Snafu
That afternoon, the park we are supposed to stay at in two weeks called to cancel our reservation since they’re not going to be able to open in time. Cindy scrambled to find us a spot for those two weeks or places with some mixture of days to stay. Being the pro she is at this, she found us another spot not far from our original campground where we can stay for the entire two weeks.
During our walk with Bella that first night we saw an armadillo. Bella was enthralled with it and its behavior.
Thursday morning we hiked the trail around the north end of the campground with Bella. Saw several deer and a wildly twisted tree that was bent over at its base. It looked like a tornado touched down on top of the tree trunk and torqued it around before knocking it over. There is a photo of it in the album and it’s also in our video for this post.
Which leads to…
Tornado Watch!
Friday morning, after a two-mile hike with Bella and then shopping for groceries, we returned to Nomad. Not long after, one of the camp hosts came by to warn us about the incoming severe weather forecast for Saturday night and Sunday morning for our area. She said the park and campground had NO local alert system like sirens or horns, so they were asking all the campers to be sure to keep an eye on the weather. (We always do and we already knew about the system she was warning us about)
During our evening walk with Bella we saw several deer and a raccoon, but couldn’t get a photo of the raccoon.
Congratulations Ann
We have known for a while that Ann was up for a well-deserved promotion to supervisor at her place of employment. In fact, a couple of days ago HER supervisor told her it was going to be announced soon to the rest of the staff. Well, she texted us Friday evening that it was officially announced at her office that day…20 minutes after she left work for the day, lol!
But at least now it’s official. Congratulations to her on her promotion and all the hard work she did that led to it.
And in the second-best news of the day, the noisy neighbors with the 5 barking dogs finally left.
NOAA Weather Radio App
Another two-mile hike with Bella Saturday morning. We found a wildlife viewing area that we didn’t know about, but it turned out to just be a bird blind. While on the walk through the campground we checked out which bathroom building (because they’re made of concrete) was closest to us in case we needed to run to it in the middle of the night. We have our go bags ready. Raincoats ready. Flashlights ready. Weather radio all charged up and keeping our ears tuned to it. We slept in our clothes that night. I didn’t spend 15 years as an Emergency Manager to be caught unawares by some severe weather.
I also downloaded a new app for my iPhone; the NOAA Weather Radio app. It has two advantages that I can see. 1. It’s a fraction of the cost of a regular weather radio ($5.00) and 2. You’re not limited to hearing warnings about your immediate area. You can tell this thing to get the weather radio broadcast for a location across the country. This is great if you want to keep track of severe weather where your family and/or loved ones are.
There are a couple of in-app purchases you can make if you want a detailed weather readout or an enhanced radar experience, but I haven’t seen the need to buy those yet. We got ours from the Apple App Store, Android users can get it from the Google Play Store.
With this app and our standalone weather radio we’re in great shape for staying advised of severe weather conditions when we’re not able to get Over The Air (OTA) weather reports from local TV stations.
Before heading to bed, I finally got to watch the third episode of “Daredevil: Born Again” that aired the previous Tuesday night. Another good episode, but I was unhappy with the death of (NO SPOILERS) a particular character at the conclusion. However, it could open up the door for another character from the comic books to make an appearance.
Rude Awakening
Sunday morning at 6:15am, the weather alerts sounded, jolting us awake. Well, Cindy was already awake, so it jolted ME awake and just startled her. It was only a warning, nothing serious. It hadn’t even started raining yet like it was supposed to, so after breakfast we took Bella on a walk around the campground. It was windy and the clouds were gray and heavy looking. We happened to be on the dock out by the Ogeechee River when Cindy saw a Bald Eagle flying overhead. I was hoping that was a good sign.
It started raining at 9:30 am and rained all day until 7:30 pm. There was a lot of wind, but it wasn’t too strong, and quite a bit of lightning throughout the day.
We did a lot of reading, writing and, for Cindy, tatting. We also finished off Season Eight of “Modern Family” and had several good laughs from those episodes. Ann got the congratulatory floral arrangement we sent her at work (although it was at the end of the day, grrrr!). Our daughter-in-law Wendy sent us a video clip of our youngest granddaughter, Jade, taking center stage to tap dance her way into our (and the audience’s) hearts during her latest on-stage performance. You can watch it too if you take a look at our video for this post.
Monday morning got off to a bad start. Bella woke me up at 3:30 am asking to go out. I took her out and she had diarrhea. She was such a good girl to let me know. We came back in and I saw that she had vomited on the rug, so I cleaned that up. I went back to bed but she woke me up again at 5:30 for another round. Poor thing.
Cindy gave her some medicine and Bella seemed better later in the day. She ate her dinner that night with no ill effects, thank goodness.
Tuesday, Bella was still having some stomach trouble in the morning. Cindy gave her some anti-nausea medicine the vet had prescribed and it seemed to help.
The stomach issues worry us because it is one of the signs that she may be moving to stage 4 of kidney failure. Or it could simply be something bad she ate. We’ll keep closely watching her.
I finished the book “On Tyranny” by Timothy Snyder. You can read my review here.
Wednesday we were on the road again.
Thanks for following The Wandering Wetheringtons.
Awww, you didn’t have to put me in the post but TY. The flowers are still going strong! Poor baby Bella, I hope she is doing better. Also, please be careful! All these ‘events’ worry me with you guys in the RV. Love you both!!
We’re proud of you so I like to write about it. Glad to hear the flowers are still good after a week! Thanks for the well-wishes for Bella. We are always careful, so please don’t worry.
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