Family Time!

Once we left the river, we traveled on toward Bowling Green, Kentucky, stopping at Cave City for the night. This is a park, Singing Hills, that we have used in the past. I don't care much for the drive going in, but it is do-able and the people are really nice. We got situated and relaxed for the rest of the day.

We drove out the next morning and headed toward Nashville. We skirt around the northwest part of the city on the Brylee Parkway and jumped on the Natchez Trace. This drive is my all-time favorite. It is a slower paced drive. The first section starting in Nashville is only 40 mph, but with the curves and hills and the big rig, you aren't going to go much faster anyway. We saw more wild turkey than we could count, deer, vultures, and snakes. Some of the snakes were dead on the road but a couple of them were alive. I don't know my snakes, but one was yellow with markings. Hmmmmm. Oh, we saw box turtles too. I safely managed to dodge all wildlife. We stopped at Falls Hollow Camp just east of Hohenwald, Tennessee. Hohenwald is German for "high forest." This was a decent camp with indecent hookups. Funky doesn't begin to describe them. The owner told us however we were able to maneuver and get comfy was okay. Didn't have to worry about pulling in, backing in, straight, crooked, otherwise. The camp was a large grassy area with little definition to the sites. But they could make vast improvements with a bulldozer and re-routing some water lines. As it is, there aren't many functional sites for large motorhomes. But we managed to get in and setup and stayed for 2 nights. The owners here are wonderful people and they came and invited us to go out to dinner with them our last evening there. We would have in a minute if we hadn't already eaten. Our dinner was over and cleaned up, so we weren't interested in going. The owners have a restaurant on site and they prepare meals on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. We weren't there any of those nights, but some time we may have to go back. The restaurant was very clean and I bet the dinners are good.

We did go see some places along the Trace we normally don't have a chance to visit. Since we were unhooked, we took the little truck and went back to Falls Hollow to look at the waterfall. Not a lot of water going over the falls, but it was interesting anyway. We also went to the Meriweather Lewis death and burial site further down along the Trace. There is a campground there and it's been years since we were there, so we wanted to see if we might be able to get the big rig in there some time. There are no hookups, so you are boondocking, but that is okay. There were many sites we could have used and it wasn't busy, so perhaps next time we will try it out. We also hiked a short way to see the remains of a small scale railroad used in the mining of phosphate. We also visited a couple wineries along the wine trail and made a few purchases. The country around the area is really hilly and we enjoyed our drive out through the countryside.

Yesterday we packed up and left the camp and headed for Bay Springs Lake, near Burton, Mississippi. We didn't have far to go and checkout isn't until 3 p.m., so we didn't want to get in too early. We stopped at the rest area on the north side of the Tennessee River, one of our favorite stopping points. We walked the dogs, watched the barges on the river, had lunch and eventually started rolling again.

Once off the Trace in northern Mississippi, we fueled up and ran on in to camp. We were still early, but our site was open, so we made it in and set up in quick time. Jo and Gary were due in on Thursday, but about 8:30 I was looking out and saw them sitting in their site. Not sure how they managed to sneak in without us knowing, but to be honest, we were both dozing in our chairs, so no wonder. We went out and visited briefly. Later, after giving them some time to set up, we went over and while we were there, their gas detector kept going off. They had their toy hauler with their two huge motorcycles in the back. There were fumes from the bikes and that was causing the detector to go off. Annoying, but lifesaving. So we all helped get the bikes offloaded and eventually the detector stopped beeping.

Today we are headed to Red Bay, Alabama, Phaeton Place's birthplace, to grab some goodies at the camp store. And we'll spend some time visiting family I'm sure. Saturday is the Pace-Stevens reunion at Marietta. We missed it last year because we went to Alaska, but that is only the first time in over ten years that we have missed. We always enjoy seeing everyone. Many of the older generation who started the reunion are gone now and it is up to us younger ones to keep the tradition going. So we are planning on having a great time visiting with everyone.

 Till next time. . .

Dale