Tag: Alabama

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Blogging Driving Geography History Travel

Retirement Road-Trip

Welcome back to #TravelThursday. During the first 3 weeks of April – I’ll be on a retirement road-trip – so-called because I’ll be enjoying the open road as a newly minted American retiree with lots of free time on my hands. It’s a road-trip that I’ve been imagining in my mind for many years now. It’s a road-trip that I’ve been practicing for the past 35 years.

I was originally going to embark on this road-trip not knowing what I would see, who I would see, and where I would go with each new day. But the more I thought about it – the more I worried that it would be a bit chaotic. I did not want chaos to be a part of this adventure, so recently I determined a departure date from home, an arrival date in North Texas (where family lives), a departure date from North Texas, and an approximate end date of my road-trip. I’ve also created pitstops along the way, so I know about how many hours and miles I plan to drive each day on the road, and which towns I plan to spend the night in.

Night 1 will be spent in Gadsden County Florida near Quincy – a western suburb of Tallahassee. Night 2 will be spent in Mobile Alabama. I’ll be leaving Quincy fairly early in the morning so that I can pull-in to Mobile later that same morning and maximize my time sightseeing around town. My first stop will likely be the USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park. I’ve driven by it so many times, and I’ve always wanted to check it out. I also hope to visit the historic (built in 1855) Bragg-Mitchell Mansion. Finally – time and weather-permitting – I hope to check out the Mobile Botanical Gardens. If I don’t make it to the Gardens on this day – then it’ll be on my list of places to visit the next time I’m in town. I really like the Mobile area. There’s so much history to see all around, and I have friends who live in the area who are part of my personal history in Homestead Florida.

Next #TravelThursday – I’ll write all about the Tampa Bay History Center. Let’s keep traveling together.

All rights reserved (c) 2024 Christopher M. Day, CountUp

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Blogging Driving Food Holidays Television Travel Weather

My November Vacation 2021 Road-Trip

#TravelThursday continues now with Part 6 of my 7-part blog series on my recent 18-day road-trip between South Florida and North Texas.

Last week I left-off at the end of Day 16 at my hotel destination on the west side of Hattiesburg right around sunset that night. It was my 2ND stay at that particular hotel, and it was a good night’s stay. Back in November I wrote all about Hattiesburg Mississippi here on #TravelThursday. On a future road-trip I need to spend a couple of days there exploring the local area rather than just a hotel night.

Early the next morning – Saturday November 27TH 2021 – I departed at dawn with freezing cold temperatures and a heavy layer of frost on my car windows. Temperatures dropped to as low as 30°F / -1°C during the first hour of my drive southeastward along historic U.S. 98. I drove through Semmes and Mobile Alabama right around 8 AM, and on the east side of Mobile (after another scenic drive along Battleship Parkway) I picked-up I-10 eastward.

Post-Thanksgiving holiday traffic on I-10 eastward was a madhouse. Once again it was quite scary driving through Pensacola. It didn’t really get much better after that. I don’t think I’ve seen and experienced I-10 as busy as it was on that Saturday.

I eventually had enough of the extreme anxiety, and I got off I-10 about 95 miles earlier than originally planned – at U.S. 231 – which leads southward into Panama City. I’m very familiar with this road, as one of my longtime friends has lived a couple of miles off the road for the past 20+ years. After a fuel pitstop at Love’s (my new favorite gas station / travel stop on the road) I took a series of backroads across the Florida Panhandle (south of Tallahassee) and into the “Big Bend” area of the Florida peninsula.

U.S. 98 is fun (translation – peaceful) to drive between Hattiesburg Mississippi and Mobile Alabama, and I especially love it along the “Big Bend” area of Florida south of Perry. I picked-up U.S. 98 in Wakulla County – which is another fascinating area of my state that I’ve spent very little time in (other than driving through). I’m a big fan of “Welcome To Plathville” on TLC, and on a recent Season 3 episode the family ventured down to Wakulla Springs State Park for some fun in the sun and sea. Now I want to visit !

I enjoyed a nice #LuDinner (late-Lunch / early-Dinner combined) at an all-you-can-eat buffet restaurant in Chiefland – which incidentally I plan to eat at on every future visit through Chiefland. After my hearty meal I continued on for another hour to my hotel destination for the night in Crystal Springs (another town I’ve spent the night at previously). It’s located along U.S. 98 and Florida State Road 44, and where the two routes meet – it’s a very busy and congested intersection.

From the very cold low-30s up to the mild mid-60s – those were the temperatures during my drive back into my home state.

Just like Day 16 I drove another 523 miles on Day 17, so that’s 2,497 miles on this road-trip so far. And that’s where I’ll end Part 6 of this 7-part blog series. I’ll conclude with my road-trip adventures and experiences next #TravelThursday.

All rights reserved (c) 2022 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries

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Blogging Driving Nature Photography Travel

My November Vacation 2021 Road-Trip

#TravelThursday continues now with Part 2 of my 7-part blog series on my recent 18-day road-trip between South Florida and North Texas.

At the end of Part 1 I was enjoying food and fellowship at a Thai restaurant in Semmes Alabama – a northwestern suburb of Mobile. From there I got back on U.S. 98, and I headed northwestward into Mississippi. I enjoy driving this mostly peaceful stretch of U.S. 98 – particularly on the Mississippi side, as it’s a rural divided 4-lane highway (versus a narrow 2-lane road on the Alabama side west of Semmes). I think there have been plans to widen the 2-lane stretch to 4 lanes over the years, but due to environmental concerns regarding the Big Creek Lake reservoir and its watershed those plans have been postponed indefinitely. (The reservoir serves as the municipal water supply for the Mobile area.)

On the south side of Hattiesburg Mississippi I took U.S. 49 northwestward through the heart of the city and beyond. (I wrote about “The Hub City” Hattiesburg 3 weeks ago here on #TravelThursday.)

In the past I’ve taken U.S. 49 90 miles northwestward from Hattiesburg to Jackson – the capital and largest city of Mississippi. But this time I took a much different route. From U.S. 49 I jumped on U.S. 84.

U.S. 84 is a major east-west highway that extends over 1,900 miles across 7 states from high up in the Rocky Mountains of Southwestern Colorado to the low-country of the Atlantic shores of Georgia. It crosses the U.S. Continental Divide in northern New Mexico at an elevation above 7,700 feet.

I took peaceful and scenic U.S. 84 mostly a little south of due westward (and mostly with the mid-November afternoon sun directly in front of me) all the way to the eastern banks of the mighty Mississippi River at Natchez. I didn’t get to see much of Natchez (other than the drive through the city to my hotel), but I did walk over (across the street from my hotel) to the grounds of the Natchez Visitor Reception Center – where I captured a few nice photographic memories as the sun was getting ready to set on the bluff. Here’s one of them overlooking the Mississippi River. (Louisiana is on the other side of the river.)

I didn’t get to visit the museum inside, as I got there about 20 minutes prior to closing time. I’ll have to visit Natchez again on a future trip to and from North Texas.

“The River City” Natchez looks like a fun destination city for locals and others in the region to experience and enjoy for a few days and nights right along the mighty Mississippi River. It has a large downtown district with a stand-alone convention center. Many of its hotels have their own convention centers and rooms. There are about 1,200 hotel rooms in and around Natchez. Tourism supports this city. Its population has actually been declining over the past 40 years, and less people call Natchez home today than they did in 1940. But it still looks like a fun town to visit.

I spent the night in Natchez at the conclusion of Day 2 of my road-trip. I drove 462 miles on this day (Friday November 12TH 2021), for a grand total of 981 miles since the start.

And that’s where I’ll end Part 2 of this 7-part blog series. I’ll continue with my road-trip adventures and experiences next #TravelThursday. We’ll cross the Mississippi River into Louisiana, continue along the Interstate Highway System into Texas, arrive at my family’s home, enjoy a fun Japanese hibachi grill Lunch, and finally visit two of the top tourist attractions in Dallas Texas.

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries

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Blogging Driving Food Holidays Military Travel

My November Vacation 2021 Road-Trip

I have returned back home (where I belong) to Homestead Florida after 18 days on the road between here in South Florida (30 miles southwest of Miami) and my family’s home in North Texas (25 miles northeast of Dallas).

#TravelThursday continues now with a recap of my adventures and experiences along this extended multi-holiday road-trip. In fact I’ll be looking back on this road-trip for the next 7 Thursdays (starting today). I’ve got a lot to cover. I’ve got a lot to look back at with joy. If you’re interested in this trip then read on and stay tuned, for we’ll visit some fun places together (virtually).

Let’s get started – at the crack of dawn on Thursday November 11TH (Veterans Day here in the U.S.A.), as that’s when this road-trip commenced. I took Florida State Road 997 (known locally as Krome Avenue) onto U.S. 27 up the spine of the Florida peninsula. I refer to Krome and the southern portion of U.S. 27 as the #CMDRH. (That stands for the “Chris M. Day Retirement Highway” – for obvious reasons.)

Every military veteran knows that on Veterans Day you can pretty much eat for free at selected restaurants for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. Many restaurants offer free portions of meals (appetizers, desserts), and other restaurants offer assorted discounts. Denny’s and Bob Evans are two restaurant chains that offer free meals on Veterans Day. As I cruised up U.S. 27 into Central Florida I intended to stop at either restaurant – as long as the respective parking lot wasn’t jam-packed. I passed by about a half-dozen Denny’s and Bob Evans locations that were bustling with cars and people – even lines waiting to get in. An ideal situation would’ve been to eat at Denny’s for Breakfast (free) – and then Bob Evans for Lunch or Dinner (free). I finally found a Bob Evans with a few empty parking spaces at around 11 AM in Clermont, so that’s where Lunch was to be. After a short wait in line I enjoyed a nice, hearty, and delicious “Country-Fried Steak – Dinner Bell Plate”. #Yum

After my free meal at Bob Evans I continued up the road, over to the Nature Coast (“Big Bend”) of Florida, into the Panhandle, and just past Tallahassee for my first night’s pitstop. I drove 519 miles on Day 1 of my 18-day road-trip.

On Day 2 I took I-10 westward for another 180 miles to the Alabama state line. That’s right – it took me nearly 700 miles just to get out of Florida !

Incidentally driving through Pensacola along I-10 is never fun. It’s actually rather intimidating (for me). It’s a close call as to which stretch of I-10 in the Florida Panhandle is more challenging – Tallahassee or Pensacola. In both cases I-10 skirts the northern fringes of the cities (rather than traversing right through the middle of them). But due to the combination of local and Interstate traffic there’s a whole lot of merging going on, and merging traffic gives me anxiety attacks.

Rivaling both Tallahassee and Pensacola is I-10 through Mobile Alabama. I prefer to cruise the scenic route along Battleship Parkway (the concurrency of U.S. 90 / 98 which runs adjacent to and closer to the water than I-10).

I wrote about Mobile Alabama 4 weeks ago here on #TravelThursday. On this visit (on Friday November 12TH) I drove past a few more places that I’d like to spend some quality time at in the future – including the USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park. I really need to return to Mobile and spend several days there exploring the attractions of the city on both land and sea. It would also be nice to spend more quality time with my friends there.

I did make a 90-minute stop in Semmes (a suburb northwest of Mobile). I think I know about a dozen people who live in or near Semmes who also lived in Homestead 10 years ago. I ate with one of those people. I enjoyed good Thai food and fellowship with one of my great friends. I’ve known her for nearly 15 years – since the first 3 minutes of my very first Sunday morning church service as a born-again Christian on January 21ST 2007.

And that’s where I’ll end Part 1 of this 7-part blog series. I’ll continue with my road-trip adventures and experiences next #TravelThursday. We’ll cruise-up U.S. 98 into Mississippi, and we’ll cross the state via old rural U.S. highways – over to the eastern bank of the mighty Mississippi River.

All rights reserved (c) 2021 Christopher M. Day, CountUp Ministries