Leap Day 2012!

It is a leap year and seems appropriate to be on the road. We are in South Carolina driving in the rural towns in the south.
We just left Charleston which was an architectural marvel. Everywhere you looked there were amazing houses.
We are now headed to South of the Border, which may be the quintessential American tourist trap. I went as a little girl when my parents drove my sis and I down to Disneyworld. This would have been 1979 or 1980. It has changed quite a bit since then. They now have an RV park,  pools, mini golf, rides, etc. Kind of smart of them to build a RV park.  The longer a family stays,  the more they will spend on lucky rabbit feet and Mexican jumping beans.
We intend to buy both because we are total suckers and we love our children.

Alex Townsend was something special

Here we are in Savannah, GA to celebrate a remarkable guy named Alex. He went to the oliverian school for 4 years.  Carl was his teacher and I worked in the dorm where he lived. We became very close to Alex and to his family.
Alex died in a car crash on February 14, 2010, in Savannah. He was a student at SCAD and was making cool art. He had a great girlfriend named Chelsea and everything was going really well.
It doesn't make sense that he had to leave us at 21 years of age.
Alex has been a guiding force for us on this RV trip. We have run into Alex look-alikes, stayed in the town of Townsend by chance and have felt his spirit on many occasions.
Alex's Mom ,Jeanne, gave us some stickers to put around America in honor of Alex. We have been doing this the last 8 months.
Today we had a special moment. We saw the smallest church in America in Darien, GA. Believe me when I say it was small. Foe those that know us well, we are not church going folks, but this place spoke to us. It was non denominational and just plain earnest and special.
We put an Alex sticker up in honor of a cool dude and one of my favorite oliverian students.
We miss you and love you Alex!!

FLORIDA

The state of Florida is the tale of the good, the bad and the ugly. The weather is fantastic, like really incredibly mild and pleasant. We went to the beach, swam in the water, frolicked with the birdies ( you get the picture ). We loved being there. It was like we were on vacation from our year long vacation, if you know what I mean.
OK...now the problems with Florida.... ...it is busy in many of the towns. Driving in the state is downright treacherous.  We almost got hit twice by crazy folks.  I mean it isn't that hard to see us coming , right? We are in a bright white, 27 foot long RV covered with bumper stickers.  If you can't see us, you definitely need some glasses.
Oh, and Orlando, although fun, is such a rip off. You tell me why it has to cost 500 dollars for a family to go to an amusement park. Pleeease!
All that aside, the coasts are beautiful and we found some killer places. I think our favorites were Mexico Beach on the emerald coast and San Sebastian Inlet on the Atlantic. We also thought ST. Augustine was awesome.
We saw alligators everywhere. I also saw anough snowy egrets to last a lifetime. They are gorgeous birds,  by the way.
I could go on and on about the good and bad of Florida, but I wont bore you.  The good did outweigh the bad, that is for sure.  I think it is a state where you have to put some work in to find the gems. But once you find those places, you are definitely sold on the state of Florida.
Pics.

It has been awhile

I have not written a blog post in a couple of weeks. We have had a fantastic time visiting folks and I just got so busy. I this New Orleans was the last place I updated.
We went pretty quickly through Alabama and Mississippi. We mainly stayed on the coast and not the big guns like Biloxi and Montgomery. One thing that stuck with us is that the gulf was demolished by hurricane Katrina and Ike.  There are so many places that are still trying to rebuild. I cannot imagine how bad it looked back when the initial damage occurred.  There were so many piers completely crumbled and many houses, especially in the poorer towns, demolished beyond repair.
I think our next family adventure will include a habitat for humanity component.  There are so many Americans in dire need of housing. This seems to be especially true in the southern gulf states.

New orleans

Sneak peek

LOUISIANA

I WROTE A GREAT POST ABOUT Louisiana which you will never read. It is lost in the blogger world somewhere. Such a bummer because it was a doozy and had good pics too.
In a nutshell,  we loved Louisiana.  The food was outstanding and the folks were ultra friendly.
We are inFlorida now and it is hot. Have to pull the shorts and skirts out of storage. Kids swam in the gulf today.
I will write a longer post soon and update the map. We are staying in a hotel this weekend ( with wifi!)and going to Harry Potter world. We decided to go on super bowl Sunday. Shouldn't be very crowded.
Will post about all that soon and will get some pics together from AZ on.