Goodbye, Fort Pickens

As we were driving down the narrow sandy park road to leave Fort Pickens, I really felt a little sad. I'm so glad we chose to stay here. With all the indecision about it, checking on the weather, being concerned about safety while we knew Brock was going to be gone, it was such a nice park! The hosts on our loop were very friendly and helpful and the beaches were close and beautiful. The showers in the bathhouse, though they soaked our clean clothes with overspray, were hot and had great pressure.

Brighton called Walmart and someone had turned in a wallet, but it wasn't his. Bummer.

We had a goal of getting out of our parking space by 10 am to avoid parade traffic (again), but more importantly to get on the road since the forecast called for thunderstorms and we wanted to get to our destination and get setup before they were supposed to arrive. The winds were already picking up. We beat our goal as we were pulling out of the dump station by 10:05 so we must've left our campsite early. Wow! That is rare!

We had a scheduled stop at a restaurant which was recommended to us by our good friends, the Dimmitts. We arrived at Lambert's Cafe in Foley, Alabama between 11:30 and 12:00. The restaurant's claim to fame is that they are the "only home of throwed rolls".  They have waitstaff that go around calling out "Hot buns!" and if you raise your hands, they throw one to you. They were really yummy freshly baked rolls and were our favorite part of the experience. Inside the restaurant is kind of like a Cracker Barrel with the barnwood look. At Lambert's, you order your meal and two sides, but they also have waitstaff that go around with other sides that are served "family style". They just go around to the tables and ask if you'd like fried okra or black eyed peas or fried potatoes and onions. They also come around and ask if you'd like apple butter or molasses for your rolls. Then the guy will come by and yell out "Hot buns!" again. It's a busy place. There were several birthdays announced over a loudspeaker while we were there also. The fried okra was the best we've had though still not everyone in our party appreciated it. The rolls were heavenly. I don't think I'd ever tried black eyed peas so that was good to try a bit, they were tasty. The rest of the food was ok, but the experience was definitely worth it.

Huge mugs of sweet tea and root beer

Spencer enjoyed his rolls.

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*Side note* Just as we were sitting down at our table at the restaurant, Brock's phone rings and there is a lady telling us that she found Brighton's wallet. We couldn't really hear her over the din inside, so Brock got her number and went outside with Bri to call her back. Come to find out, she was a very nice lady who didn't actually find Bri's wallet, but she found all his cards out of it. The wallet and his $7 cash were gone. The funny thing was how she got Brock's number since Bri had given Walmart my cell number. She said she had found Paul's business card, "Call.paul", with Bri's other cards, so she called Brett and Paul looking for Brighton and they gave her Brock's number. She was so sweet even offering to meet us somewhere to return stuff. We let her know that we'd left the Pensacola area already and asked her to send it to Carly's address so Carly can forward it to us in the next mail shipment. All Bri's cards were there including his debit card and library card which is a big blessing. She said they are in pretty rough shape so they'll probably have to be replaced, but it is so good to know what happened and that all Brighton lost was that little bit of cash. I think he won't be sticking his wallet into sweatpant pockets anymore either. Painful life lesson. I think he'll soon be receiving a bill from "Call.paul" too. Ouch. LOL

We drove about an hour more to our campsite for the next 3 nights, Meaher State Park, in Spanish Fort, Alabama. The park is really nice with paved sites and tall trees. We are right on the water with grass between and it has full hookups, rare for a state park. We got all setup and went outside to watch some kite surfers out on the water, Ducker Bay.

We finally got to put a new state on our map.

Our campsite

3 Kite Sufers in the bay right behind our trailer - fun to watch. They get lots of air in their maneuvers.

The rest of the day was pretty much down time, relaxing at the trailer.

We really haven't seen much bad weather today, some scattered rain showers, but no thunderstorms to speak of. We saw there was a tornado watch until about 11 pm, but we think it is to the north of us and we don't see any signs. Thankfully. We did have a pine cone fall on our roof earlier this afternoon, which hit so hard it sounded like someone had shot a gun and was quite startling until we figured out what it was.

We're going to watch the weather and decide on our final plans for tomorrow, but at some point in the next couple of days, we are looking forward to seeing the USS Alabama and possibly taking in a Mardi Gras parade. Evidentally, Mobile has the oldest annual celebration and is supposed to be more family-oriented than the New Orleans celebrations. It might be some of the "local culture" we get to experience, we'll see.