Our philosophy is that if you are away, you are away, distance is not important. The camper now has some age on it and so do we, so we are hesitant to head off cross country with it. This weekend we are off to Augusta, where our main interest is the canal the city built in the 1800's.
It was a long winter (southernly speaking) but spring is now popping out at an amazing pace. On the drive we saw so many pretty redbud trees along the highway, trees that were putting out those "new green" leaves and dogwood trees trying their best to go from yellowish to white.
First stop was Greensboro for breakfast. Gene's cousin, John, who lives on Lake Oconee recommended Main Street Cafe and we were not disappointed. It is a small place with a small staff and kitchen so it took a good while to get our food as a party of six had come in just before us. Nevertheless we passed the time perusing the local school year book from 1950 that sat on our table. Looking at the advertising in the back I was surprised at the number of businesses in the town in that year. Five grocery stores for instance. The owner of the restaurant came by several times to chat with us and offer service. When the food came, my eggs were fluffy and tasty and Gene said his omelet was wonderful. We picked up two servings of peach cobbler to satisfy the Midnight Marauder's late night snack habit and went on our way.
The closest campground I could find to Augusta was Mistletoe State Park on Clark's Hill Lake, which I believe to be about 45 minutes away. Happily upon arrival we found that our Friends of the State Parks membership was still valid and we got a discount which brought the cost down to about $20 a night. Wow! They have a lot of facilities here from tents, to RV to cottages and everything was well tended. The RV section is arranged on two peninsulas and the majority of the spaces have lake views. The wind was blowing a gale out of the west so we found an east facing pull through spot near a bathhouse where a little rise in the land left us protected. As you can see from the photo, the view is killer and there are only three other campers on this peninsula.
While setting up we discovered that we had neglected to bring a few items since we has not been out in awhile, but nothing critical. We did, however, find four flashlights in the camper and Gene had two in the car. No wonder I have had trouble finding one at home. We also discovered that while getting into the bank parking lot where we stashed the camper in Greensboro, a valve had broken off and when you hooked up water, it just ran right back out. So off we headed in the direction of Augusta to find plumbing supplies. We were pretty much out of civilization and it was quite some time before I could get a signal to search but we were delighted to find that Evans, GA to the north of Augusta had everything one could want. After a visit to a Home Depot where customer service was obviously a priority, we were soon on our way back.
Preparing meals in the camper is considerably more work intensive than at home and having found myself really tired of all the planning and preparation, I declared this a no-cook trip. Somewhat at least. We stopped at a Publix in Evans and picked up potato salad and Gene cooked burgers on the grill. We ate on disposable plates to reduce the clean up. They were delicious. Happily we found that our ATT hot spot worked like a charm even with reduced signal and we can use the computers.
The night was pretty cool, but our little portable heater kept us cozy. As I am writing this, the sun is about to come up, turning the sky and water varying shades of orange. A truly wondrous sight. Today we go off to explore.
