Driving Thru Florida - All Day Long - Day 68

On Tuesday I drove over to Martha’s for coffee at 7:30 in the morning (too early for Mary). She showed me around her cute 1960s era brick fixer-upper. The house has good bones and will make a great home for her when she is done making it exactly the way she wants it. She has already remodeled.

Back at the camper, Mary and I put the camper down (she had done a lot while I was gone and I did a little before I left), and got on the road by 10 am. Good-bye Fort Pickens. Mary pointed out that this National Park may not be here 20 years from now and this may be the only chance we had to see it. I finally found a car wash on Highway 98 out of Pensacola, so I was finally able to wash the visible coating of pollen off my car. My sinuses felt immediately better!

We took I-10 all (and I mean ALL) the way across Florida to Jacksonville, which took almost all day. I had to stop for one 10-minute nap. We had lunch at a buffet named Steak and Seafood in some medium-sized town I can’t remember. I had steak and baked sweet potato. Very good. I bought some silicone lubricant spray at Lowe’s – whose parking lot we parked in while we ate. Florida along the I-10 corridor is heavily forested and hilly. Even when we turned off onto I-295 around populated Jacksonville, it was heavily forested.

We left Florida behind about 7 pm (finally), and drove thru Georgia on I-95. The highway thru Georgia was 3 (and sometimes 4) lanes all the way – even thru the rural parts. We saw a beautiful sunset around 8 pm. Even though the highway is near the coast, we never saw the coastline. We stopped in Richmond Hill, GA at a truck stop for McDonald’s dinner about 10 pm. We both had breakfast biscuits. Beggars can’t be choosers when it comes to getting late night food on the road.

We drove for a little while on I-95 thru South Carolina, and then veered off onto Highway 17 into Carleston. It was a long drive (or so it seemed) since we kept expecting to see the turn for Folly Road/ Highway 171 any time. We saw several groups of deer waiting on the side of the road - hopefully not to bound into cars passing by on the highway. Found our campground – James Island County Park (which is huge!) and got checked in. The Ranger on duty helped us guide the camper in to our #34 spot and even helped us push it the last few feet. This all took place around midnight. We put up the camper in record time and fell asleep immediately.

Mileage at the end of Day 68 = 7,500