It seemed like Speedy's house batteries were pretty low on Friday night. In the middle of the night the CO detector started beeping, waking us up. It wasn't CO but the batteries were almost dead. I shut everything off and went back to sleep.
By Saturday morning, nothing had improved. We had been running the van on battery power for about a week without much running of the engine to charge them back up. When Ellen went off for her morning walk, I started the engine (Speedy's engine battery is separate, so we don't end up with a dead van when the house batteries run down.) and started charging the batteries.
When she returned, we discussed a new plan for the day...a road trip. We decided to go to Ocala, about an hour's drive each way for some shopping and lunch. After breakfast, off we went. After a short stop at the Salt Springs Saturday Market, a small flea/farmer's market, we drove to Ocala to the Publix supermarket there. While Elen and Sally went off to shop for food and Harry went to take a look at the nearby Harbor Freight store, I turned on the generator to allow the batteries to charge a bit more.
I was also tasked with finding a place for lunch, preferably BBQ. There was good wireless reception in Ocala so it was onto the Internet for a bit of searching. There are quite a few BBQ places in Ocala, but the best rated seemed to be Champion Bar-B-Q Services, run out of a trailer. This was a good sign, as our local favorite was True Blue BBQ in Kingston, also based in a trailer (alas, it lost its parking spot last year and it is not known if it will reappear).
So, it was off to Champion when Ellen, Sally and Harry returned. It lived up to its name. The meals were excellent. Ellen, Sally and I had pulled pork sandwiches, while Harry opted for the brisket. I also ordered a half-slab of ribs for all of us. The sandwiches were tasty and large, but the ribs were superb. Just the right texture, almost falling off the bone with that smoke line in the meat...and a crispy surface with a great rub. No sauce was needed, but enhanced it even more. Did I mention that we really liked our lunch?
On the return to Salt Springs we passed an area of the forest that was a known habitat of the Red-cockaded Woodpecker, a relatively rare species. This area is supposed to have one of the highest concentrations of these birds in the country. We spotted many nesting holes. (It wasn't very hard, most of the trees with nesting holes are painted with a white band.) We did not spot any woodpeckers. The breeding season doesn't begin until next month, so it probably wasn't likely they'd be nesting yet.
In the late afternoon, I walked over to the recreation barn. It is a large building maintained by the winter full-season campers. They have several groups that inhabit various parts of the building: a woodworking section, where the predominant activity is turning wooden pen barrels; a section of sewing machines, where various projects, mostly quilting, are done; and an area with large puzzles are being worked on. The campers here come back every year and spend large parts of the winter in these hobbies. The barn is also used for potluck suppers and other events and free coffee is available every morning, by the fire. There is a huge fireplace and while we were there, it was always going.
The reason I went up there was for the wi-fi. One of the campground hosts, situated next to the barn, maintains a 10Mb DSL link to the Internet that is available via a public wi-fi connection. It wasn't available from our campsite in the primitive area, but is very strong in the barn. The other advantage is an electrical connection and, of course, the warm fire.
It has been getting colder since we have been at Salt Springs and Saturday night went down into the the 30's. We were pretty chilly under the Travasak and the propane heater was needed to warm things up on Sunday morning. It was predicted to be even colder on Sunday night, so we looked into moving into the powered area, figuring there might be some opening on a Sunday. Ellen, Sally and I took a stroll around the powered campground and listed the empty sites we found.
I went over to the office and enquired. It turned out all we had seen were actually reserved for Sunday arrivals...but there were several other sites where people were scheduled to leave. Being non-reservable sites, it wasn't guaranteed as a camper can just add another day or more if they do it before checkout time. I took the new list and we walked back to the campground and looked again.
On one of the better sites, the occupants were just getting into their truck as we came by. They were, in fact, leaving. I offered to return their site pass to the office so we could get the site. No problem. It was back to the office to check into our powered site for our last night at Salt Springs. They had no objection to both Roadtreks in a single site. The site was easily long enough for both.
It was back to the primitive campground to pack up and move, something done in record time. Speedy took the back of the site and Shiny the front, we plugged both vans into power and turned on our respective electric heaters. It was pretty cold most of the day. While Harry and I stayed warm, Ellen and Sally rode their bikes to the Salt Springs Trail, about a mile outside the campground.
They had a bit of trouble getting there as there was a wildfire several miles south and the road was closed (As of Monday morning it had burned 1500 acres and destroyed ten homes). After a bit of checking, they let Ellen and Sally through since they were not going anywhere near the fire area. It was a nice hike and they returned somewhat chilled, but we had the Roadtreks warm and toasty.
The cold wind had stopped in the late afternoon and I'd gone up to the gate to get more firewood. Ellen and Harry also brought back a couple of downed branches they found on a sojourn to the Rec. Barn. We decided it would be a good night to brave the cold, build a large fire and have dinner around it, which we did. When the fire burned down and it got chilly, we packed up and returned to the warm vans. It was predicted to reach the 20's overnight. Ellen flipped the Travasak onto the winter position and we retired to a warm bed.
It was 27° when we got up this morning, but the day was predicted to be much warmer than yesterday. Time to pack up and leave. While Ellen and Sally did one last chilly morning bird walk, Harry and I got the Roadtreks ready to go. It was time to go back to the coast. Little Talbot Island State Park was our destination, with a stopover at the Jacksonville Whole Foods for a bit of re-provisioning.
We arrived in time for lunch. Ellen and I had a campsite for tonight and then another one for the next two nights. We did a bit of a shuffle when we arrived, since there was a site that was now open for all three nights, but after we actually moved into it, we decided that the original sites were much better. So it was back to the office to undo our shuffle. They are all heavily wooded sites, so we haven't escaped the forest, but we have a bit of a view of Myrtle Creek and the wetlands beyond the campground...and we are surrounded by other Roadtreks. After we parked in our site, other Roadtrek vans arrived in the sites on each side of ours, like a mini-rally.
After strolling around the campground in the afternoon, we went over to join Harry and Sally for dinner. It has cooled significantly since sundown, so we'll be using the heater and leaving the bed in winter mode tonight.
Champion Bar-BQ Photos
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