Avon NC to Quinby VA (193 Miles)

We really enjoyed our time at Sands of Time but it was time to leave this morning. Still, it is a great drive, even when you are leaving here!

Little visitor last night....think she liked the vittles in the garbage!

 

About an hour after you head north from Avon you hit a really sandy

area. Not many trees for a little bit.....still on the Outer Banks. 

 

We saw this place when we were heading down to Avon

last week and thought of you, Mel Beatty!!

Too bad it was closed today!!!

And it looked like a beautiful diner too!!

 

Once you go through the Norfolk/Chesapeake area, you go over and through a series of tunnels that cross the Chesapeake Bay/Atlantic Ocean. There was the first bridge and then the Thimble Shoals Tunnel, then back on a bridge network again and then into the Chesapeake Channel Tunnel; and then one more bridge. All in all, it spans 20 miles. There is a hefty price tag to go through it though, $13.50 for us!!

 

I think we could use this to get to Vancouver Island from the mainland of Vancouver!!

 

Whoo-hoo, here we go!!

First tunnel....

On the next bridge section and here comes the

next tunnel.....

 

Last huge bridge section coming up.

All in all, pretty impressive. Now, can we have one in Vancouver??

 

After we got back over the Chesapeake Bay Tunnel system it was about another 40 miles up to Quinby VA. Nice drive into the park, about 8 miles off the main highway. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, here we are at Virginia Landing Park....

 

A bit of history on this park. It was very badly damaged by Hurricane Sandy in late October 2012. Sandy was the 2nd costliest hurricane in US history and cost the country about $68 Billion.

 

Sadly, most of this park was never rebuilt. I think if we had known this, we likely would have made another choice. The pictures below are nice looking but you will notice a distinct lack of people. There are a few campers and mostly permanent people. Most of the sites were never rebuilt and many, many do not have electricity. In fact, in the area we are in, Doug had to walk along a row of 6 campsites and found one that worked on the 5th try. 

 

Once, in it's prime, it was probably a great spot. It has a pool, mini-golf and some great green areas. The ranger told us that it only gets busy now on the weekends. I will try and get a few more pictures tomorrow night. We are at the Family Lodge for internet and I want to be able to ride back in the "sort of" daylight!!

 

   

 

There are some privately owned homes in the park area too.

We are not sure how they are associated with the actual campground.... 

 

Mini-golf.....

The road we have to ride on to get back to the campground.....

View out the van window, towards the Atlantic. There are a few

barrier-type islands way out in front but not accessible by car. No roads....

Doug trying to take back his patio from all the debris....

The trailers you see behind Doug are just being stored. All through the

trees there used to be campsites. There are still broken

tables but you can't use the area.....

 

 

These trees are behind us. You can't see, but there are large patio slabs out on that grass that are no longer used. The many Canadian Geese and their babies like them though!

We started out at the far end trying sites and ended up at this one!

 

Hope everyone is well and has had a great weekend!! See you when we get to Greensboro MD tomorrow!!

 

Peace....

 

Thought for the Day: Sometimes things aren't as they appear!!

Avon NC (Day 5)

Happy to say that we woke up to sunny skies and that really motivated us to get out of here to do "something". Oh my gosh, if we sat in the van in rain for a second day, I am not sure what would have happened!!!

We headed over to the beach again for a nice long walk. It was especially nice as it was about 22 C (72 F). We walked about 3 miles on the beach (round trip)...checking for shells and interesting bits of sea life. Check out our walk. Better yet, come along with us!!

Doug checking out the water temps. Not too bad!!

 

Love, love the waves and the sound.....

 

 

Typical surf fishing get-up. I think most of them go to

McDonald's for dinner!! But, that's fishermen for you!!

 

Once again, Nancy leaves the beach with some AWESOME shells!!

 

So as we walked back, we saw a group of guys pulling in a pretty big "fish". Turned out to be a small thresher shark. When one of them ran and got his knife and ran towards the shark I told Doug..."I can't watch" but then it became obvious that they weren't going to hurt the shark. They were saving it!!

 

See, the shark had got himself all tangled up in heavy fishing line, multiple times over. It was all tangled up around his fins and all over his head. Some of the line had actually cut into his fins. There was also the hook in his mouth from their attempts at surf fishing.

 

So, the group of guys went to work to free him from his entanglement. We were SO impressed. Of course, the shark was not aware of their attempts to help him and he continued to thrash around and try to bite them. They were pretty successful in getting everything cut off of him. They figured that he weighed about 30 lbs.

 

 

See the hook on his lip? The fishermen told us that the hook would actually just

disintegrate with the salt water and it was not going to be a problem for the shark.

Guess he will be in style with a pierced lip!!

It kept flipping around. Too bad he didn't know they were helping him!!

 

This guy dragged him back into the surf. He had to keep pushing him back into the water.

The strong surf kept pushing him back up onto the sand. I guess they are also

a bit traumatized so it takes them a bit of time to get their senses back!

 

He took one last "fling" and the shark was gone.

 

We were so happy with this group of guys for taking so much time to help this one sea creature. Good to see that people really do care about helping. Way to go men!! 

 

Here are a few pictures of the dune/house area where we entered the beach.

 

Our bikes are parked way down there.....to the right of the path.

 

 

The county is very protective of the dunes. They are all that keeps the

sea from the land. You need to protect them!! Don't walk on them....

 

 

After this beach afternoon, we rode about 8 kms (round trip) to get a few groceries. Love riding here on the sidewalks.

 

Well, that's it for our stay here. A few loads of laundry (I know it NEVER goes away) and we will be out of here tomorrow morning.

 

Tomorrow's travels will find us into Quinby VA at Virginia Landing RV Park. Look it up on a map. It is in a pretty neat area about 192 miles north of here. Should be wifi.

 

See you all then. Have a happy Saturday!! Pork roast is almost done on the bbq!!

 

Peace....

 

Thought for the Day: May you always have a shell in your pocket and sand between your toes......right, Josh?!! 

Avon NC (Day 4)

Sorry to say that we did LESS today than yesterday. It started out nice and bright and sunny this morning but shortly thereafter it clouded over and by the early afternoon it rained off and on for the rest of the day. Nothing sucks the life out of your outdoor plans more than rain!

Our new friends from Berlin, Peter and Dorothy, left today. They are meandering their way around for the rest of this month. They have to be in Baltimore MD by June 5th so they can ship their van back home. It was really nice to meet them. They were kind enough to invite us over last night for a visit. We got to see their van, up close and it is as nice as we imagined.

Unfortunately, we all forgot to take pictures last night so we took some today before they hit the road.

Peter taking a picture of us while I take a picture of him....

...and sadly, they left us behind!!!

 

Anyway, Peter & Dorothy, it was really nice to meet you and I hope we can stay in touch!! Safe travels for the rest of your journey here in the US and on the way home too!!

 

That's it for our Friday. Hope everyone is having a great evening!! We miss you all!!

 

Peace....

 

Thought for the Day: Enjoy the little things in life, because one day you will look back and realize they were the big things.....

Avon NC (Day 3)

Happy Birthday to our nephew  Kyle Beglaw, who lives in Medicine Hat, AB. We hope that you have a great day!

 

Hope you are enjoying your day!!

 

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I really, really have nothing worthy of reporting to you all. We did our expenses for the month of April and with all our tours, races, 4 hotel nights, restaurant meals......well let's just say it wasn't pretty. Oh well. We will move on from there and try not to look back and try NOT to repeat it going forward....

 

Small bit of trivia. This area is affectionately known as OBX - for Outer Banks. I told you it was a "small" bit of trivia........

 

We met some nice travellers in this park today. Peter and Dorothy from Berlin, Germany. They have ben travelling in a camper van, custom-made in Germany, for the past year. This is actually their second tour of the US. They had the van shipped over from Hamburg to Baltimore MD. They even have gone across Canada as far as Nanaimo, so when we told them that was where we lived, they remembered exactly what we were talking about. Super interesting travellers. We loved their van!! It was a bit taller than Euri with more amenities (......insert bathroom here) while still managing to keep a very small footprint. They get about 23 miles per gallon on their diesel engine. They had it built a bit higher so they would have bigger cupboards on the top for more storage. I believe what I have is called "van-envy"!!!

 

 

 

I have this thing when I travel that I like to look at and collect license plates. Well, not "collect" in the sense that I steal them, but I write down where they are from. (I know, weird, right?). We have been gone so long now that I am proud to say I have managed to write down 49 states. It took a long time to get that 49th plate from Rhode Island. I mean really, I know it's a small state but I was beginning to think that those people NEVER went on holiday. Someone finally did because I saw it when we were in Key West. So, the only outstanding plate is Hawaii. Come on!! WHERE are you people?????

 

We have just paid for 3 more days at Sands of Time, sounds like a soap opera doesn't it? We will leave here on Sunday and drive up to Quinby VA to another Passport America park there. Another good rate....after last month, we need good rates!! The park is really nice here. Only complaint is that the little bathroom building is on a well, while the rest of the park is on city water. I guess years ago there was a hurricane that came through and ever since then, the water in the well has turned "brackish". Which, short of a super scientific explanation, makes the water smell like rotten eggs - sulphury. Pretty gross. But, that is the only thing wrong with it. Otherwise we are very comfortable and can ride (as you saw yesterday) to lots of things. Too bad they never converted the bathroom building to the city water too.

 

We headed out for a little bike ride this afternoon, to find bread and milk. We ended up riding about 11 kms. Guess that's an okay ride.......

 

So, that's it for tonight. Feels like rain is coming as the wind has really picked up again. Last night we had quite the thunder storm and lots of rain and this morning about 7 am the lightning came back (with a vengeance) and it brought it's buddies thunder and rain. So, we did what anyone in our position would do. We rolled over and went back to sleep. By the time we got up, the sun was shining and pretty much everything was dry again.

 

Peace....

 

Thought for the Day:  Push yourself because no one else is going to do it for you.