Day 12 - Travel to the Gulf Shores

Saturday, June 17, 2023
Posted from: Sun Outdoors, Orange Beach, AL
Miles driven: 532
Total trip miles: 2788

Today was one of our four long travel days on this trip. We drove all the way from St. Pete, FL to Orange Beach, AL. Trading one kind of paradise for a slightly different kind of paradise. 

But on our way to our new paradise, we made a few questionable choices…okay it was me. I made a decision that resulted in the picture below. It was really a sequence of decisions…(I thought saying that would make it sound better, but now that I read it, it sounds so much worse.)

Goggle Maps warned us of a little road construction down by the beach that will slow us down by ten minutes. I thought, wow, what a horrible hardship to be stuck in traffic on the beach for ten minutes. The other route was all inland, and looked super boring. So we stayed on route. 

Then a couple things happened at the same time: 1) we unknowingly passed the last station selling diesel, and 2) the delay increased from ten minutes to almost thirty minutes. Eek! 

The roads were tight and turning around was not practical, so here we are. Thankfully, we always have two of these yellow diesel containers full of fuel in the back of the truck. This was the third time traveling all over the country that we used them. We likely could have made it, but it was a hot day, we knew we would be sitting in traffic, and the fuel is actually part of the cooling system on our truck, so it’s best not to run it under a quarter tank on hot days. 

I can’t say there isn’t the tiniest bit of frustration represented in this picture. It was a little quiet in the truck for the next five miles before we all recovered from our disappointment in my poor decisions. 

When you pass a campground near your final destination after a long day of travel, the question is inevitably asked by the kids: “Why didn’t we book a site here?” Matt is wiser, I knows better than to ask questions that may bring him harm. 


It was fun to look at the houses while stuck in the looooong construction delay. 


And just like that we weren’t stuck anymore. Wait. Where was the construction? We didn’t see so much as a single orange cone. We did see a bottle of spray foam that has exploded in the middle of the street, so we got some mileage out of stories about the spray foam construction. 


As we were checking in to this new campground (as in this is the first season the campground was open), a tornado warning was issued. It wasn’t for our location specifically, but it looked and sounded like storms were coming, so we asked the campground people where we can take shelter. Here is how that incredibly productive conversation went: 

Me: Where can we take shelter?

Lady: We can’t tell you.

Me: So you don’t have shelter at the campground?

Lady: We can’t tell you. It’s a liability.

Me: So you have shelter and we just have to find it? Or you don’t have shelter and we need to find somewhere else?

Lady: I can’t tell you.

Me: So we are on our own. 

Lady: I can’t tell you. But good luck and be safe!

Alright…We walked away while she was in mid sentence saying that she has ent finished telling us the rules of the campground. I said over my shoulder that we would worry about rules after we survive the storm that was fast approaching. 

We needed to get unhooked and set up before it hit, so everyone performed their tasks in record time! 

Aaaaaand it never stormed. The whole thing blew right over us and ushered in some wonderfully cool air. It was now a perfect night to make dinner, hang out, and swim. 


The pond right behind the campground has alligators and frogs. It probably has other things too, but the other things didn’t get their own sign and/or didn’t loudly announce themselves. 



The pool was pretty big and no one was there after dark. 




The frogs make sort of a horn sound. Not quite an air horn, but very loud for a tiny little frog. This little guy is maybe two and a half inches and can be heard across the campground. 

A pretty good long travel day.