East Coast Spring Vacation 1

It's been nearly a month since we embarked upon the vacation that will be detailed in the next few posts.  We had planned this time for some time, as we do with most of our trips.  We knew it would be early in the season due to Parker's spring break being so early this year.  We weren't sure if we would be able to de-winterize the Airstream or not before going.  As it turned out, the weather didn't cooperate and we embarked upon our trip with the red stuff still in the plumbing and jugs of water for drinking until we got to warmer climates.  Not to be totally outdone, my job had one up it's sleeve, too.  We were supposed to leave home on Tuesday night.  It turned out I had to work very late that day, so the trip leaving time was moved to Wed morning.  In the end, it probably wasn't bad.  I was dreading boondocking in a parking lot (again) in freezing temps.

As sometimes happens, this trip got combined with a business trip.  It allowed us to add one of our favorite stops to the trip: Williamsburg, VA.  This time, we didn't even buy Williamsburg passes.  But, we stayed in our favorite campground at Newport News, VA.  Not a whole lot new here other than the kids riding bikes as usual.  Oh, and I managed to hit a deer while staying there; not in the park, though.  Luckily, the damage was not trip-ending and it was a company truck, so no worries about paying for damage!

Riding bikes at Newport News City Campground

One day the kids will understand the ramifications of what this device once was.  For now though, they find it a must-have photo op.

This seems cool to do, too.

A colleague of mine suggested this place in Wilson, NC.  It's called Parker's so we had to stop.  Definitely not your chain restaurant and not too far out of the way.  Plenty of camper parking.

Yes, shorts in March.  We were in FL.

One of just many forts (National Parks) that we visited on this trip along the east coast.

We took the scenic way back to the truck.

Sometimes they are cute.  Sometimes.

The boardwalk over the swamp to another fort.

Ahoy, matey!  Actually, these telescopes are pretty cool.  We gave in to them both spending $25 of their collected birthday money on these.  Amazingly, they work quite well.

The fort that we went to see.  I forget the name now, it's on the FL coast just south of St. Augustine.  This was apparently a torture point.  There was a lot of stuff about prisoners and killing.  There was a free ferry to the fort, but we could not visit due to a storm in the area.

This was the parking lot at the fort.  Awesome trees.

What would a trip with the kids be without a zoo visit?

Actually, this was a zoo and alligator park in St. Augustine.  I was wary of it at first especially because of the price of admission but in the end it was well worth it.

Parker doing the "Parker slump" because he's tired of waiting for  us.

It was mating season or something for a lot of big white birds in the zoo.  Lots of people with really high powered cameras.  It sounded like an explosion when a bird would take flight from the rapid fire shutters of all the cameras.