Mardi Gras Parade, Foley, Alabama

There are parades galore in this area but we only made it to this one and what a great day for a parade it was.  Temp was 74 sunny degrees.  We arrived early, got a prime parking spot, and sat in our chairs in the back of the truck.  The parade was small but very nice.

This interesting fellow rode on one of the floats.

Galen and I thought this Foley High School Steel Band was the best part of the parade.

We came home from the parade with many beads and two Moon Pies.  Why Moon Pies?  I have no idea.  We don't like them so gave them to our friends.

There is a very nice train museum in Foley and this train can usually be found giving train rides there.

Most people, like me, take photos of the floats and such but Galen is more creative and got some fun shots of the parade watchers.

Note the temperature on the bank sign - 74 degrees!

This little girl looks like she has had enough parade for today.

I took a photo of Galen wearing beads several years ago and never thought I'd get him to wear beads again, but I did.  :-)

Anyone need some beads?  I have extras.

Pensacola Lighthouse

We visited the historic and haunted Pensacola Lighthouse after we left the museum.

The lighthouse is said to be be haunted by Michaela Ingraham, the light keepers wife.  She and Jeremiah moved to the lighthouse in 1826.  He died in 1840 and it is possible he was murdered by Michaela but that was never proven and she took over his job.  She died in 1855 and is said to be a hostile ghost who wants to be left alone.

 

There are 177 steps to the top and Larry is the only one of the four of us who took on the challenge.

Larry taking photos of us taking photos of him.

We didn't stay long at Fort Barrancus because it was closed but did stay long enough to get a geocache related to these mortars and guns and take a silly photo.

Pensacola Naval Air Museum

Larry, Lu, Galen and I visited the impressive Naval Air Museum.  We needed this photo for a virtual geocache located in front of the museum.

There is an outstanding variety of actual planes from WWI and WWII inside the museum.  Admission is free.  It is easy to spend hours there and if you get hungry, food at the Cubi Cafe is good.  There is an iMax theater in the building and simulators, including a 4D simulator, available but they aren't free.

The building is so nicely set up and spotlessly clean.

This plane is the USS TEXAS.  Note where the guns are in relation to the propeller.  This could have been quite dangerous but the guns and propeller are synchronized.

Galen standing next to an actual space shuttle.

Larry in the cockpit.

Galen thought about getting in the cockpit, too, but....

....there was no way he could fit his long legs into this.

Blue Angels hanging from the upper level of the museum.

Galen, Karen, Lu, and Larry in front of what is basically a very large drone.

Dauphin Island

Galen and I got up early and headed 30 miles south toward Gulf Shores to catch the ferry to Dauphin Island but the ferry never left the island because of fog.  So we drove the 30 miles back and then 60 more miles to reach our destination.  This photo of the ferry was taken in Dauphin Island where the ferry spent the whole day.

We played music for two hours and then enjoyed an excellent lunch prepared by our good Dauphin Island/Mountain View friends.

They are excellent cooks!

Normally fog burns off late in the morning but not here, at least not today.  We drove home in patchy, thick fog.  This is the entrance of the Bayway Tunnel.

Inside the tunnel.

Once out of the tunnel we were back in the fog all the way across the Bayway.  Once we were away from the water, the fog was not much of a problem.

The Plantation

Sunset at the Plantation Escapees Park near Summerdale, AL.

Our home sweet Plantation home.

Galen is enjoying all the jams.  This one is at the Senior Center in Foley.

Alabama Geocaching Event in Foley, AL

Lu, Larry, Karen, Galen, and Chris at a Geocaching Event in Foley, Alabama.  Chris is from Mobile and we met him at the event.

There was a vendor at the event selling cool geocaching goodies.  See the numbers on the back of her vehicle?  They are travel bug numbers that turn her car into a moving travel bug.

We didn't take part in the entire event - just the poker run.  We had to find five sites, pick up an envelope at each site, and after finding all five we turned in our envelopes to see what kind of poker hand we had.  I won a geocache container that I can use when we settle down or find someone somewhere who will maintain it.

More travel bug numbers.  These were on the back of the shirt Chris was wearing.

Hodge Podge

We went to Fredericksburg with Steve and Kathy, our friends and next door neighbors from Iowa, and introduced them to one of my favorite back roads - the Old San Antonio Road.   When Galen and I first visited this area on the Old San Antonio Road there were no people, no bleachers, no state park, and nothing to keep up from going into the tunnel except the bats and the scary beetles that live on the floor of bat caves.  We did get right up to the entrance of the tunnel though.   The steam train that ran between San Antonio and Fredericksburg from the early to mid 1900s is no more.   It was never financially successful and workers on the train would stop on the way up the hills to cut firewood for fuel or even hunt deer so staying on schedule was also an issue.  Today people come to what is now a state park in the summer to watch millions of bats emerge from the cave at dusk.  We did this once - sat so close to the entrance we could feel the breeze the bats made as they flew out of the tunnel, pick out the occasional albino bat, and hear the hawks scream as they zeroed in on dinner.

Galen and I volunteered at CAM (Christian Assistance Ministry) before Christmas.  Our job was to help parents pick out gifts donated by people in San Antonio for their kids.  We helped this mom by holding this darling little boy while his mom shopped - mucho fun for us.

Mission San Jose

San Antonio Riverwalk

We've not had a photo taken of the two of us in a long time.  I don't think I was always this much shorter than Galen.  I'm not old yet so how can I be shrinking.  :-)