Thur 5/7 - No Alarm Clocks Needed

Bright flashes of lights and loud claps of thunder greeted us about 5 am this morning. It was time to get moving. We decided not to stay in Georgia : ( as the weather was too uncertain. Our plans to go to the Federal Reserve Bank and Stone Mountain will be postponed for another time. We headed west for a long driving day. Of course, when you leave so early even driving 370 miles doesn't seem quite as bad. The weather can be seen a little in the above photo and our windshield wipers got a workout.

We think Apollo realized his friend Blue Belle would not be coming for a visit. He was very quiet and seemed really sad all day. One bright spot for him was when we stopped at a Camping World somewhere in Alabama.

They invited pets into the store so he got a chance to check out all the smells along the bottom shelves! We did have a shock when we checked out our merchandise. Our credit card had been cancelled! The company had sent new cards in the mail (in Dayton, of course) and cancelled all prior cards yesterday. No amount of talking to the customer service department would get our account reinstated. They were willing to expedite a card to our location, but we don't have a location right now as we are traveling. Very poor planning on their part and very inconvenient for us. We are having Ron and Leslie send our new card to his Mom's house in Oklahoma - we expect to be there next Monday. If we didn't have that stop planned we would be in deep doo doo. Until then we will have to be careful about using our ATM account for spending.

Our lunch stop was made at a rest area in Alabama. We had our leftover Subway sandwiches from yesterday (that $5 footlong is a super deal - two meals!) but stayed in our RV because of the weather.
There are definite bonuses for being able to travel during the spring - but are finding out the disadvantages, too. Weather is unpredictable, and some places are not open for the season. Such was the case with Meridian, MS where we stopped for the night. There is a historical carousel in this town which we planned on seeing, but it is only open on weekends until the end of May. The town does have it's own celebration of its history by having about 50 carousel horses around the town. This one is from a mall near where we are camped.

Dinner was Mexican, which is why we were out around the mall, and we found that Mexican in

Mississippi isn't quite the same as what we are used to eating. It was fine, just different. While at the mall we found an AT & T store so - we now have a cell phone that can be connected to our computer for WIFI! We will try it out as we travel tomorrow. Tonight we have free WIFI at our campsite but the new opportunity to have WIFI where ever we are camped will make our choice of stops much easier and hopefully much less expensive!

I am still hearing some thunder on occasion. It is so different to have this much rain. While we ate dinner tonight there was a cloudburst and we had puddles all around our campsite when we returned.

Plans for tomorrow - the Battlefields at Vicksburg, MS. We will be camped on the east side of the great river this time and plan on spending two nights there.

Besides the battlefield there is quite a bit of southern and civil war history in this area and I am really looking forward to seeing it. It's fascinating to see, hear and read all that our country experienced in its early years. My interest in US History, Geology and Natural Habitat give me a continual education.