Bethpage Camp Resort, Urbanna, VA

The trip from American Heritage RV Park in Williamsburg to Bethpage Camp Resort took only 50 minutes on Thursday late morning. Barbie went in the office and checked us in at 12:25pm. Bethpage is a Woodall’s 5 Star campground and in 2005-2006 Bethpage was recognized as the National Park of the Year by the National Association of RV Parks and Campgrounds. They have about 500 grass sites and 30 concrete supersites. Plus, their are about 400 permanent sites that have trailers or park models on them. All the sites have 50 amp service with water, sewer, cable and a great wifi system. Nearly all sites are shaded by rows of predominantly pine trees. Their is a marina since part of the park is on the  Rappahannock River along with a huge pool and water park. They have a large rally center and smaller activity building. They have “THEME” weekends from April through October nearly every weekend. This past weekend while we were there, it was OctoberFun Weekend. There were food and craft vendors lining the street in front of and inside the Activity Center Saturday and Sunday and a DJ played from 6-9pm Saturday. The campground was quite packed with weekend campers. The weather was great in the 70’s during the days and in the low 50’s at night. I don’t know if I have ever seen as many campfires in a campground as I saw Saturday evening. What an atmosphere and aroma! Friday we spent some time driving through, as the locals call it, “Rivah Country”. Barbie drives during these day excursions and she nearly freaked out Saturday driving over the Norris Bridge which crosses the Rappahannock River. You see the bridge was narrow, only 2 lanes with no shoulders, it had very low guardrails on the sides, plus it was tall and looooong. As a matter of fact, once we got over to a Walmart in Kilmarnock to pick up a few items, she asked me to drive the return trip. I thought she was joking at first, but no, she was quite serious. At one end of the resort they also have a miniature golf course and creamery that serves Hershey’s ice creams. Well, over the weekend, between the 3 of us, yes Kozmo too, we sampled banana pudding, Reese’s peanut butter chocolate, blueberry cheesecake and pumpkin flavored cups. DELICIOUS, enough said! This is a place we’ll return to down the road I’m sure. Below are some of the pictures taken during our stay.

 

  

 

 

 

 

‘Til next time……

Williamsburg, VA Area

As I said in the previous post, we arrived in Williamsburg last Thursday, September 29th. We spent 7 nights at American Heritage RV Park. Picture hint: Remember you can click on any picture to enlarge it.

Park Entrance

This was our base to explore the “Historic Triangle,” ---Wiliamsburg, Jamestown & Yorktown. We spent the week in the area researching, touring the area, and of course, shopping. We discovered that the Historic Triangle gave birth to the United States, and our huge nation grew from this tiny place in Virginia. In that same tiny place, Europeans, American Indians, and Africans first lived together and became the seed of the American people. The first permanent English settlers sent by the Virginia Company of London, England were at Jamestown. The ideas of revolution were fanned at Williamsburg. Independence was won in the final victory at Yorktown.

The National Park Service's Colonial Parkway joins the three historic attractions of Colonial Virginia with a scenic  roadway carefully shielded from views of commercial development. Intended to help visitors mentally return to the past, there are often views of wildlife and waterfowl along the roadway (and crossing it). The only human development that can be seen from most of the parkway are the two loading piers of Cheatham Annex, part of the Naval Weapons Station Yorktown which borders the inland side of much of the parkway, a testament of how this area still plays an important role in the United States Military.

Near the James River and York River ends of the parkway, there are several pull-offs. The Colonial Parkway is free of tolls or user fees.

The Parkway starts in Yorktown, passes through Colonial Williamsburg and ends in Jamestown. No commercial vehicles are allowed to use the parkway for transportation, although commuter traffic has picked up drastically in the past decade.

JAMESTOWN:

The first permanent English settlement in the New World was established at Jamestown in 1607. Today, Jamestown Festival Park and Jamestown Island attractions is open to visitors. Included are re-creations of a native American village and colonial fort, and archaeological sites where current work is underway.

There are two major areas at Jamestown: the former Jamestown Festival Park, a living history museum which includes the replica ships and is operated by the Commonwealth of Virginia, and is now known as Jamestown Settlement; and the National Park Service site which includes Jamestown Island and the ongoing archaeological projects is known as Historic Jamestowne.

 

 

WILLIAMSBURG:

In 1699, the capital of Virginia was moved from Jamestown to a location on high ground at Middle Plantation at the suggestion of students from the College of William and Mary, which had been established there in 1693. Middle Plantation was soon renamed Williamsburg, in honor of King William III, and it was a busy place until the American Revolution.

William & Mary

William & Mary

After the capital was moved to a more secure location at Richmond in 1780, Williamsburg became a largely forgotten and sleepy little town for almost 150 years. All that changed in the early 20th century was due to the preservation efforts of Reverend Dr. W.A.R. Goodwin, rector of Bruton Parish Church and the generosity of Standard Oil heir John D. Rockefeller Jr. and his family, who shared a dream of restoring the old colonial capital city to its 18th century splendor, and made it come true.

Today, the result of those efforts, Colonial Williamsburg, is a large living museum of early American life. It has dozens of restored and recreated buildings and reenactors. It is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world. The Visitor's Center (right off the Colonial Parkway) features a short movie and provides a place to start and leave automobiles, which are restricted from the restored area. A wheelchair-accessible shuttle bus service is provided.

Pictures of Colonial Williamsburg follow.

 

 

YORKTOWN:

The third point of the triangle is Yorktown where General Cornwallis surrendered to George Washington in 1781 the last land battle of the American Revolution. There are two large visitor centers, battlefield drives, and a waterfront area. Pictures of Yorktown follow.

  Victory Monument

  Yorktown Battlefield

Bridge at Yorktown

 

Notwithstanding the amazingly successful efforts to provide a non-commercial atmosphere at the three Historic Triangle areas (and on the Colonial Parkway between them), there are many hotels, motels, campgrounds, restaurants, outlet malls, shops and stores, gasoline stations, and amusements close by.

Much of the info above (EXCEPT for the pictures), I got from Wikipedia.

One of our favorite shopping stops was at a Yankee Candle “Flagship” Store in Williamsburg. This store had every fragrance they make plus every size candle and every other type of item they make from car fresheners, to diffusers, wax beads, scented oils, home air fresheners, even hand soaps, hand sanitizers and lip balm. We bought a few items there for sure!

One of the more interesting places we ate was at the Yorktown Pub. Barbie enjoyed her fried oysters and I enjoyed my crab cake. The local micro-brewery beers were quite cold and tasty. See pictures below.

 

This past Tuesday we took a day trip to Virginia Beach-right on the Atlantic. We really enjoyed walking their great boardwalk and walking the beach. I‘ll include some pictures below of that trip, including the tunnel (under water) we had to travel in Norfolk.

 

 

 

 

All in all we enjoyed our first trip ever to this area! But, it was time to move on.

We hitched up and left American Heritage RV Park about 11:30am, Thursday, October 6. In 55 minutes we pulled in to Bethpage Camp Resort in Urbanna,  Virginia. More on Bethpage in the next post.

‘Til next time……..

On the Road

After a delay of four days because of rain, we finally left our site in Dillard on Monday, Sept 26, and headed east to visit Barbie’s sister, Linda, and her family in Selma, NC. Selma is just off of I-95 in eastern NC. We really had no problems hitching up the 5th and making the trip to Selma. According the Microsoft Streets and Trips software, it was a 369 mile journey. We stopped once at a rest area to eat lunch and walk Kozmo, and stopped a second time for diesel for the truck. We arrived at RVacation RV Park  in Selma at 5:10pm. This is really a great overnight stop for anyone traveling I-95. It has full hook-ups, all level gravel pull thru sites and a small catch and release lake-with lots of ducks, huh Kozmo?

Our site

Guess who’s chasin’ ducks

There is no pool and no cable but it had  a great wifi system and with our antenna up, we found 29 over-the-air digital tv channels. Like I said, a great stopover on I-95. After we got unhitched, set-up, and ate some sandwiches, Linda and her two sons came by to visit. My sister-in-law can sure talk as she didn’t leave to go home until 1:40am! Needless to say, we slept in Tuesday morn. Linda came over at about 2:30pm and we went to a local drive thru chain in the area called “Cookout.” They have all the typical fast foods plus over 40 flavors of old fashioned ice cream thickshakes. The burgers were really good but the shakes were outstanding! I had a peanut butter/fudge shake and Barbie had a peanut butter/banana shake. Did I say they were OUTSTANDING? We brought the food back to the 5er and Linda’s husband, Dwayne, and son, Keith, joined the three of us. They all could not get over how much room we had inside the fifth. They loved it too. Tuesday was an early evening with Linda leaving at 7:30pm. Wednesday after spending the morning in, Linda, Barbie and I went to a local discount store, JR’s, to pick up a few items. This place has about everything but food items, although they have some snacks. I’m sure most of their business comes from the sale of tobacco products, wine and perfumes/colognes---all at discount prices. As a matter of fact, they claim to have the world’s largest cigar humidor. It must be 200 ft by 75 ft in size, packed full of cigars and a small supply of pipe tobacco and accessories. It was really strange to see smoking was permitted not only in the humidor but throughout the entire store. Plus, we found out once we got there, you can bring dogs inside provided they are in the shopping cart. Of course, we didn’t know, so Kozmo was back guarding the fifth. After shopping we stopped and ate at a Bojangles Restaurant before returning to the campground. At 5:00pm, Barbie took Linda up on their offer to use their washer & dryer. She went over to their house and I stayed with Kozmo in the fifth. Linda has 10, count ‘em, 10cats and 2 dogs, so we felt it best not to take Kozmo over there. Besides, Barbie and Linda got to spend some alone time and chat. After a good nights sleep, we hitched up Thursday morn and headed for the next stop on our abbreviated journey, American Heritage RV Park in Williamsburg, VA. We left at 11:10am and after a rest stop for 25 minutes, we arrived in Williamsburg at 3:00pm.

Linda & Jeff

Linda, Barbie & Kozmo

If you follow this blog, you knew our plans were to head up to New Jersey and then through Pennsylvania to visit Barbie’s parents, her other sister and some of my cousins. Then, we were also gonna spend time in Pennsylvania Amish Country around Lancaster. Then, we’d be back to Dillard by Oct 26 to DJ the Halloween Dance. Well, those plans changed since we finally spoke with the carpenter that built the deck on our site in Dillard. Why you ask? Well, we’re going to have a “coach house” addition built on the deck. Essentially, it is a 21 ft by 10 ft covered roof over our deck. The coach house roof will tie into the shed roof. Below is a picture of our deck and I have drawn(roughly I’d say) a sketch of what it may look like with the roof-over. We’ll add a couple of ceiling fans and outlets as well. It will give us a great covered area for our outdoor table and chairs that we can relax under.

Sketched “coach house”

Anyway, Kevin, the carpenter, can finally get to it and will start it October 11. We’ve been on hold waiting for Kevin to finish other jobs for a good bit of the summer. We wanted to be there while it was done AND we wanted it done before we left to head back to Florida November 1st. Soooo, our trip to visit the relatives had to shortened significantly. In the end, we decided to check out the “Historic Triangle,” of Williamsburg, Jamestown, Yorktown areas, at least before heading back to Dillard. More on our Williamsburg area experiences in another post coming the next day or so.

‘Til next time…

Hodge Podge

Barbie writing here today……

We traveled to our Valrico, Florida home on Sept. 6. We just took the truck and left the 5th wheel in Dillard. The trip went smooth. We left at 7 A.M. and got in Valrico at 6:20 P.M. after stopping for gas twice and food to eat. Jeff drove the whole way down so I got to vegetate and watch the scenery while playing with Kozmo. Jeff had a dentist appointment on Wednesday, which went very well. He has to get a crown on a tooth when we get back down to Florida in late November. On Thursday, he had his doctor’s appointment, which also went very well. He is good until December; when he will need his annual blood work done. That will be about the time that I will have to see my doctor for my 6 month checkup.

When we were in Florida, I spent Wednesday and Thursday mornings pulling up weeds that had grown through the rocks while we were gone. I had sprayed down some great Round-up Extended 4 month spray and it did work in most of the spots. However, we were gone a little over 4 months and the rain and sunshine took its toll on the little suckers that wanted to grow through the rocks. I was thankful that it had rained and the weather wasn’t excruciatingly hot so the weeds were easy to pull up. I sprayed some more of that “love potion” on the rocks again. Hopefully the rain will stop and and so will the weeds. We also cleaned the leaves out of the gutters.

Weeds Gone !

I tried to clean up the inside of the house since it was a bit dusty, but time wasn’t on our side for this trip. I took Kozmo to Pet Smart to buy her whatever “she” wanted. She put her nose up at all the squeaky toys and chews. She did like the new halter I bought for her. I asked her if she wanted blue or pink in color and she pawed at the pink one. Now that she has it, she doesn’t like it too much. But she understands that “Mommy” and “Daddy” need her to wear it whenever other puppies are around so she doesn’t pull and crush her vocal chords and make her cough or slide the collar off her neck and over her head. Whenever we are down at the stream here in the park we let her roam the area without a leash since she just loves it down there. Whenever we see other puppies coming, we put the halter on. While at Pet Smart she wanted her favorite little soft biscuits. Kozmo was a bit upset because there was only one other puppy in the store and that puppies’ owner was a snob and didn’t want her dog associating with my dog. I felt sorry for the little puppy because she really wanted to make friends with Kozmo and so did Kozmo. We spent 40 minutes in the store while “Daddy” was at the dentist. After I picked up Jeff from the dentist, we went to Tijuana Flats for our supper. We love that place. We each got our favorite chimichanga with black beans and rice. The weather would have made it impossible to sit outside with Kozmo since it was drizzling off and on.

We also managed to get take out from a Brandon favorite of ours, La Septima, on Thursday. We both enjoyed a pressed Cuban sandwich with a deviled crab. The place was not crowded since they now close at 3:00 at their Parsons Avenue location and it was 2:20 in the afternoon. They opened up a newer place about 2 miles away on Lumsden and Kings Avenue , also in Brandon, which has outdoor seating in addition to a larger inside dining room.

I did manage to bring back some “much needed things” from the Valrico residence to our 5^th wheel. Things like a food processor ( I have two of them in the house), spices, foot tub massager, more candles, Gatlinburg wine, and some books that I have to read so that I can read more on the Kindle when I get done with them. Haha We also brought back a dog bed that Kozmo didn’t like when we got it for her and had left it at the house. She was laying in it at the house, so we figured we’d bring it back. Now since we have it in the 5th wheel she has slept in it three times during the day. She mainly hides her biscuits in it and wipes her face on it after she eats. At least it has a purpose for her. LOL

We are now getting ready for our three week trip. We still haven’t decided on where we are going other than to Selma, NC to see my sister, NJ to see my parents and my sister who lives in Unionville, NY, and Jeff’s cousins who live in Claysburg, PA. We thought about going to the Lancaster area again since we loved it there when we visited it about 10 years ago. So, we are up in the air, but will make a decision before we leave hopefully this coming Thursday, Sept. 22. After our trip, we are headed back to Dillard for about two weeks. Jeff has to DJ the Halloween Dance on Oct. 29^th.

After that we definitely know we want to leave November 1 and head down and spend a few days on the  Alabama Gulf Coast before getting to Crystal River for the winter.

Wish us well in our planning of the trip…. Until next time….

Busy Having Fun

We finally got our landscaping completed on Tuesday of last week. Our landscaper, Brian Cabe, put 6 “little evergreen trees” in along the side of our site. There is a proper name for the little trees that will only grow to 8 feet tall in about 10 years or so and not be but 30 inches in diameter-but I don’t remember it. Brian also added new mulch to refresh what was already on the site. He also laid down some more gravel to the front of the lot where we park the truck and golf cart. Below are some before and after pictures.

Before AFTER

Before AFTER

We were planning on taking a day trip to Gatlinburg on Tuesday but postponed it until Wednesday. The weather was nice but hot in Tennessee. We bought 6 candles at 3 different places in the Crafters Loop to see what kind we really like so that we can go back in October and buy some more. Another stop on the loop, Misty Mountain Soap Company, has very nice lotions and soaps for sale in their new facility in the Crafters Loop. Their Mountain Energy lotion is very good for softening up the skin and just smells great! We bought a present there for Barbie’s friend Linda whose birthday was Sept. 4. Next door to this place is More Than Just Candles. They sell a soap that you use to wash dogs with and it is supposed to leave in all the great oils that dogs are supposed to possess. We will see if that works. Barbie usually uses baby shampoo to wash Kozmo.

After leaving the Crafters Loop we headed for Pigeon Forge. We didn’t have enough time to tour Cades Cove this trip or visit freinds Tom and Wendy, formerly of Rock Crusher Canyon where we winter. We did stop for a big treat at A & W Root Beer in Sevierville. We both got root beer floats for our lunch and nothing more. They were delicious! Next time we head up there we will have to call Wendy and Tom in advance to be sure they aren’t working at Dollywood and have some lunch with them. This trip was so busy that we knew we wouldn’t have enough time to see them. If you are reading this Wendy and Tom, see you in October.

The only “disgusting” thing on the trip was a stop in Cherokee at a picnic area. Kozmo had to go “take care of business” and the area was just as we were going into the Smoky Mountain Park. The smell was terrible. It smelled like garbage had been strewn across the area and never cleaned up. We hurried up and got out of there after she did her business, but will never stop there again.

I was getting ready during the week for the DJ’ing I was doing here in River Vista on Saturday, Sept. 3. My play list is getting very extensive. It took a few hours to go through it and pick my songs for the Street Dance. I stopped on Friday evening long enough for us to head to Clayton to see Brad Garrett play at the Rock House Park, which is next door to Praters Books. Brad, during the days this summer, has been working on remodeling the cabin next to us. He and his band played from 6 to 8 P.M. and they were GREAT!!! They were going to play at Main Street Bar and Grill from 9 to midnight that same night. Brad has a very nice voice and played many good country songs. There wasn’t much of a crowd but the atmosphere was neat.

Brad Barrett & Band

We ate at Zaxby’s for dinner before heading for the concert. We just love Zaxby’s! When we head back to Crystal River in November, I guess we will have withdrawal symptoms until we find one close by. I think the closest one is in Ocala, an hour’s drive. :-( We probably would go that distance, since another favorite  restaurant of ours is Tijuana Flats and that is located in Ocala, also.

Saturday, Sept. 3 was a great day. The campground was almost full. We counted 8 empty sites. Children were everywhere with adults either cooking out or just enjoying the pool area. There was a barbeque supplied by River Vista from 6 to 7. They served grilled chicken, baked beans, potato salad and a roll plus iced tea. It was very good! I DJed from 6 to 10 that night.

Big Daddy w/new banner

It started to rain about 6:10 but it didn’t last that long. How do you like my new banner? You wouldn’t believe how many dancers there were in the street during the night. Of the four “Street Dances” we’ve done this summer, this was the largest crowd with the most dancers.

“Locals “line-up

We had kids and adults dancing to the oldies, country and dance favorites. I think the Cha Cha Slide drew the largest crowd. Everyone was having a great time. It was really funny that little kids come up to request Justin Bieber or Miley Cyrus songs, which I don’t have in my repertoire.

  

 

People were starting to leave the campground on Sunday because of the threat of Tropical Storm Lee and the rains on the way. It did start to rain last night around 11. We put all of our things away since we are leaving for Valrico Tuesday morning. It has been raining off and on today. Poor Kozmo got drenched the two times Barbie took her out, but she loves to get dried off. I have a dentist and doctors’ appointments on Wednesday and Thursday of this week in Valrico. We hope to leave Valrico on Friday and head back up to Dillard so we can start getting ready for our vacation to PA, NJ, NY, and NC.

Until next time….

Not Much New and Some Reminiscing

It has been a long time since we have posted. Sorry about that-we ARE well. Nothing really outstanding has been going on with us. We have been relaxing following our daily routines and just planning everyday what we are going to eat.  :-)  Priorities, doncha know!

Last night Barbie went to play bingo in the park. That was the second time that she went down to the pavilion and tried to play. The previous Friday she was one of only two people who showed up, so they cancelled it. Last night there were four people and they played three games. Each card costs $1.00 so Barbie played two cards. She won two out of the three games played and after expenses cleared $8.00. Not bad considering the small amount of people that showed up. It was held in the pavilion next to the pool area outside and the weather was very pleasant.

A Good Sam Club chapter is holding a rally here at River Vista this weekend and was using the Mountain Center. During the daytime, temperatures were very hot with the high being 92 degrees. Today we are supposed to get very nice weather with highs about 82 degrees. Barbie called her parents who live in New Jersey this past week and they were oblivious to the hurricane heading up in their area. Hopefully the winds and rain will subside so that damage will be minimal. They live on a hill with two gigantic oak trees on the two sides of the house. We hope that the river which empties into a pond at the end of the road at the bottom of the hill doesn’t overflow. Barbie can remember years ago growing up in Hawthorne, NJ and floods occurred and almost knocked out the little bridge that was right down the hill from their house. Of course the best part about living in Hawthorne was the winter time when blizzards would come and shut down school. Since they lived on a hill, there were about 38 steps that needed to be de-iced before anybody went anywhere. Her grandfather would get up extra early and shovel and throw rock salt on the steps so the family could go to work. What a great guy he was!!!

We went to eat last weekend in Franklin, NC to a place called Cajun Connection. It was fantastic!!! We really haven’t found any place to eat up here that has great seafood. This one has it! I had shrimp creole followed by a shrimp basket which was outstanding! Barbie had blue crab soup followed by an oyster basket which was equally as good!!! Since this was our only meal of the day we ate their dessert of bread pudding, which was to die for! We will definitely go back there. Today we are headed somewhere to eat since we haven’t eaten out since Monday of this past week.

Kozmo is being her usual wonderful self!!! She loves her golf cart rides and her truck rides for sure. She gets so much lovin’ and is spoiled OH SO MUCH!!!!

     

I got booked to play “Big Daddy DJ” again for the Labor Day weekend on September 3 for the park.

  Big Daddy’s business card!

River Vista is 100% booked for the Labor Day weekend. They are having hot dogs and smores, a bonfire and a movie Friday evening. Saturday, a two day horseshoe competition will begin followed by a barbeque dinner. I will be playing light music from 6 - 7 as the dinner is going on and then I will play from 7 – 10 for the “Street Dance”. Sunday morning there will a pancake breakfast followed by the final rounds of the horseshoe competition. There is probably more going on and we will report back next weekend to let you know how everything turned out.

If the weather holds up as forecast we will be headed to Gatlinburg, TN on Tuesday. We have various stores we like to visit and hopefully will have some time to see Cades Cove again. Of course Kozmo is going with us so she can experience the beautiful mountains!

‘Til next time……..