Betty's RV Park Abbeville, LA

This was our first stop in Louisiana.  I had read about Betty's on another blog which said you have to put this on your things to do in Louisiana and they were right.  Had a great time here and met some great people.  There are 17 sites and happy hour is at 4:30.  Everyone gathers under the shed bring a snack if you feel like eating to share and your beverage of choice.  The group is small enough to meet people and learn where the best restaurants and things to do in the area.  Betty is a kick.

They had a Cajun street festival in Abbeville with bands playing zydeco music.  Everyone was dancing and had a great time.  They all know the dances.  Amazing. 

One of the places we went was to Avery Island where Tabasco is made.  It sits on a salt dome where they still mine salt.  Jungle Gardens and the Bird City sanctuary are also on the island.  We did not pay to go through the bird sanctuary but the island was pretty.

One of the places we ate in Abbeville was Shucks.  It was awesome the crab cakes some of the best I have ever had.

Bay St. Louis, MS

The girls got to go on the beach here and we had it pretty much to ourselves.  It was hot and Ali was not that happy.  Brandi she got in the water with me.

The reason for our stop in Bay St. Louis was for Cruisin the Coast Rod Run.

Rich Hays brought Dennis's car down after doing a lot of work on it and a great job he did.  I drove it for the first time for more than a couple of blocks.  GREAT JOB RICH.

They have a parade of cars that lasted forever!  At least we had good seats and a good location.  They have thousands of cars show up for this.

Got to spend some time with Rich and had a great dinner.

Had a beautiful view of the bay and the moon.

Cedar Key, Fl

Remembering back to my hippie days everyone was going to Cedar Key, Fl to chill and find a new life.  I have always wanted to see Cedar Key so it was one of our stops up the coast.  I think some of the hippies made it by the looks of things.  We stayed at this RV Park and checked out the town.  Really not much here about a two block area along the gulf with the usual restaurants and t-shirt shops.  The rest of the town looked like the hippies hadn't done anything since they moved in.  I guess they are still chillin.

St George Island, FL

Dennis wanted everyone to know this is white sand NOT snow.

Tom and Bev suggested St. George Island and I really liked it.  Great beach town.  They had some cute shops and great restaurants.

On to Navarre Beach.  I do love the Gulf Coast.

This is Emerald Beach RV Park.  It was a nice park not much of a beach and what there was I couldn't take the dogs out on the beach.  It was close to Destin and Gulf Shores so got to check out the area.

Had lunch at the Boardwalk where there was a big volleyball tournament going on, not a bad view for lunch.

The water was great.

Ocala FL.  Went to the Villages to look at retirement communities, homes and life styles.  There are several communities in the Ocala area and a very interesting type of retirement.

While in Ocala we went to Sunrise Labradoodles.  Our friends Ardel and Maureen's daughter is breeding Australian Labradoodles  and she has a new litter so had to see.

How cute.

She does a live feed on her website of new litters if anyone wants to see.  We took Brandi along she was more interested in the cat outside.  It was like been there done that.

Karen has a beautiful set up for breeding puppies.  Ardel and Maureen had not left Minnesota when we were here but we did get to visit on our return trip.  We got to see the puppies again and Maureen and Karen made a great dinner and we got to catch up.  Ardel and Dennis were in Mayo at the same time waiting for their heart transplant.  Ardel got his a little more than a year before Dennis. After his transplant Ardel sailed around the world in a 25ft sail boat by himself to promote organ donation.  They are a great couple.

From Ocala we were off to Hudson FL a little north of New Port Richey.  Love this area.  We looked at more retirement communities and met up with our friends Bev and Tom Lee.  Bev worked with Dennis at Molex and they retired to this area about a year ago.  They showed us a great time.  Took us to local restaurants and bars.

Lots of fun places.

Their favorite places are on the river or the gulf, how can it be bad.

They took us to parks and the inter coastal water ways and showed us old Florida which is how I want Florida to look.

See the dog on the jet ski?

Loved these trees.
They took us to Tarpon Springs where they bring in all the sponges.  Neat area but I forgot to take pictures.  I did get more restaurants and bars though.

We had a great time here and can't thank Bev and Tom enough for all their time.  Thanks guys.

After two fun filled weeks in Red Bay we were on our way to Talladega AL.

The winners.  We did not get to go on track because they were doing time trials but we did get to see the track.

From here we went to the Hall of Fame Motor Sports.  We had a great time looking at all the vehicles in the Hall of Fame and the history of all the racers.