Texas & New Mexico

This morning we continued driving across northern Texas, stopping at the headquarters of the Lake Meredith National Recreation Area in Fritch, Texas. Most of the towns we drove through looked like they had seen better days; my guess was that they were oil towns that had expanded in the early 80's and declined in the 90's when the price of oil fell. We were hoping to visit the Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument, but weren't able to, as it is an archeological site, and there were no tours scheduled for the day. There is a visitor center, but it's closed in the off-season. However, we were able to to pick up a Jr Ranger program for both the Lake Meredith NRA and the Alibates Flint Quarries NM at the headquarters. Once the kids earned their badges, we drove out to the lake, but there wasn't much to see. The lake was formed when a dam was built on the Canadian River back in the 60's, and it's surroundings are sparsely vegetated.

We left Texas and entered New Mexico, reaching Albuquerque after lunch. We had seen patches of snow on the ground in Oklahoma and Northern Texas, but as we approached Albuquerque, the fields were covered. Petroglyph National Monument is located on the western edge of Albuquerque, and contains the largest concentration of Indian Petroglyphs in the US. Basically it's a bunch of rocky hills that Indians carved symbols on. The visitor center was pretty small, with very few exhibits and no movie, and the Jr Ranger program mostly consisted of word searches and scrambles, that could be completed anywhere. After completing the booklets, we drove up to one of the canyons, and took a short hike to see some of the petroglyphs. We then drove to Grants, where we stopped for the night.

Oklahoma City & Washita Battlefield

We continued west on Monday morning, stopping in Oklahoma City to visit the National Memorial there. In the winter, eastern Oklahoma is marked by brown scrubby trees on rolling hills of brown grass, with occasional spots of bare red soil. The Oklahoma City memorial is different than a most National Park sites, as the memorial itself is owned by the park service, but the visitor center and museum are run by a private foundation. We walked around the memorial and talked to the Rangers onsite. The Junior Ranger program was pretty easy. We were at the memorial for about an hour, then we continued west. While it had been a little cold in Hot Springs, we really noticed it in Oklahoma City. 

We left Oklahoma City and continued to western Oklahoma, stopping to see the Washita Battlefield National Historic Site. It's a pretty small site, commemorating something that wasn't much of a battle. In 1864, the 7th calvary, under the leadership of George Custer, wiped out a Cheyenne village. It was notable mainly because it was the first time US troops had attacked the Cheyenne during the winter. The tragedy of the incident was the chief who was killed was a moderate trying to work out the difference between the Cheyenne and the US. A visitor center for the site is under construction, so we stopped at the headquarters for the site, which is located in the town of Cheyenne. They had a short movie about the battle that they played on a big screen tv, but there was only room for four chairs around it, and there were no exhibits. The kids completed the Jr Ranger program, and then we drove out to the battlefield site and briefly looked around. After that we drove to Pampa, Texas, where we stayed the night.

Hot Springs & Fort Smith

Sunday morning we headed west to Hot Springs, Arkansas, boyhood home of President William Clinton. Hot Springs National Park is an interesting park, as it is intertwined with the city of Hot Springs. The visitor center is in an old bathhouse, in downtown Hot Springs, in the former bath house row. In the late 1800's and early 1900's, people came to the city to relax and sit in the waters of the area's hot springs, and magnificent bath houses were built. Only a few of them operate now. Through the Jr Ranger program, the kids learned about the history of Hot Springs and the bath process. Bryan really wanted to take a hot bath, but the bath house by the visitor center was closed on Sunday, and the others were located in local hotels. We headed out of Hot Springs just before noon.

We the drove west over the Ouachita Mountains, and through the Ouachita Forest, and then turned north to rejoin I-40 at Fort Smith, Arkansas. As we approached Fort Smith, the trees turned from green to brown. Fort Smith started out an outpost to prevent conflicts between Native American tribes, then became a major staging area for westward expansion, and later an outpost for justice as the main courthouse for the west. The visitor center had a lot of interesting exhibits about the different eras of the fort, and the people who were there, and a well done Junior Ranger program. It took us about two hours to complete it. We then drove west to Henryetta, Oklahoma, where we stopped for the night.

Graceland & Little Rock

Saturday morning we got up and visited Graceland. We walked through the mansion, as well as viewing Elvis' private planes and cars. The mansion itself is not that impressive - it's just a fairly big house - I'd guess about 6,000 square feet. It is interesting to see how Elvis decorated it in the mid-70's. Susan was disappointed that the tour did not include the upstairs rooms - just the main floor and the basement. The outbuildings are now being used to house exhibits on Elvis' life, and were fairly well done.

The car museum was also pretty cool. The kids liked that it was themed to a drive in, and sat and enjoyed watching the short clip of Elvis' film highlights. The two planes included the Lisa Marie, a big four engine jet that we walked through to see how Elvis' customized it (gold-plated seat belt buckles!), and a smaller jet that was mostly used by his manager. The tour was pretty interesting, although it was also fairly expensive. We spent about 3 hours doing it all.

In the afternoon, we drove to Little Rock, Arkansas, and visited the Little Rock Central High School NHS. The High School was the site of a confrontation in 1957 due to Arkansas' refusal to abide by the Brown vs Board of Education decision. The high school is still in use, but the National Park has a small but well done visitor center nearby.

It was almost 4 pm when we arrived, and the center was scheduled to close at 4:30, but the Ranger and his assistant there stayed open an extra 10 minutes or so to award the kids their Jr Ranger badges. They were very nice, the program was well done, and a new, larger visitor center is under construction, scheduled to open later this year. After we finished there we headed south to Benton, where we spent the night.

Natchez Trace Parkway

Thursday morning we drove north to Birmingham, then turned west. We arrived in Tupelo, Mississippi in the afternoon. There we visited the Tupelo National Battlefield, the Tupelo visitor center for the Natchez Trace Parkway, and the Brices Cross Roads National Battlefield. Only the Natchez Trace Parkway had a Junior Ranger program, and to earn that we had to watch the orientation movie and drive a short distance up the parkway and stop at a couple of stops. The Natchez Trace Parkway runs from Natchez, Mississippi to just south of Nashville, Tennessee. It marks the route that early settlers would take after floating down the Mississippi river to sell goods. It was the kids 100th Junior Ranger program.

Both the Tupelo and Brices Cross Roads National Battlefields are pretty small sites, with just a couple of signs, monuments, and cannons at both. Neither had a National Park visitor center, and there wasn't any information about them at the Natchez Trace Parkway visitor center. After we completed the Junior Ranger program at Natchez Trace, we camped nearby.

We set out Friday morning to travel northwest to Memphis, Tennessee, to visit Graceland, the home of Elvis Presley. Unfortunately, as soon as we got on the freeway, the RV failed to accelerate, and the "check engine light" came on. After a while, we were able to get to the next exit, where we added some oil. We then drove to Memphis, where a mechanic determined that a clogged fuel filter was the problem. Unfortunately, by the time the repair was finished Graceland had closed for the day, so we camped in an adjacent campground.

Jimmy Carter & Andersonville NHS

Wednesday morning, we continued traveling northwest until we reached the small town of Plains, Georgia, hometown of President Carter. The visitor center for his national historic site is located in the former high school where he and his wife attended. Unfortunately, they were out of their Junior Ranger program and badges, so they promised to mail it to us. We walked around the visitor center and watched a film about President Carter. The site also included his boyhood home. We drove by his current residence, but couldn't see it from the road.

Our next stop was Andersonville National Historic Site. Andersonville was the site of the main confederate prison. Around 45,000 Union soldiers were imprisoned there, and almost a third of them died due to the poor conditions. It also contains a national cemetery, and a Prisoner of War museum. The museum was closed for refurbishment, but we were able to drive around the former prison grounds as well as inside the cemetery, and both were pretty interesting. After the kids earned their Jr Ranger badges, we continued west, stopping outside Montgomery, Alabama for the night.

Fort Wilderness

On Sunday we headed back to Walt Disney World and a site at Fort Wilderness. We spent the day hanging out and exploring the campground. Disney provides lots of activities for campers, so we thought we'd try them out. Bryan played dodgeball, and both kids did origami. Fort Wilderness is the most expensive campground we've ever stayed in, but it is definitely also the nicest.Monday was supposed to be hot and sunny, so we headed to Blizzard Beach. It didn't turn out that way, but we had fun anyway, staying there from opening to closing. We met some friends there, and hung out with them. Jennifer and I even tried out Summit Plummit, the highest, steepest water slide in the world. We planned to go to the campfire at Fort Wilderness after Blizzard Beach, but it started raining.

Today was our last day at Disney World. We checked out of Fort Wilderness and headed for Downtown Disney. We spent several hours playing games at DisneyQuest, did some shopping, and then got in the RV and headed northwest to Lake City, Florida, where we stopped for the night.

Busch Gardens

On Saturday we went to Busch Gardens in Tampa. Last time we were there, the only roller coaster Jennifer did not ride was Montu, so she was disappointed that it was closed this time. Bryan said he wanted to ride it as well. Jennifer and I also rode the new SheiKra dive coaster, which was pretty terrifying.

We rode almost everything there, and looked at most of the animal exhibits, although we skipped the shows. It was a nice day.

Magic Kingdom & Epcot

On Wednesday morning, we checked out of Port Orleans and went to the Magic Kingdom. The kids worked on Virtual Magic Kingdom quests, and we hit our favorite rides and saw some of the shows we had missed the last time we came, such as the Bear Country Jamboree. I wanted to see the Hall of Presidents, but we ran out of time. We did get to see a preview of the new Monsters Inc show that is opening in Tomorrowland in a few months. It uses the same technology as Turtle Talk to allow the animated stars to interact with the audience. We then checked into a site at the Fort Wilderness campground.

Thursday we went to Epcot. We did a couple of things in Future World, then took the boat to the back of the World Showcase. We ate lunch at the Teppanyaki restaurant in the Japan pavilion, then watched the American Adventure. We then made our way through half of the countries, and headed out. After Epcot, we went to the Hoop Dee Doo show at Fort Wilderness. It was pretty good. Susan and the kids enjoyed the singing and jokes, but were not impressed with the food. I liked it fine, but we all agreed that Medieval Times was a better value for the money. We decided to skip going to the Disney Studios this trip, and instead spend another day at Epcot. So on Friday, after we checked out of Fort Wilderness, we headed back, and did some of the things we had not done on Thursday. We rode the new Nemo ride at the Seas pavilion. I thought it was pretty cool, but the kids weren't that impressed. We also tried out the new "Green" version of Mission:Space, where the capsule doesn't spin to simulate g-forces. While not as intense as the regular version, it was also less nauseating for Susan and the kids. Susan actually said she'd consider going on it again, where one time on the regular version was more than enough forever. After that, we walked around the World Showcase, and the kids collected the Kidcot pieces. The Mexico ride was down, but we rode Norway and watched the France movie. After Illuminations, we headed to Tampa to stay the night.

Animal Kingdom & DisneyQuest

On Tuesday morning we went to Animal Kingdom. We went counterclockwise through the park, hitting the highlights. The new Nemo show was pretty good. We also watched the Festival of the Lion King, which Jennifer and I had seen a couple of years ago, but Bryan and Susan had not. We left in the afternoon.We headed back to the resort, to let the kids swim. This is the first time we've stayed at Port Orleans French Quarter, although we've stayed at all of the other moderate resorts. It's a pretty nice place - the rooms are decent size, and include a small refrigerator and a coffee maker, and I like the theming. However, I was disappointed in the slide at the pool - it always looked bigger in the pictures than it does on real life. My favorite moderate is the Coronado Springs - it definitely has the best pool area.

After the swim, we took the boat over to Downtown Disney, and went to DisneyQuest. The kids really enjoyed DisneyQuest the last time we were here, but we didn't get to spend too much time there. We played several games as a family, which were fun.

Canaveral National Seashore

Sunday morning, we drove south from New Smyrna to the northern section of the Canaveral National Seashore. At the small information center there we picked up the Jr Ranger program and watched a short video. We then drove a short distance down to the Edora area, located on the west side of the peninsula, bordering the Mosquito Lagoon. That body of water is accurately named - even though it was January, the air was thick with mosquitos as we walked down to the old house there, which holds a small museum. Unfortunately, the museum was closed. We got back in the RV, and headed down south to the end of the peninsula, but there were no other places to stop and get out. All the parking lots on the ocean side of the park were pretty full, and had no RV parking. 

We drove back to the information center, finished the Jr Ranger packets, and turned them in. We were really looking forward to this park after so many forts - we thought the kids would be able to walk along the beach and see some marine life - so the reality was somewhat disappointing. We headed back north to New Smyrna, then turned southwest to Disney World.We arrived in the Orlando area Sunday afternoon, and after a stop at the Character Warehouse to see if we could find any bargains on old Disney merchandise, we drove into Downtown Disney, where we purchased some tickets, made a reservation for a Vacation Club tour, ate at the Rainforest Cafe, and did some shopping at the World of Disney. Then it was back into Kissimmee to stay the night, as our reservations at Disney World did not begin until the next day.The weather today was warm and sunny, so we decided to begin our first full day at Disney World at the Blizzard Beach water park. In the afternoon, we checked into the Port Orleans - French Quarter resort, took a tour of the new Sarasota Springs resort, and then ate dinner at the French Quarter food court.

Castillo De San Marcos

The Castillo De San Marcos National Monument is right on the beach adjacent to downtown St Augustine, the oldest city in America. It was founded by the Spanish in the early 16th century, and the fort was built to protect it. The fort was pretty cool, but finding a place to park was difficult. I let Susan and the kids off near the fort and then had to park several blocks away. The fort had many more visitors than we had been used to over the last week - it figures that we would hit one of the most popular sites in the region on a Saturday. The fort is pretty well preserved, and has several exhibits in it. We also got to watch a demonstration of a cannon being fired. I would have liked to spend some more time looking around, as well as checking out St Augustine, which looked pretty interesting, but we decided to get to another site before it closed. Susan agreed that St Augustine would be a good place to explore more in the future.

Fort Matanzas is located 14 miles to the south of the Castillo De San Marcos. It was built by the Spanish to protect the southern approach to St Augustine. It was a small fort - only a handful of men were stationed there at any one time, with an equal number of cannons. We watched a short film in a pretty small theater, and then completed the short Jr Ranger program by looking at the couple of displays in the small visitor center before boarding the boat for the 5 minute trip to the island where the fort is located. 

At the fort, a man dressed as a Spanish soldier gave a short talk about the fort and what it would be liked to be stationed there, and then we explored the two rooms of the fort, and the kids climbed up to the roof. They enjoyed taking to the Spanish soldier. It took slightly over an hour to see pretty much everything. We then drove south to New Smyrna to spend the night.

Kingsley Plantation & Fort Caroline

Our first stop of the day was at one of the sites of the Timucuan Ecological and Historical Preserve. The Kingsley plantation was unusual because Kingsley’s wife was a freed slave. When America bought Florida from Spain, the rights of freed slaves were greatly curtailed. Mr Kingsley argued for their rights to no avail, and ended up moving his family and his slaves to Haiti, where they were all freed. The Junior Ranger program just required us to walk around to the few buildings of the former plantation and answer some questions about life back in the plantation days.Our next stop was another site of the Timucuan Preserve, Fort Caroline National Monument. The French built a fort here but were driven out by the Spanish. The original fort is long gone, but the park service built a replica. This site also contains the main visitor center for the Preserve. There were a few displays about both the history and the ecology of the Preserve, but it was fairly small, and there wasn’t a movie. There are also nature trails at the nearby Theodore Roosevelt area, but we didn’t go there, as the Junior Ranger program dwelt with just the visitor center and the fort.

We haven’t been making as good of time as I anticipated the last few days. When I looked at the maps, the national parks and sites on the southeast coast looked pretty close together. However, looks can be deceiving. The sites we have been visiting the past few days are pretty much all located on the east sides of islands with only one way in and one way out, and on two lane roads with lots of traffics, turns, and stop signs and signal lights. The first two sites we visited today were some of the worse – at the first one, the visitor center was at the end of a two mile long narrow dirt road lined with trees with low hanging branches. The next site was only a two miles away, but we had to drive about 10 miles west and then 10 miles east to reach it. Luckily, all four of the sites we visited today had pretty short Junior Ranger programs, so we were able to get them all in, but I definitely would have liked to spend a bit longer looking at a few of them.

Forts Pulaski & Frederica

We headed south to Savannah, and then went out to Fort Pulaski National Monument. This fort was started in the early 19th century, but wasn't fully manned until the State of Georgia seized it in the early days of the Civil War. The Union then laid siege to it, and eventually forced its commander to surrender it by bombarding it with new rifled cannons. The fort itself was pretty cool, but the exhibits inside were sparse, as well as the visitor center. We attended a Ranger talk in the fort, and then watched the movie before turning in the Jr Ranger program and heading onto Tybee Island for the night.It was cloudy but warmer as we made our way off of Tybee Island and through the outskirts of Savannah. By the time we made our way south to Fort Frederica National Monument, it was lunch time, so we ate lunch and then went in and watched the movie and walked the site of the old fort. Frederica was a fortified town, established by the British in the early 18th century under James Oglethorpe to secure the area north of modern Jacksonville for the crown. The Spanish in nearby St Augustine did not appreciate this, and sent troops north to chase off the British, but were repelled. The town was largely abandoned in the later by midcentury, and then suffered a fire which left nothing but ruins. However, the foundations and walls of some of the buildings remained, and archaeologists where able to determine the layout of the town. From there, we planned to visit the Cumberland Island National Seashore, but the visitor center had closed at 4 pm, so we continued on into Jacksonville for the night.

Disney's Hilton Head Resort

After lunch, we headed south along the coast to Disney's Hilton Head Resort. We called to see what availability was, and were quoted a great rate. However, the reservationist didn't know if we could park an RV in the resort parking lot. She suggested we drive down and check, and get a room at that point. What we didn't realize is Hilton Head is a long way of the highway, and by the time we made it to the Disney resort, we sure didn't want to hear that we couldn't park there. Luckily they were able to accommodate our RV for one night, but it was clear it was not something they wanted to encourage. The resort is very nice, and it was great to spread out a bit, even if only for one night. We let the kids swim in the pool, but the slide was closed for the day.

In the morning, we went on a "Marsh Walk". A Disney naturalist discussed a few of the plants and animals that live in the wetlands adjacent to the resort. We then let the kids swim and slide at the "Big Dipper" pool, and met Shadow, the resort's dog, before we headed out. The area around the resort is a little more developed than I had imagined it, but I could definitely stay a few days here in the future, hanging out at the resort, doing the activities offered by Disney, and using it as a base to explore Charleston and Savannah. Next time, however, we'll come in a car.

Snee Farm & Fort Moultrie

It was clear but breezy as we made our way southeast from Congaree to Charleston, SC. I was surprised at how thick the trees were and how little development there was along this road. After a couple of hours drive, we arrived at the Snee Farm. The Snee Farm was once part of several plantations owned by Charles Pinckney, a former Senator, Governor, Ambassador to France, and a signer of the Constitution. This site is rather small - the visitor center for the Charles Pinckney NHS is in the bottom floor of a 19th century house built on the site of the house Pinckney owned, which burned down in a fire. In addition, half of the visitor center was closed for renovations, so we weren't able to view most of the exhibits. The site also contains a short trail through some of the former grounds of the plantation, which we walked. 

The kids answered the Jr Ranger questions as best they could with the limited information available to them, and had to ask the Ranger for some of the answers. It only took us about an hour and a half to complete it, but even if all the exhibits were available, I doubt it would have taken more than two hours to see pretty much everything.  We then drove to a KOA in nearby Mount Pleasant.This morning we visited Fort Moultrie National Monument. It is located at the entrance to the Charleston harbor, near Fort Sumter. It was pretty interesting, as the Fort provided a defense of the Charleston area from Colonial times to World War II. 

At the visitor center, we watched the video about the different eras of the fort, and viewed the exhibits before walking through the fort itself. We were there about 2 hours, and the kids earned their Jr Ranger badges. Since the history of Fort Moultrie also included much of the history of Fort Sumter, we elected not to pay the fee to take the boat over to Fort Sumter, or to try to take the RV to downtown Charleston to the visitor center.

Congaree Swamp

The wetlands bordering the Congaree River southeast of Columbia was made part of the National Park Service in 1976 as Congaree Swamp National Monument. In 2003, it was upgraded to a National Park, and the "Swamp" was dropped from the title. It is still a swamp, but it is interesting and beautiful, and teeming with life. However, it's still small as far as National Parks go. There's on one fairly small visitor center, and a few primitive campsites. The main drawback to the park is the limited ways to really get out and see it. There are very few roads through it, and the primary trail, the boardwalk trail, is a loop over 2 and a half miles long. They do offer canoe tours down some of the creeks, but only on Sundays, and those fill up weeks in advance.

The kids and I walked the boardwalk trail, which took over an hour, and all of us looked at the nicely done but somewhat small exhibits, and we watched a 10 minute film about the park. The Junior Ranger program was typical of a National Park, where the kids had to do a handful of fairly easy activities out of about a dozen in the packet.

Revolutionary War Sites

A light rain had begun falling while we were at Connemara, and it continued as we drove southeast to Cowpens National Battlefield in South Carolina. This was the site of a stunning defeat of the British during the Revolutionary War. Although the visitor center was nice, and had a fairly nice electric map, we were not impressed with the Junior Ranger program. Since it was raining hard, we couldn’t walk the battlefield, so the program said we should drive around it to a cabin, and answer questions about it. Trouble was, the cabin was locked, and there was almost nothing to be seen driving around the battlefield. It would have been much better for the program to have the kids to answer questions about the electric map presentation, or the film, but it did neither, and the Rangers working there weren’t exactly proactive – we didn’t even realize they had a film until after the kids had finished the Junior Ranger program, and I asked about it. We elected to skip the film so that we could make it to another site before it closed.

We had called ahead to Kings Mountain National Military Park on our way to Cowpens to make sure they had a Jr Ranger program, and they had told us they did, so we were a little surprised when we walked in to the visitor center and asked for one, and were told they were out. On top of what happened at Cowpens, we were a little frustrated, but luckily the Ranger was able to find a quiz sheet they used for other school groups while we watched the movie. The kids then walked through the exhibits to answer the questions and earn their badges. The exhibits were pretty neat – they were set inside fake trees, and each stop was started by a motion sensor and included a multi-media presentation. I was pretty impressed. Kings Mountain was a turning point in the Revolutionary War. A group of patriot irregulars from the western areas of the southern colonies marched east and stopped the advance of a force of loyalists under the command of a British officer. Since we were the only ones there, after the kids completed the program, we talked to the Rangers until well after 5 pm, even though they were supposed to close. I would have liked to walk the trail to the top of the mountain and see the monument there, but the lateness of the hour and inclement weather prevented that. We camped for the night at a state park adjacent to the national park, and the rain continued into the night.

When we woke up this morning, the rains had stopped, and the sky was clear but breezy. We made our way southwest to Ninety Six National Historic Site. Ninety Six began as a small trading village where two major roads of colonial South Carolina met. It's name came from the fact it was 96 miles from the main Cherokee village. Later it was fortified against Cherokee attack by the British, and was the site of two battles during the Revolutionary War. The first was a small battle between Patriots and Loyalists in 1775, notable mainly because it resulted in the first southern casualty of the war. The second was a seige of the British fortifications in 1781. It failed, but coming as it did after the British losses at Kings Mountain and Cowpens, it convinced the British to abandon their plan to use South Carolina as a base to reassert their authority over the Colonies. We walked through battlefield, which took about an hour, then watched a short film and viewed the exhibits in the small museum, which took another. The kids earned their Junior Ranger badges at that point, but we hung around for about another half an hour, chatting with the Ranger. As at Kings Mountain and the Carl Sandburg Home, we had the visitor center to ourselves. We then headed southeast to the outskirts of Columbia, where we stayed the night.