Spring 2022-On the Road Again!

Monday, May 2, 2022

Day 17

We spent last night at the Georgia Veterans State Park on Lake Blackshears in Cordele, Ga. It was a typical Georgia State Park, which meant it was exceptionally clean, with spacious camp sites and very clean bathrooms.

Site #12, Lake Blackshear Resort aka Georgia Veterans' State Park

Site #12

On our way out of the state park we visited the Veterans museum which focused how Georgia veterans served in all of our wars. That's a B-29 in the foreground.

On our way to Andersonville we passed countless pecan orchards which won't be ready to harvest until the fall, but the watermelons were ripe and ready for market!

Pecan leaves

ANDERSONVILLE NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE

Our first stop of the day was the Andersonville Historic Site which commemorates not only the Confederate prison, Camp Sumter, but also has a museum dedicated to all POW's of all US wars, and lastly hosts the Anderson National Veterans Cemetery which serves all veterans and their wives.

The POW museum was extremely moving, especially the Vietnam POW's some of whom spent over seven years in captivity. How Donald Trump could, "all POW's are suckers or losers..." proves the man has no heart, no soul. I've never been to any of the German concentration camps, but I can only imagine how moving it much be to visit any of them.

Leaving the museum we then toured the Andersonville prison. When the Civil War began, neither the Union nor the Confederacy believed the war would last more than 90 days, so neither anticipated the need for a prison. The Andersonville prison, opened in February 1864, only operated for 14 months. It was built to hold a maximum 10,000 prisoners, but at it's peak it housed 33,000 prisoners, and over the 14 months over 45,000 prisoners were there, and 13,000 odied while there.

Conditions were brutal. Most of the deaths were not battle related, but instead a result of infections and diseases. The only source of water for prisoners was a stream that ran through the middle of the camp. The prison guards were housed upstream from the stockade, so all their waste flowed contaminated the stream before it ever got to the prisoners.

The stone marker indicates the location of one of the corners of the stockade. The white vertical stakes on the left indicate the location of the stockade and the white markers on the right indicate the location of the "dead line".

The hill in the background descends to the stream that provided the only water for the prisoners.

A reminder of the beauty that does exist in this world.

We stopped for a very late lunch in Macon at the Ocmulgree Brew Pub. The temp was a humid 88°, so the cold beer, delicious cheeseburgers, and fries were very well received. Those are peach slices on the burger!

By the time we arrived at this park, it was already 4:30 PM, and closing was at 5:00 PM, so we had a quick tour of Indian mounds that date back to 1100 AD and earlier.

This one was called the Earth Lodge and it was believed to be used for special ceremonies. It is estimated that 10 million baskets of dirt, each weighing 60 pounds, were used to build this mound. The Ocmulgee are just another example of the sophisticated civilizations that existed in the Western hemisphere long before Europeans came here and claimed it for themselves.

The only entrance. When it was restored they enlarged the opening to about 4' in order to accommodate tourists!

Our final visit in Macon included the Rose Hill Cemetery in Macon, where we paid our respects to Duane, Barry, Butch, Greg, and Elizabeth.

Sunday, May 1, 2022

DAY 16

Sadly we left St. George Island this morning after being there less than 24 hours, but that was the only vacancy that we could get when we started booking camping spots in February!

FINAL PIX FROM ST. GEORGE ISLAND

Site #3, Dr. Julian Bruce State Park, St. George Island, FL

Found this tree frog in the electrical box this morning!

The bridge back to the mainland from St. George Island

Breakfast at the Sand Dollar in Port St. Joe

Better than a full Monty

On to Plains

Leaving Port St. around 10 AM after that disgustingly good breakfast, we headed for Plains, GA, to visit several of the President Jimmy Carter sites. The 300 mile route to Plains was straight as an arrow, and flat as a pancake as we headed north to the Georgia border. As we approached Georgia, the pine barren waste land gave way to green productive farms, and the closer we got Plains, the more prosperous the farms appeared.

Earl Carter purchased this farm in 1928, and like any children growing up on farms, young Jimmy had plenty of chores. There was no indoor plumbing for the first ten years that the Carters lived there. Jimmy, an Anapolis graduate, gave up his career in the Navy to run the family farm when his father died in 1953.

Jimmy's bedroom. Notice the books in corner which included Treasure Island. Jimmy loved to read and one of his school teachers, Miss Julia, recognized he was something special and gave him War and Peace to read when he was 12.

Earl and Miss Lilian's bedroom

The Carters had a clay tennis court and Jimmy and Earl often played each other.

Billy Carter's Gas Station

Main St.

Official White House Portrait

Jimmy, age 97, and Roslyn, age 94, still live in the same house they built in 1961. It's now well protected and inaccessible for public viewing. The ranger at the visitors' center said the President is now confined to a wheel chair, so he doesn't get around.

The audio guide to his boyhood home included tapes that the President recorded, making it even more touching. Certainly in my life time we have not had a more honorable man in the White House. The more I learn about Jimmy Carter the more I like him.

Day 15

We were on the road by 7:15 heading to St. George Island and Apalachicola which are in the Florida panhandle. We arrived in Apalachicola around 12:30 PM, just in time for lunch at Up the Creek Raw Bar. Needless to say the food, drinks, atmosphere, & view were worth every inch of that 300+ mile drive!