Rum Runners + Ft Morgan & USS Farragut....no show!

Thursday evening we returned to Rum Runners with Clayton & Pat to see the dueling pianos. We were up early Friday to be at Ft Morgan by 8:45 to see the USS Farragut, a guided missile destroyer, arrive in Mobile for Mardi Gras. The USS Farragut was named after Union Admiral David Farragut who said "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead" during the Union victory at the Battle of Mobile Bay. The Farragut was going to stop at Ft Morgan and exchange salutes then place a wreath over the USS Tecumseh which was sunk by a Confederate torpedo (mine) during the battle.

It is VERY windy (35mph and gusty) which apparently caused the Farragut to sail right by the fort into the bay without stopping well before 8am and our arrival. So we missed the Farragut, cannon fire and the Farragut's response. We did see the flyover by the Coast Guard.

Clayton & Pat arrived

After a weeks plus delay Clayton & Pat have arrived and are staying a week here at Gulf Breeze. We went to Pensacola and the Naval Air Museum one day and saw the Imax movie Hubble along with some of the museum.
Yesterday we both had lunch with Don & Zola and Dave & Donna who are leaving today to start their summer travels around the USA. After lunch the four of us went to the Flora Bama for a drink, see the picture. Then we hit the Mud Bug bar and spent the evening playing cards.

Rum Runners duelling pianos

Well, it's been 3 weeks since the last post. We have been busy. Here's some pics from Rum Runners where have gone twice to enjoy the duelling pianos. After the first visit with Don & Zola's RV park Judy organized a trip for our RV park and had 92 people attend. They had so much fun some are going back tomorrow (we are going too with Clayton & Pat) & Judy is arranging one more for the end of March. Notice anyone familiar in a green hat?

Summer has arrive as if a switch was thrown. We had a week of sunny 60 degree days and now it's been in the 70s and sunny for the last two plus weeks. Beautiful.

We have been taking part on the usual many park activities.

Delta Explorer

Today Judy had to shove & push me out of bed at 6:30 so we could pick up Dave & Donna at 8 allowing us to be at Blakely State Park for a 9am 3 1/2 hour 35 mile boat ride in the Mobile Delta and port. She is mean, cruel & inconsiderate. We did make it and it was a very cold morning. Blakely is the location of one of the last major battles of the Civil War. It's not very well known because Lee surrendered in the early afternoon and the battle was fought late in the afternoon when the war was already over.

Here we all are huddled up trying to stay warm as we cruise by one of the better local home sites. We passed several shanty's used by hunters and as a get away. Looks like they all got away.

If you have a good memory you can recall in 1993 a barge took the wrong turn

on a foggy night and hit a railroad bridge knocking the tracks 18" out of alignment. Soon after a passenger train passed by and was derailed killing 47 people. This is where the accident happened. It is in a very isolated location.

Here's some pelicans cruising around the bay. We saw lots of both white and brown pelicans.

Here's a docked small Navy patrol boat and the FBI out cruising the port. We waved at them, they waved back and the skipper blew the siren, it was so loud it made all the agents on board jump.

Here's the Peacemaker. We had one member of the crew ride with us from the state park back to his ship. It was built in the 1980s in Brazil and is now owned by The Twelve Tribes. It's a group of young people scattered around the globe living in what sounds like religious communes; modern day hippies?
She is in Mobile to use a dry dock for repairs.

Here's two ships in dry dock for repairs, there must have been 5 or 6 dry docks and they were all in use.

How do you like the helicopter pad on top of the Helix Caesar? The ship is used for deep water pipe laying. It sure does look strange. I assume the other ship is under construction.

Here a tanker being turned around by 3 tug boats before being taken to a terminal. The abandoned Navy ship is used for training exercises such as fire control.

As we were leaving Mobile we passed the USS Alabama and the USS Drum in Battleship Park. Both are National Historic Landmarks.

You can see how cold we were when the boat was traveling fast between sites to view.

As we finished the 3 1/2 hour 35 mile trip the weather front came through and pushed all the clouds away and out came a beautiful sunny day. The front was very pronounced and visible. We rushed to the Olive Garden for LOTS of hot soup.

Water aerobics

Here's a couple shots of the park this morning, the pond by the entrance and our truck in front of our home sweet home so you can see our block.

Here's Judy leading the water aerobics class this morning. I notice them jumping out of the water in one picture, do you think they are excited to see me or there might be a shark in the pool? I think she's pointing toward the shark in the last picture. Judy does this 3 mornings a week, water aerobics not pointing at sharks.

Dave & Donna & Ft Morgan

Today we went with Dave & Donna Driver to star shaped Fort Morgan built in 1833 for coastal defense & the entrance to Mobile Bay. It obviously worked as no one invaded us here, except ourselves during the Civil War. Even then it was outdated with steam powered war-ships and rifled cannon. The fort was updated in the 1890s and used during the Spanish-American War and WWI & WWII.

During the Battle of Mobile Bay 8/5/1864Union Admiral Farragut gave his famous order "damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead" after his leading ironclad, the USS Tecumseh struck a Confederate mine (then called a torpedo) and sank in one minute killing 90 sailors as it ran past Ft Morgan toward Mobile.

The last time we were here was in 2007 and we are still amazed at the number of oil well platforms in the area and how close to shore several of them are. Drill baby drill.

Pensacola Beach & Fort Pickens

Since my last post we have been doing what we do here, eat out, visit, and partake in the parks activities. Today we went with Tom & Ann to Pensacola for lunch at McGuires Irish Pub for lunch. After lunch we went for an afternoons exploration of Pensacola Beach. We went to the Gulf Islands National Seashore and at the end checked our Fort Pickens on Santa Rosa Island. The fort is huge and covers many many acres with batteries tucked away out of sight. The only person killed by any of the forts guns over the years was one soldier watching a gun drill when the gun broke off its mount in 1922. The fort was built in 1834 to defend Pensacola Harbor and remained in use until 1947. In 1886 the Apache chief Geronimo was imprisoned here. In 2004 Hurricane Ivan pretty much decimated the area and you can see what it did to the trees. The fort was not damaged too much but the Ft Pickens road was not reopened until 2009.