T-Time: Turkey Hunting

Thursday 11/22/2012

Bass Lake RV Campground

Dillon, SC

 

I love Thanksgiving.

It’s the quiet, peaceful holiday preceding all the craziness and chaos of the impending Christmas rush.  It’s the holiday when we give thanks for our many blessings.  The holiday set aside to simply enjoy time spent with family and friends, indulge in waaaaay too much gluttony, and then waddle off to the recliner for a little snooze.

 

Thanksgiving dinner was especially tasty today, perhaps because we had to “hunt” for our turkey this year.

Last week in preparation of our feast, we pawed through the Butterball turkeys at Wal-Mart in pursuit of our bird.  A full-size turkey is way too much for the two of us.  We’ve always opted instead for a three-pound turkey roast.

That’s just the right size.  Wal-Mart offered a plethora of poultry to choose from, but we searched and searched and could only find turkey breasts – no turkey ROASTS with both white and dark meat.  No problem.  Thanksgiving was still a week away, so the next time we were out we’d check the local Food Lion.  Surely they’d have one.

Three days later after A LOT of rain and desperately needing to get out of the RV, we set out again on our quest.  Food Lion here we come. . . and Food Lion there we go!  Strike two!  Their peck of poultry also consisted of full-size turkeys and turkey breasts.  Hmmm.  This was becoming more difficult than usual.  Save A Lot was right across the street, so we bounced over there to scope out their inventory.  Well, that didn’t take long – all they had were full-size turkeys.  Now Dillon is a pretty small town, and we had quickly run out of grocery stores to scour.  Normally we would’ve given up, but it was a beautiful day following three days of rain, and we were still suffering from cabin fever.  After checking the GPS Mike located an IGA seven miles south in the town of Latta, so off we went.

Nope.  Negatory.  IGA’s only offering consisted of a few full-size turkeys.  By this time we reluctantly decided it was time to throw in the towel and relinquish the hunt.  Defeated, we returned to the Wal-Mart in Dillon, picked out a turkey breast in settlement, and turned to head up to one of the cashiers.  But wait!  Ever tenacious and still not quite willing to give up, Mike delved back into the freezer one last time to rummage. . . and forage. . .  and dig. . . until at last he spotted not one, but TWO turkey roasts!!

     

Triumphantly my hero placed both birds in the shopping cart – one for Thanksgiving and one for Christmas – and we victoriously swaggered off to pay for our bounty, thus finally ending our turkey hunt.

We've had a lovely day, and we hope that you have too.  We count our many blessings on this and every day and give thanks for – just to name a few – our family and friends, our health, and our armed forces, both past and present, that have sacrificed so much to secure the freedom we so richly enjoy in this wonderful country.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

           

The final few days of the CC Gathering and on to Dillon, SC

Thursday 11/15/2012

Bass Lake RV Campground

Dillon, SC

It’s been just over a week since we left our friends at the Carolina Clan Gathering (CCG) at Huntington Beach State Park.  We had a really great time!  Our last blog entry took us through Friday, 11/2.  Here’s a recap of our last four days at the CCG.

Saturday, 11/3, we took a walk down “the historic straight road” which passes through a freshwater marsh/swamp area of the park.  It’s closed to vehicular traffic and is just used as a walking trail now.

Ray, Kris, and Dee joined us as we leisurely walked the “road” together.  To our right was the fresh water lagoon…

and to our left was a swamp.

We were warned about alligators by multiple signage.

Soon enough we did spot an alligator!

It’s hard to see, but it’s just above center, peeking out of the murky water.  A little further down the path we spotted another smaller one.

Again it’s just above center, just sunning itself.  We also saw a few turtles and a snake!  It was in the tall grass just to the side of the trail.  NO PICTURES OF THE SNAKE!!!  I didn’t want to get close enough for a picture.  We all continued on down the “road” until we reached a local traffic service road.  Here they come…

(Terri, Dee, Kris, and Ray)

and there they go!!!

By the way, we did not maintain the speed limit.   We circled around until we were at the causeway.  The freshwater lagoon was on one side…

and the saltwater marsh was on the other side.

About halfway across the causeway we met up with Gary and Peggy and watched the various birds out on the freshwater lagoon.

(Dee, Gary, Ray, Peggy, Kris, and Terri)

There were butterflies and cattails along the causeway.

This dude was just chillin’ here in the sun.

He didn’t seem bothered by any of us walking by and gawking at him.

Eventually we made it back to the campground, and Kris and Ray brought their three dogs outside to meet us.  They sure are cuties.

A little later some of us headed out to sit on the beach for a while.

(Lee, Martha, Terri, George, Laurie, and Dee)

Late in the afternoon many of us gathered for a “swap meet” at the fire ring.  Some of the things offered up for grabs were a small table, wine rack, backpack, dog washing kit, shower rack, a TV,  bike seats, dog bed, and a step stool.

Bill was the “auctioneer” for the event!

Last but not least was a George Foreman Grill that made the rounds at last year’s CCG.

Unbeknownst to Steve and Evin, they were the final “recipients” of the grill last year!  About four months had passed before they found it stashed in one of their kayak compartments!  This year someone actually wanted the grill, so Steve conducted a formal presentation while we all watched and listened with intensity and anticipation!

Selene was the happy recipient of the George Foreman Grill…

and then the campfires were started.

Sunday, 11/4, was a pretty quiet day.  Terri and I took a long walk northward on the beach.  We watched the waves, the birds, and the people and saw a very detailed sandcastle.

Later in the afternoon we all gathered for pizza which Laurie had ordered earlier in the day and Bill and Paul D. went to pick up.  They brought back 10 huge delicious looking pizzas.

This is one of the meat lovers pizzas…

also available were cheese pizzas and veggie pizzas.  The pizza was really good, and we all sat around the campfires and indulged.

Monday, 11/5, was another quiet day around the campground.  Terri and I took another walk on the beach.  This time we headed south and just strolled along watching the waves and birds.

Later we went to Carrabba’s Italian Grill with Paul and Marti, and after dinner we headed over to the nightly campfire.

Tuesday, 11/6, was our original departure date.  However, we had been keeping an eye on the weather and rain was predicted for Tuesday.  So on Sunday we decided to extend our stay another day to leave on Wednesday.  Well the weather forecasters were right!

We don’t like to travel on rainy days and were definitely glad that we made the right decision.  That afternoon we met up with Jim and Dee for lunch and a movie.  After our stop at Arby’s we headed to the movie theater complex.

 

We walked in looking for a ticket window to buy our movie tickets.  We found a snack bar and even a bowling alley!  But, we couldn’t find the ticket window.  Then we saw the lines for the tickets.  Everyone was waiting to use the automated kiosks.

Just another example of technology replacing humans.  Someone did tell us that you can still buy your tickets from a human at the snack counter, but the lines were so long we would have been late for the movie.  The movie we went to see was Argo.

This was an excellent movie loosely based on a true story about the rescue of six U.S. diplomats from Tehran during the 1979 Iran hostage crisis.  After the movie Jim and Dee headed back to the campground while we made a run to Camping World, Petsmart, and Walmart.  After completing our errands we headed back to the campground for our last nightly campfire with the group.  We sure did have a great time at the CCG hanging out with all of our friends.  Hopefully we’ll see some of them again real soon!

Wednesday, 11/7, after getting diesel we packed up, stopped at the dump station, and then headed northwest to Bass Lake RV Campground in Dillon, SC.

It’s a Passport America park with a nightly rate of $17.44 including tax.  That rate is only good for three nights.  We decided to stay one night and see if we liked it here.  We have a full hookup site with 50 Amp, and I was able to get the satellite dish set up with a strong signal on the first try.  When I turned on the TV to check the signal I already had high 90’s and 100’s.  We can get ABC, CBS, and FOX with the antenna, but not NBC.  Thursday we decided to renew for two more nights, and on Saturday we went ahead and paid for a month at the monthly rate of $395 including electric.  Bass Lake isn’t a real big campground, and it seems to be quiet except for the I95 traffic noise.  The “residents” here all seem to be very friendly.  Here’s a couple pictures of our site #A10.

There’s a Cameo parked a couple spaces down… but unfortunately it’s not our good friends Jim and Dee.

Here’s a couple shots of the lake.

We’ve been here now for about a week.  So far we like it except we can’t watch NBC.  Also, there is only one washer and one dryer, so that’s a bit of a hassle.  We haven’t gotten out too much yet, but we did drive past South of the Border.  We’ll have to go and check that out one of these days.  We also drove down to Little Pee Dee State Park and checked out the campground and lake, but I’ll write about that in an upcoming post.