Heading North – Part Deux

May – June – Part of July

There Be Chickens!

Whittington Woods Campground

So we pulled into the campground this afternoon and off to the side were a bunch (flock? gaggle?) of chickens.

A campground first. Very cool. The owners even offered us some free eggs.

After settling in, we decided to introduce Flirt to the chickens who were right outside our RV door (turn up your volume) . . .

Nolin Lake State Park & BTS

Nolin Lake State Park, KY

Nolin Lake State Park, KY — We’re here two days and love it. This park reminds us of the days we camped in Wisconsin state parks . . . quiet, lots of space, lots of birds, and quiet. Our campsite is surrounded by Lake Nolin. We’re just a few feet away from the lake. Love it.

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From our experience, state parks are pretty vacant on weekdays — and that’s when we’re here. Just us and a few other folks. That’s it.

We even feel nostalgic about the state park “facilities” (bathroom & showers).

The Facilities

IN OTHER NEWS . . .

Billboard Awards in Las Vegas

We watched the Billboard Music Awards on TV last night. We were pleasantly surprised to see BTS, a KPOP boy band, beat Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez, and Shawn Mendez for a Billboard Music Award — a first for a KPOP group.

BTS’s fans, called the ARMY, racked up about 300 million social media votes which ended up to be about 75% of all the votes. Yikes.

Here’s a video of the award. Listen to the fans when the hosts mention “BTS” . . .

Battle of Franklin — 153 Years Later

Yikes! We’re Surrounded.

It was Civil War history day for us. We decided to take a field trip to the Battle of Franklin historic site in Franklin, TN, about an hour away from where we’re currently camping.

However, as often happens, we were caught in the fog of war and became lost soon after parking in downtown Franklin.

We’re Lost

But at last we found a reliable source of information . . .

Visitor’s Center

After getting a map and pointed in the right direction, we were off to the Carter House, the center of the battle . . .

We Are Here

We signed up for an hour walking tour and our tour guide was very good, a recent political science graduate who knew his history.

However, the highlight of the trip was talking to a young archaeologist who was involved in excavating part of the former Union entrenchments near the Carter House.

Apparently, soldiers were much smaller in Civil War times . . .

Civil War Musket?

Heading North

POINTS NORTH

Points North (click to enlarge map)

Up until yesterday we’ve been traveling east along the Gulf of Mexico. Just let me say that we would travel that route again as camping along the Gulf has been great . . . the cleanest, longest beaches we’ve seen.

Anyway, we’ll probably get an early start on Friday as the weather in Tanner, AL looks to be stormy.

The Weather in Tanner

CAMPGROUND WIFI

People usually don’t have anything good to say about the WiFi available in campgrounds because more often than not campground WiFi sucks . . . it’s often very weak and/or overloaded.

Today that’s not the case. We have a strong signal and a fast connection (about 7 to 11 Mbps). It could be the time of day or a host of other factors, but it’s good WiFi.

I have to thank our new to us WiFiRanger CORE router (photo above). It’s similar to the original WiFiRanger Pro, but smaller and more powerful. Our CORE was able to access several WiFi hot spots:

WiFiRanger CORE Main Screen (click to enlarge)

Just finished watching a HD (720p) video. It streamed at speeds between 2.5 and 5 Mbps:

Campground WiFI Speeds (click to enlarge)