We made our reservations for St. Joseph Peninsula State Park in February of this year and we were really excited because the place looked beautiful. It's on Cape San Blas which has been voted best beach in America two years in a row. And we were especially excited because we were supposed to go there last year, but we canceled at the last minute because of the predicted path of the oil spill.
So we were stoked, is what I'm saying.
We had planned to break up the drive by spending one night in a town along the way and so we made a reservation in an RV park, sight unseen. It looked nice enough on the website. However. HOWEVER, upon pulling into the "RV" park (and yes, I'm using air quotes) it quickly became evident that it wasn't so much a campground as a trailer park? Only, instead of regular trailers they were campers? But permanently attached with lattice work attached and small, semi-permanent porches? There also didn't appear to be any predetermined spaces for us to put our camper and to top it all off, the office was closed with only a note on the door instructing us to put our money in an envelope and slide it through the slot on the door.
Ooookay.
As we pulled through the campground trying to figure out what in the hell to do, we passed a sign that said "No overnight campers past this point." Uh, what? We meandered through the "campground" passing a couple of cars up on blocks until we finally had to turn around in what was obviously someone's back yard.
Um, no. Or as we say in my family, not only no but hell no.
We drove to a nearby hotel and briefly
Hellloooo Best Western.
After hanging in the hotel room for a while we ventured out to find something to eat. Before we left home I had scouted out a couple of restaurants in this town, but when we arrived downtown we discovered that everything was closed because it was Sunday. We drove around for a good 30 minutes before we found the strip malls and the chain restaurants.
We spotted a Ruby Tuesday, headed inside, and as we sat down I reached for the beer menu. After 5+ hours in the car, getting lost in trailer park, and trying to find some place to eat, I needed a drink.
"I'll have a Red Stripe with a lime," I said to the waitress, when she showed up to take our drink order.
"Um, is that a beer?" she asked me timidly.
In my head I thought "Oh my God. Are you an idiot? I need to know right know if I'm dealing with an idiot" but I smiled politely and said "Yes?"
"Oh, you're not from Georgia are yewwww?" she drawled. "We can't serve alcohol on Sundays."
For the love of....
I resisted the urge to run screaming from the restaurant and kindly informed her that yes, we were from Georgia but that the city we lived in had voted to serve alcohol on Sundays in restaurants. I started to tell her how each city could vote on the issue, but she really didn't seem like she was up for a civics lesson, so I let it go.
Fortunately, a fairly decent steak and some delicious mashed potatoes helped me get over my sorrow. And to prepare me for the next day's adventures.
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4 comments:
Oh Lawd. The South as a whole has obviously forgotten that Jesus WANTS us to drink, otherwise why the whole water into wine at Cana?!? (not that your youthful waitstaff would've been aware of that,either...)
That must be why my family travels with their own alcohol stash. :) Hope the rest of the trip faired better.
You have a camper and it doesn't have a full bar in it? Interesting. I didn't realize that was an option. ;-)
Back in the day we stayed in a lot of campgrounds out West that weren't trailer parks, but which did not feature a single blade of grass anywhere. Just big parking lots. Not a great place to pitch a tent, but we were young and frugal.
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