Arrival Date 4/1/2015 Gulf Shore State Park - Gulf Shores AL
Our primary desitnation for travelling around the Gulf is Gulf Shores State Park. We have stayed here on many of our 7 years RVing. Gulf Shores State Park is one of our favorite RV Resort/State Parks in the United States. Unfortunately they have changed their reservation policy and have had problems with WIFI in the last couple of years. If it was not for that it would be our favorite RV park in the US.
We will be here for two weeks. Due to reservation guideline issues we could not book a site on our favorite road so we spent 4 days on the main road through the park and then the rest of the two weeks across the road from one of the lakes. 10 out of 14 days in a site we really liked was not bad.
Since we have visited this area for several years we are very familiar with the local attractions, so we spent a little more time hanging in the hood on this visit. Also we started seeing rain much more frequently on this stay than on the rest of our winter trip (about 4 days of rain out of 14). Being in one site for ten days also allowed us to settle in a little more. I put out the sun shade (off the awning) and rigged up a new set of solar lights with covers that I have acquired over the years. It’s nice to be a little more festive when we stay.
So what were the highlights of our visit? There was still an Osprey nest on a telephone pole/platform with a nesting pair of Ospreys. This nest is visible from a lot of the sites on the end of the street that we were on. As usual lots of small birds and small varments around (bunnies everywhere). I managed to get a nice picture of a Mockingbird in flight. The park has several miles of paved bike/walking trails and one afternoon we took a bike trip to see Leftie the large/female/resident alligator. She had three of her offspring (maybe two years old) with her and one was riding on her back. Kind of cute. It’s not a visit to Gulf State Park with out a bike ride to see Leftie. While we were on the bike ride we saw a new (to us) Osprey nest. There is a resident nesting pair of Bald Eagles in the park. This year they were using a new nest so it was fun searching it out. We spent a couple of hours finding it and then observing the commings and goings of the parents. There were two babies from this years mating, they were likely close to fledging so they were quite large and jumped from branch to branch. The parents did not have to sit on the nest so except for bringing fish the just hung in the trees close by.
We played golf at Gulf Shores Golf Club. This was a nice course that was closed in previous years. One of the highlights of this course is that they have very friendly squirrels that are two different types/colors.
One of the good things about this area is they have an interesting variety of bars and restaurants. We ate the first friday night at LULU’s. LULU’s is run by Lucy Buffett, Jimmy Buffetts crazy sister. Its a Margaritaville like place that has good food (Lucy Buffett is a Chef) and entertainment. We always visit LULU’s and it never fails to be fun. Across the intercoastal waterway from LULU’s is a new site for ACME Oyster House. Linda doesn’t like much seafood but the ACME Oyster House in New Orleans introduced her to roasted oysters. Now she is hooked. So ACME is a great addition to the area. We went there on the second Friday for dinner. Now whats a beach town without beach bars/restaurants. Gulf Shores has several that we have enjoyed in the past. This year there is a new one that we tryed for drinks on one beautiful sunny afternoon; Bills by the Beach. This was a nice two story building that had indoor and outdoor (on the deck) drinking and dining on the second floor. That allowed us to sit on the deck and overlook the beach road to the beach across the street. Nice place with good staff.
Last there is shopping. We spent an afternoon at the Tanger’s Outlets on RT 59 in Foley AL. Linda and I always seem to find stuff to buy there, this year it was a leather jacket at Wilsons Leather. Another afternoon we visited Fairhope AL. Fairhope is a cute town on Mobile Bay. Lots of “junk” store opportunities for shopping there. I call the speciality gift shops Linda likes her junk stores.
