Well what a week it has been… this could be called Matt’s Mishaps Two – but as I am writing it I thought it might look a bit unfair to apportion any blame…

Last Monday – remember it was the 13^th… well Matt is not superstitious but we managed to do the following in one day:  have a car accident, nearly burn Reg down and become ill.  Quite good going.

The day started with us leaving Tallahassee and I had read that we should visit Panama City Beach in Florida.  Heaven knows why – it was the Floridian Blackpool or Great Yarmouth. Really horrid and tacky so we drove through and out the other side until we came to Camp Helen.  This was a former holiday camp for a textile firm in Alabama who sent their workers to these chalets for fishing and swimming every summer.  Such enlightened times until it all went wrong in the 1980’s and they went bust.   Not so much Hi de Hi as Low de Low!

What was amazing was the sand on the beach. It was beautifully white and clear – just like icing sugar and we were both rather taken with it.  

On our way to our site that afternoon we were driving along a single lane road – the 30A for any anoraks out there, when it came to a light at a junction. The person behind – Gabrielle as we know her to be – became rather impatient and tried to undertake Matt in the lanes for the turn and hit us.   Needless to say, we were a bit shocked. Reg shrugged off the damage to his wheel arch and hubcap – but her car had a hefty dent in the side.

Accidents are very boring at home and we can report they are just as dull here.  Only amusing parts were that no one when taking a statement from us could understand Matt saying ‘wheel’ in his estuary/Oz accent and an indicator is not an indicator it is a blinker!  

By the time we got to the site I was developing a raging sore throat so Matt very kindly said he would cook.  I started to feel worse and asked if all was ok as Reg filled with smoke.  “All under control” I was told.  By now the smoke alarm is ringing, our eyes are watering and we are about to catch fire when we realise that the enchiladas are not browning on the top – they are being incinerated on the bottom due to the design of the oven.  In the panic to avert the fire the oven gloves were burnt to a crisp and the table has a very slight imprint of the oven glove pattern on it!

Our third disaster – the cold raged all week.  I got better and then Matt went down with it.  Valentine’s Day was spent on the shelf – just like old times for me – but I mean the shelf above the drivers cabin.  I felt terrible and Matt was bedridden a day or so later.  We have no idea how the two of us caught something like that… Maybe it is Zika?!

So, we had three days on the Panhandle of Florida.  Much chillier.  We went on Wednesday to Henderson Beach – not nearly warm enough to sit on it, so had lunch in the car park as you do in a rv and braced ourselves for a walk in the cloud and wind.  Stunning beach again and just as we fancied a cuppa – we stumbled upon a café where a man was singing. The sun came out for precisely an hour and it was magical.

We also went to the National Naval Air Museum at Pensacola and saw the types of planes that were in Top Gun and loads of others.  It is a great museum for plane fans and as you drive on to the base and show your ID we looked a bit silly in Reg.  Al Qaeda coming for holiday perhaps.  There is also a lighthouse on the base which was quite a climb up.  Met a Democrat at the top – but as he described his wife as someone with ‘benefits’ we are not sure he counts! 

By the weekend we drove further west to Mobile.  Lovely site – we camped under 60ft pine trees, surrounded by water and yes admittedly the slight hum of the interstate.   I got very excited as I saw some beavers on a walk whist Matt was dying back in Reg.  Just like the Fast Show I tried to show him where they were and ‘insisted on complete silence’ as we approached the magical spot.  He coughed and they were gone!  Charlie Higson could not have done it better…  

On Saturday, we went into Mobile in Reg – narrowly avoiding a 12ft tunnel – phew!  That would have been a mishap and would have rather curtailed this blog.   We parked up and started to notice a lot of commotion.  Well they were having their own Mardi Gras – but as we are going to New Orleans I will not elaborate at this stage.  Of all the towns in the all the world I have to say I rather liked Mobile. 

Yesterday we drove over the border back into Mississippi and are camped in Buccaneer State Park.  This park and the town that we cycled to today – Bay St Louis bore the brunt of Hurricane Katrina when she hit land in Mississippi.  Even nearly 12 years on you can see the devastation along the coast.  Lots of broken piers and empty plots of land where the buildings have never been replaced.  Strange to see it today to think of the havoc that happened here.  The surge in water was 30ft high and there are no cliffs – so a bit like Sandbanks being swept away.   That said it is again rather lovely and because of the hurricane there is a casino down the road which is now built on land as the old mobile, floating ones just became battering rams in the hurricane.  We will not be going there with our luck at the moment!

o, we head tomorrow to our park just outside New Orleans.  Really excited to see Matt’s brother Andy on Friday and H and Steve on Saturday. 

Have a great week and we plan to get in the words of another Fast Show character …verrry, verrry drunk!  A x