We’re back on the road once again after reuniting with our beloved RV, which is parked at a campground in Orange Beach, Alabama. If you’re slightly confused, I’ll rewind a bit and explain how we got here. We flew from Fort Myers back to Texas one evening last week, stayed one day to prepare the RV and celebrate two birthdays, then got on the road at 8am the next morning to head to Alabama and meet up with my parents. In two days, we covered 680 miles to get here.
On our first night, we stayed in the campground at the Ameristar Casino in Vicksburg, Mississippi. After a long day of driving, I won a little bit of money in the casino and we decided to cash out while we were still ahead. Win!
Mom and dad were excited to see us and ready to go exploring, like we did back in our Alaska days. So we hopped on a ferry headed to Dauphin Island for our first day trip. You can see a map of the area above. We started that morning east of Fort Morgan, close to Gulf Shores.
The ferry goes back and forth between Fort Morgan and Fort Gaines and carries 28 cars, as well as bikes and pedestrians. During the summer months, a second ferry is deployed to keep up with the vacationing crowds. In less than forty minutes, we arrived on the island.
We passed by several gas drilling rigs and later learned that the Deep Water Horizon spill was about 100 miles off shore from our location. A supply boat was stopping at several rigs and a smaller boat pulled up to one of them.
Florida has been fighting any legislation allowing deep sea rigs in water near their state. Honestly, they are ugly to look at and distract from the beauty of the ocean. The ones here claim to be environmentally friendly, but they are so visible from shore.
We drove as far down the island as we were allowed, because the main road was closed. Crews are still cleaning up piles of sand on the west end of the island from hurricane Nate which hit last October. As we were driving toward the bridge to Mobile, this brightly colored row of houses caught our eye.
The blue one in the middle is being offered for $179,000 by the owner. Each tiny house comes with a boat slip and large dock area. Right next door is a putt putt course and ice cream shop. Added bonuses! Darin said we couldn’t buy one, so we kept going.
One item on our list to visit was the estuarium, a public aquarium highlighting the four key habitats of coastal Alabama: the Mobile Tensaw River Delta, Mobile Bay, the Barrier Islands and the Northern Gulf of Mexico.
My favorite exhibit was the 7,000 gallon sting ray touch pool. It was the first time I have ever seen cownose rays and these creatures were very friendly and docile. We watched one of the students from the nearby college throw pieces of squid into the tank at feeding time.
If you noticed on the map, there are two historic forts at the mouth of Mobile Bay. The construction of Fort Gaines was started in 1853 and completed in 1862 and named after General Edmond Pendleton Gaines who had died in 1849. The fort was used by various military and coast guard groups until 1926.
The most famous clash here occurred between Confederate and Union troops during the Civil War and was named the Battle of Mobile Bay. The Confederate Colonel over the garrison surrendered on August 8, 1864.
The Fort Gaines Historic Site is considered one of the best preserved examples of nineteenth-century American coastal fortifications, but due to coastal erosion, it is also on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s list of the most endangered historic places.
Nine rifled 32-pounder cannons from the Civil War remain in place as well as marked damage from the guns of the USS Chickasaw. An interesting fact – the fort is close enough to sea level to have the latrines flushed by daily tides. Can you imagine the smell?
While coming in and leaving the dock, we saw the Coast Guard station. It appeared quiet, which is good, but I didn’t see any of their larger boats around. I really wanted to see if they were sporting machine guns like the one in Fort Myers.
For dinner, we stopped at Tacky Jacks in Fort Morgan. One popular signature drink is the bushwhacker, and I have seen it on menus at other restaurants in Orange Beach too. It reminds me of the Monkey Lala drink on Roatan. A very tasty treat after a busy day!