Where does the time go? It seems as though if I blink these days a month or more has gone by and I’m scrambling to catch up with this site. The latest realization is that it is now spring and with that came Spring Break! … and the biggest trip in Talley we have made to date: Disney World!!
While Ethan had a great time, we knew that he’s far too young to commit any of it to memory, however Ryder is right in the wheelhouse of discovery and we had postponed the adventure as far past the COVID shutdowns as we could. As it turns out, Thousand Trails has a campground about 8 miles from Disney World in Clermont, Florida and with our plans not to renew TT this year we targeted spring break for our visit (yes, along with 5 billion other families) since we can stay at those properties for free.
Talley was all set to go and we hit the road early Friday morning. We had openly talked about the trip plans in front of Ethan, however moose had no idea, only that we were in for a long drive. 3 days of driving each way staying at Harvest Host locations along the way. Night 1 was at Secret Garden Bees outside of Fort Bragg, NC. It was a bit chilly out so the bees were a little slow which was probably good considering Angus would normally try to eat them. We bought a couple different types of honey and had a wonderfully quiet evening only hearing the occasional passing rainstorm.
Stop 2 followed the hardest day if driving I’ve experienced yet towing Talley thousands of miles all over the eastern seaboard. Persistent 30 mile an hour head and crosswinds combined with 45 mph gusts kept the drive difficult to relax behind the wheel. The rig still did great, but I found I needed to make adjustments to tire and airbag pressures to make the trailer less squirrely, however no adjustments will eliminate the erratic tug of a 30′ long sail behind us at freeway speeds. We arrived at Georgia Peach World along with several other campers to weather the remaining cold front as we heard reports from home that a few inches of snow had fallen in Annapolis. The location is so much more than just a roadside fruit stand because it includes a huge playground and petting zoo for the kids. Unfortunately that section was closed due to the wind so we grilled some burgers and fed Steve the donkey through the fence.
The final stretch into Orlando was thankfully easy and purposefully the shortest drive so that we’d have some extra energy to set up camp and it worked out well. We finally encountered a TT campground that matched their descriptions and wasn’t a dilapidated mess as most of the others are. They had a great swimming pool, lots of outdoor games, multiple ponds (some with gators) and something like 1,000 well groomed and surprisingly roomy sites unlike what we’ve seen at other locations. We were led to our site by a camp host and pleased with how spacious it was and it backed to an open space area where the boys could run.
Continued in Part 2
