Hurricane Irma and Heading Home

From Dillon, South Carolina, we made it to Petersburg Corps of Engineer Park near Appling, Georgia. We were definitely keeping an eye on Hurricane Irma. As with most hurricanes, her path was unpredictable. It looked like she would head east of Augusta, Georgia, but then she changed directions again! As you can see, our campsite was heavily wooded. Strong winds could be a disaster in this area.

Bob and I were able to get some hiking in while on hurricane watch at Petersburg. One trailhead for Bartram Trail is located near the entrance to the campground. The trail follows the shoreline of Strom Thurmond Reservoir. One day we hiked it to the east, the next, we hiked to the west. The trail is multi-use and is good for mountain bikes, also.

Still keeping a watch on Irma, we decided we should do laundry just in case power is out when we return home.  Irma hit home on Sunday, and made her way to the Augusta area on Monday. Since we were in such a wooded area, we made the decision to move Sol to an area without trees. Bartram Trailhead was the area of choice. We had about 2 side by side football fields of open area where we parked Sol--slides in, of course. The winds picked up Monday afternoon and we watched several trees fall at the perimeter of our open space. One tree fell on the power lines across the campground road. We were glad we were out of the trees! Other campers were not so lucky. When we were checking out on Tuesday morning, we found out that our camping loop lost about 200 trees and there were about 8 campers still in the loop! We couldn't get near to see the destruction.

Due to hurricane assistance trucks heading south, we drove US221 and US301 south. There was very little traffic and we were able to top off Sol's tanks in Baxley, Georgia. Since there were so many trees down, we decided to drive all the way home. The only things not bothered by Irma were the love bugs!

 When we arrived in our neighborhood, the streets were already lined with hurricane debris.

After cleaning Sol, we parked in our driveway where we could safely run our generator. Our street was without power and we were told it would be Sunday before power was restored. 

Since arriving home, we have cleaned our yard and are starting to make plans for our next adventure! Your guess is as good as mine as to where we will go next!