Eleven Days in Red Bay, Alabama!

When we rolled into Red Bay, we were hoping for a quick fix for the motor home slides and several other things on our list of repairs. But we were prepared for a more lengthy stay, as we settled into small-town life in Northwest Alabama. It's a good thing we were prepared, since we ended up staying eleven days. Because we would be out of our home during the day while it was in the shop, we ate out more than usual.  You know you are living in a small town when you get the list of places to eat from the Chamber of Commerce, and at the top of list is the "Piggly Wiggly Grocery Store."

What the list didn't point out is that you needed to be there early. When the buffet opened at 11:30 there were already 20 people in line. We found that the two of us could share one generous dinner that included an entree, two side dishes, and a fresh yeast roll for $5.19.  Now it's at the top of our list too!

We were surprised to see that they had a McDonald's in one of the convenience stores, and that became our favorite place for ice cream.  To get some exercise, one day we walked from our campground all the way across town to the McDonald's at the other edge of town. With a population of only 3,130 people, that shouldn't take long. But several large industrial areas in town made our walk longer than expected. We figured we deserved that hot fudge sundae by the time we walked the loop back home and determined it was over five miles. So our new little town is spread out over several miles.

On our walk across town we walked around Tiffin industries, and beside the Tiffin employee parking lot. In a town of just over 3,000 people, Tiffin employs around 1,500.

What's that group of big metal buildings in the background of the above picture? That would be the other big industrial area in town that houses the Sunshine Dog Food mill. This area had an unusual smell that Mark liked, and another woman thought it smelt like pizza.  Denisa, however, did not embrace the aroma.

Besides our urban hiking, we were glad to find Cypress Cove Farm. A privately owned farm, its owner is glad to have visitors hike the seven miles of trails that he keeps mowed.

There were trails next to the water, and trails through forests of tall pines.

While we were hiking at Cypress Cove Farm, we met the owner--Johnny Mack Morrow. He was driving his tractor, cleaning up the trails while we were there. But he turned off the motor to sit and visit with these strangers from Oklahoma. Before we left, we found out that he was a state legislator from this part of Alabama. He gave us his telephone number, asking us to call him for a special tour of the capitol when we visited Montgomery later this month. Alabama is certainly a friendly state!

No repair work happens on the weekends, so we used that time to stay in our home and do our income taxes. So we felt like we made a major accomplishment while we were visiting Red Bay. We have found it is difficult to make ourselves stay home and do tasks like that. Also, since we were here for two weekends, we got to attend two different churches in a single town--a rare thing in our travels.

On some days when the motor home was in the service bay, we stayed at the comfortable customer lounge. It was here that we discovered that putting puzzles together can be fun.

Before we retired, we wouldn't allow ourselves time to put together something that you immediately took apart. Now we have time to do things just for the fun of it. Awesome! Even finishing a temporary piece of art gives one a sense of satisfaction.

It was also fun visiting with other motor home owners, with their great ideas for places we should visit. We had much in common with these people, and many of them live in their coaches for extended periods of time like us.

To top off our successful stay in Red Bay, we have to give kudos to Bunk House RV Conversion and RV. They are the company that successfully handled all of the items that needed attention on our coach, and communicated smoothly with our warranty company. We still think having an extended warranty is a good strategy for this life-style. Last time we used it, we found in the fine print that in addition to our $50 deductible, we must pay shipping and handling to get the parts delivered to our repairman. Since our repairman could just walk across the road to get parts from Tiffin, coming to Red Bay still saved us money with no shipping charges. 

One of the projects completed at Bunk House RV was building a new storage compartment with shelves and adding cabinet doors that perfectly match our motor home. Denisa gets almost giddy about increased storage options in our motor home!

So eleven days later, we are glad we came! On our eleventh night, Red Bay sent us off with a beautiful sunset over our motor home campground.