Sweet Home Alabama

Love this area! Today we drove down to Dauphin Island. If you're looking at a map, look on the west side of Mobile Bay south and if you scroll in close, you'll see the island. It's a "true barrier" island. All sand, with dunes, maritime forests, salt marshes, tidal flats and also has two freshwater "lakes". It's only about a mile and a half wide at it's widest, and I think about 12 miles long all told. There is a ferry to the Gulf Shores islands to the east, and into Florida Pensacola area. If you are looking for a serene beach vacation in quiet, total beach experience, this is the place to go. The far west tip of the island is all and only white sand beach, the south facing the Gulf of Mexico and the north facing Mississippi Sound. Both sides are beautiful. If you go right to the end of the road, you can walk from one side to the other in about 3 minutes. I took a stroll and saw many beautiful shells just within the water's edge, but unfortunately they were all still inhabited! I picked one up that looked abandoned and saw the claws peeking out, it's terrified owner probably praying that I'd put it back. I did. I couldn't bear the thought of killing one of the creatures to take home it's home. At the east end of the island (this is where you'd pick up the ferry across the bay) is where Fort Gaines is located. There were Civil War battles here, something Thor is pretty interested in. We took a look around the fort, there wasn't really much there.
Almost all of the homes/cottages on the island are built up on poles. Again, the sand takes over everything. On the way back out we passed a street cleaner brushing sand off the road. I imagine this has to be done quite frequently.
Later in the day we went to Dick Russell's BBQ for dinner. Mmm. BBQ baby back ribs, chicken, potato salad and BBQ beans. Sweet tea with lemon. Homemade biscuits. Oh, I was stuffed. I really wanted the peach cobbler (our own recipe!) but just couldn't do it. We drove around a bit, checked out some residential areas. Noticed right away that many homes have huge front porches, and almost all have rockers, sometimes lots, and/or porch swings. Places to set a spell and have a sweet tea. Another thing, in Florida, you don't hear that deep south "y'all" accent very much, as most of the inhabitants are from somewhere else. Here, our northern accents stick out like sore thumbs. People are very friendly though, and it's definitely slower paced. I find it truly amazing to find these areas that we've never heard of, as opposed to the "known" vacation destinations.