Christmas in Goose Creek Trip December 2011

Christmas in Goose Creek December 2011

Trip Report: December 18 - December 27, 2011 -- Our first trip out to see Victoria, Josh, and Audrey on the Navel Base at Goose Creek, South Carolina was an educational experience. So one we elected to break the trip up and spend the night midway instead of trying to make it all the way to the east coast in one shot.

The Blandelles had a show at the Lone Star Roadhouse the Saturday evening before we were to leave. Having gotten in rather late it was just after 9:30 AM in the morning before the Honda Civic Hybrid was loaded with various Christmas gifts and luggage. Our plan was to travel toward South Carolina and spend the night at Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Our first stop was the Cracker Barrel in Greenville, Texas on Interstate 30 for breakfast. After relaxing and filling up our travel cups with coffee we embarked on down to Interstate 20 at Lindale, Texas.

We stayed at a Days Inn in Tuscaloosa. The room was clean, nicely laid out, and reasonably priced. It was quiet enough we got a decent night's sleep. We booked the same room for a cheaper rate on the return trip. We were planning to visit the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum that morning but soon discovered the 10:00 AM opening time would have us arriving at the Wyndham Resort at Lake Marion rather late that evening.

After a successful trip to an outlet mall we grabbed a quick bite before heading down the road. We will avoid spending money in Birmingham, Alabama in the future as we noted that on a $5.99 fast food combo an open food a surcharge of $0.25 and sales tax of $0.62 (over 10%) had been added. This is an effective tax rate of 14.36%!

We arrived at the Wyndham Resort at Lake Marion just outside of Santee, South Carolina. After we unloaded and unpacked we relaxed by watching the FOX network season finally of "Terra Nova" and turned in for the the night.

The following morning we drove to the kid's house in Goose Creek. We visited, played dominoes, and watched the excellent film: "The Help". We met the kids' new Boston Terrier, Zooey.

Thursday we planned on taking a walking tour of downtown Charleston with the kids, but the weather altered our plans. We had a late lunch of fresh sea food at Hyman's Seafood Restaurant and were very impressed by both the quality of cuisine and wait service.

Friday the kids drove up to the Wyndham Resort at Lake Marion. We spent the day baking cookies, playing dominoes, watching "Cars 2", visiting, and wrapping Christmas presents.

Christmas Eve through Christmas: time was spent visiting, playing cards or dominoes, watching movies, and opening gifts. Joleen and Victoria spent a lot of time in the kitchen. Josh and Nathaniel spent a lot of time playing "Modern Warfare" on an X-Box. Victoria and Josh Ham invited; Kyle, Courtney, and Aubree Gardner; friends and a fellow Naval family that had no one coming into town to spend Christmas. Praise God for His blessings that allowed us to celebrate the true Spirit of Christmas with our family and share it with new friends.

We after calibrating Christmas we packed up and prepared to depart toward home early the next morning. On the way to the motel in Tuscaloosa we visited the Museum Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum, located on the outskirts of Birmingham. The museum is highly recommended as it is a brilliantly designed building that displays the motorcycles to their fullest.

Near the Days Inn in Tuscaloosa we found a conveniently located Logan's Roadhouse. We arose early the following morning and headed out to Trenton. I got my usual cup of free Community Coffee at the Louisiana Visitor Center. We arrived home safely after placing 2746 miles on the Civic Hybrid and getting a mediocre average of 44.2 MPG.

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