We have had several people ask us if we went to Noah's Ark on our trip. The answer is yes and no.
If you are thinking about the religious amusement park with the big wooden boat, we did not. It was only a few miles north of the Kentucky Horse Park, but we never made it up there.
If, on the other hand, you were asking about the animal rescue place in Georgia that Honey follows on Facebook, we did go there and it was definitely worth the trip.
From Bryson City, we headed south to High Falls RV Park in Jackson, GA. and while there we toured High Falls State Park and the Noah's Ark Rescue Center.
This is Baloo - one third of B/L/T - a bear, a lion and a tiger who were confiscated as cubs in 2001 during a drug raid in Atlanta. The three were inseparable, and all shared thee same enclosure until the lion died earlier this year. Their story is what got Honey interested in Noah's Ark to begin with, and she has followed their Facebook page for several years.
All of the animals are rescues of some kind, many from bankrupt zoos and circuses and several from folks who thought it would be cool to have a wild animal until it got too big.
This looks like a Grizzly, but it's a Syrian Bear. Related, but a quite a bit smaller.
Our next stop was Capital City RV Park in Montgomery, AL. Just an overnight stop - nothing to report here except we had our first bad weather of the trip and drove most of the way in the rain.
From Montgomery we went to Roosevelt State Park in Morton, MS. When I was making reservations here, I learned that we had a forgotten credit for a cancelled reservation at a Mississippi Park, so we got a 50 amp full hookup campsite for $4.80. That sounds like a great deal, but we had such a hassle getting into our campsite that I would have gladly paid to be almost anywhere else. The whole shebang was one huge comedy of errors.
When we checked in, the girl at the gate gave us a campground map, and said turn left on the road right past the gatehouse, then follow the map. The map showed us taking the first right to get to our campsite. What she failed to mention was that the map didn't start at the gatehouse, it actually started two miles down the road on the other side of the dam. That first right led us down a road to lakeside cabins with no way to back up and no place to turn around!
After a half hour or so of trying to maneuver, a park ranger showed up to help. He made one of the folks who had been standing around watching move his truck and boat trailer, and we were able to back in there and pull back on the road. He then escorted us to our campsite, where we had to get someone else move their boat so we could back into our campsite. By the time we got set up we were both exhausted.
They had a massive 4th of July celebration going on in the park, with a huge fireworks display that night. To see the fireworks, we would have had to carry chairs in the rain down to the lakeside (in somebody else's campsite) but by that point we were not interested.
Our dogs hate fireworks, so I spent an hour and a half sitting in the trailer with two miniature dachshunds cowering on my lap.
Roosevelt Park has a nice lake, a huge convention/event center, a big swimming pool with water slides and a disc golf course. I'm sure it is a very nice place, but we'll be more than happy to never see it again.
The next, and last, stop was at the Red Shoes Campground in Kinder, LA. It is part of the complex at Coushatta Casino so our campsite was "comped," Our visit to the casino was less than successful, but we did have fun.
The only ones who left with more than they had when we arrived were our dogs. They came home with hundreds of fleas, and we've spent the last couple of days shampooing them, washing their beds, treating them with flea killer, vacuuming carpets, etc.
It looks like things are just about back to normal today.
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