A Visit From "THE GIRLS"

Well, we just said "good bye" to Chris and Sandi this morning. They arrived Thursday in a coastal fog that would have made Steven King proud...You could not see the water....We have never had such fog. Chris said that when they came over the Copano Bay Bridge just West of us, they felt like they were on the bridge to nowhere...they couldn't see the water they were going over.
They got here about 2:30PM and we broke out the snacks..We sat outside with a few cocktails and watched the fog coming in again..Oh well..Maybe tomorrow they will actually get to see where we are!!
We went for a little ride and ended up in town at a great bar/restaurant called "Alice Faye's On The Bay for drinks. We must have hit "happy hour"..we were really happy with the price..2 Rum and Cokes and 2 bottles of Miller Lite for $8.00...obviously, in the words of the Terminator, "we will be back."
After enjoying our cocktails at Alice Faye's, we went back to our HitchHiker and continued the party in our "jammies". Our dinner that night was prepared by our RV cook, Chef Dennis, assisted by his sou chef, Donna. We had garlic marinated shrimp kabobs and Hot Sausage kabobs on the grill with white horseradish sauce and shrimp sauce, plus BBQ'd pinto beans with jalepeno peppers and cheese, cole slaw, and angel hair pasta with Parmesan Cheese..The meal was met with rave reviews and the Chef was largely tipped..About 11PM, Chris and Sandi opened up our sleeper sofa and jumped in, and Den and I retired to the executive suite. Hey, I ain't givin up my bed to ANYONE!!!
In the night, we heard the girls moving about to find something to drink (in the way of ice tea), and Chris opened up the window over their bed. We didn't find out until the next morning when Sandi informed us that Chris almost opened the "escape window" by mistake, which would have fallen out on the ground outside..for a fast escape...Thanks, Sandi, for saying "Don't open THAT ONE!!" Dennis would have been outside putting a window in at 2AM.
The next morning we woke up to clouds and more fog and a cool wind from the North....whoopie. The plans had been for Chef Dennis to create a gourmet breakfast outside on our gas grill..CHANGE OF PLANS...the sou chef takes over on the stove inside and manages to do herself proud, but received no tips..She is still reeling. We hung out at the RV until about noon, when, miraculously, the sun came out and all the clouds left.YEA!!


Finally Chris and Sandi could see our view, and we used this opportunity to take a few cheesecake photos! And yes, that would be their chosen rental car..Chris chose it, imagine that!!

Now that the sun was out, and we could actually SEE, it was time to go sightseeing. We walked out onto the pier and down onto the beach, which is made entirely of oyster shells. What a great day!
We drove into Fulton/Rockport and the girls checked their luggage into the Hampton Inn, where they were spending the night....one night with "Mom and Dad" I'm sure was plenty, and they had much comfier accomodations and a toilet that you could flush without using your foot. Note to self...the Hampton Inn here is beautiful!! Anyone coming here would love it.

We went on the bayfront road and drove to Allegro Key. Allegro Key is a little peninsula jutting into the bay with fabulous homes we could never afford. Actually we couldn't even afford their garbage bill. We took a few photos of some homes. We had a story ready if anyone thought us suspicious for snapping pictures of their home...We were wealthy investors from Illinois, interested in buying up a few propertys on Allegro Key. The fact we were driving around in a dirty GMC truck wouldn't give us away, right??
The weather ,now perfect, we drove down where they have the oyster and shrimp boats docked. We parked the truck and got out to walk the marina and our timing couldn't have been better. The oyster boats were coming in and unloading their "bounty". I took a few photos...and even Dennis, the all knowing wealth of information, didn't realize that they bag the oysters right on the boat before unloading them...


We continued on to where they were working on private little "yachts" in a shipyard..more photos. We can dream, can't we??














The day being soooo beautiful, we opted for a cocktail at a little place on the water that had an outdoor patio. We sat down and toasted to our good fortune.
I will take this opportunity to say that Sandi use to work with Chris at Methodist Hospital in Indy until her husband's job,(he is a Doctor of Urology), took them to Dothan, Alabama. They are both from Alabama originally. Sandi is also my hero, being a 2 time breast cancer survivor, who has just come off more chemo. She is an angel on earth. Allen, Sandi's husband, is actually in Dallas this weekend taking his National oral Dr. exams. And by the way, their last name is McCool..and no, I am not kidding. In my humble opinion, they do the name proud..they are BOTH McCool!!!


After our relaxing cocktail by the water, which, by the way, were a bit more expensive than Alice Faye's, we decided to go back to the camper to have some snacks and more drinks at a "homey" little place called "Cave's HitchHiker Bar and Grill". We got a lovely little table by the ocean, enjoying the sun, while partaking of the free cocktail hour.

It was about 7PM and the sun would be setting soon, so we kept our table by the sea and got our cameras ready for some perfect sunset shots.


The people next to us seized the opportunity and grabbed Dennis to get a photo of them in front of their "home on wheels".









After a beautiful sunset, we piled back into the GMC and headed into the bay road to go to dinner. We all decided that we wanted to try the menu at Alice Faye's and we were all in the mood for seafood. We found a table and ordered our dinners. Den and I had the oyster plate,(go figure), Sandi had stuffed flounder and Chris had a seafood platter that could have fed a third world country...all accompanied by a salad bar to die for and choice of potato. We filled our pieholes with our great meals...Chris got a doggie bag, which could have easily been 3 more meals. About this time, we realized it was 9:15PM and Den and I had to make it back inside the park gates by 10PM or we would turn into a pumpkin and be locked out..not good. We dropped the girls off at their hotel and raced across the bridge in time to get inside and crawl into our bed. We were tired, happy, full of seafood and full of more great memories.


All in all, I have to say that this last photo says it all about the bonding and love of two great young women, who live life to the fullest, and are the personificaton of the phrase "best friends"!!! What a great finish!!