Honeycomb Campground, Guntersville, AL - June 12 - 15, 2017

We're home from our first camping trip of the year.  We went to Honeycomb Campground, near Guntersville, Alabama.  My only complaint is that the trip wasn't long enough!  We were too late in deciding where to go, and too late in making reservations, and were not able to stay in the campsite past Wednesday night. 

We arrived Monday afternoon.  Although our telephone map programs estimated that it was a 4.5 hour drive, and although we pretty much drove the speed limit all the way, it turned out to be more like a 6-hour trip, driveway to campsite.  We stayed in campsite #44, which is right on the edge of Guntersville Lake.  It was plenty long enough for our 32-foot camper, plus the truck, with room for at least one more car.  The campground has water and electric hookups, but no sewer hookup.  The park has a poop truck that will come around and empty holding tanks for a small fee.

After setting up camp Monday afternoon, we pretty much did nothing but sit and look at the water.  To me, the area around Guntersville is one of the most beautiful places in the U.S.  Guntersville Lake is HUGE - somewhere around 60,000 acres, if I remember correctly.  It's good for boating and fishing.  We had a couple of rods & reels in the camper, and we broke them out and fished a little.  Unfortunately, the area of the lake immediately in front of our camper was crammed with vegetation.  I did snag one little bass out of the grass, but mostly I caught tree trout, stick salmon, and grass cat.  ;)

Tuesday morning, we drove to Steele, Alabama, where there's a little place called Horse Pens 40.  I have been wanting to check it out ever since I found out about it.  The main reason I wanted to go there was that my daddy's ancestors settled in that area in the early 1800s, and I wanted to see it.  The second reason was that they have music festivals there, and campsite hookups (just water and electricity), and I want to go to one of the festivals.  Besides the music festivals, the main attraction is rock climbing (which you will not catch me doing in this lifetime).  We were not thoroughly impressed with the campsites.  It's not the best place for lazy campers, like us, who just want to sit around and admire the scenery.  The rock formations were pretty unique, though, and the area, in general, is beautiful.  We walked the trails a little bit, took a few pictures.  It was hot, though, and we were there in the middle of the day, so we didn't hang around too long.  One word of caution if you're thinking of taking a camper up there:  don't try to get there from State Route 42.  That way is steep, with hairpin curves that will let you see your own tail lights before you make it around the bend!  Take highway 11, instead; it's must easier.

I said, "Climb that rock and let me take your picture."

This is as far as he got.  ;)

The stage at Horse Pens 40.

When we left Horse Pens 40, we decided to take Highway 11 to see what it was like.  It was just our luck that right up there on top of Chandler Mountain, there is ZERO cell phone service (at least, none that we could find).  When we got to the first intersection, we flipped a coin and, naturally, chose the wrong direction.  Still, it was an interesting drive.  They grow tomatoes on Chandler Mountain - acres and acres and ACRES of tomatoes.  I've never seen so many tomato plants in one place in my life!  Eventually, we found our way out.  By the time we to back to "civilization," we were starving.  We have a road rule:  no eating at chain restaurants while traveling.  This seriously limited our choices in Attalla, the first town we came to, so we kept driving up to Boaz, or maybe it was Albertville (hard to tell where one town stops and the other begins), and found a place called "Bubba Rito's."  Hmmm...why not?  It turned out to be pretty good.  They fixed us a big old quesadilla and a big old burrito that fed us for both lunch and dinner.  Good thing, too, because about all we had in the refrigerator was milk, butter, and eggs. 

Wednesday morning after breakfast, we fished a little more.  Caught a bunch of seaweed again, and two pretty good sunburns, but no fish.  Later that afternoon, my cousin Rhonda, who lives about 20 minutes away, came over with her cute little granddaughter and spent the afternoon with us.  Later, we all went to dinner at Top of the River restaurant in Guntersville.  Her husband, Clay, joined us.  The food was good!  The visit was even better!

Alas, our time was up today, and we had to leave.  The trip home was fairly uneventful, except for the freak rain storm in Tishomingo County, Mississippi, that nearly blew us off the road once or twice.  Almost exactly 6 hours after leaving the campground, we arrived at home.  We hadn't taken much food or many clothes, and so unloading the camper was quick and easy.

It's good to be home!