Bye Bye Bradenton, Hello Wauchula!

After having one last dinner with our friends Nick and Ritchie at Woody's River Roo Pub and Grill in Ellenton, FL, we saw them off this morning--they were heading to Georgia, on their way home to Grand Rapids, and we were heading to Wauchula, FL this morning....Bye, guys! Safe travels!

We headed to Peace River Preserve which is a Thousand Trails park in Wauchula, FL...only about a 40 minute drive from Bradenton...We stay here for about three days and it's FREE with our Thousand Trails zone membership that we paid for back at the Tampa RV show. We would probably stay a little longer at this TT park, but Eldy's son and family are coming to Siesta Key this weekend, so we are moving back to Sarasota for when they get here...I'm not sure I'd want to spend a lot of time at this park for the following reasons:

1. It's a very dated, old park...sites are very unlevel and in bad shape, some with very bad dried up ruts. Parts of the park are big rig friendly, other parts are not. Some of the roads around the park are in very bad shape--potholes and extremely uneven. Our site and how it looks is quite common throughout the park...There are not many sites with concrete patios and if you are lucky enough to get one, it's probably in pretty bad shape.

2. The facilities are very small for this size park (454 sites)....The pool and meeting hall are quite small.

....the recreation hall is a small mobile trailer....But at least they have one!

3. There is some highway noise from SR 17, but it's not all the way through the park as far as we can tell. These side lots are pretty and have lots of shade, but the road noise is very pronounced here.

4. Wauchula is a small town which appears to be hard hit by economy woes...Not much to do here, but if you are willing to drive a ways, there are some interesting things in nearby towns--like the Bok Tower Gardens in Lake Wales, the Lipinzzaner stallions in Myakka City...

Are there some positives? You bet! We try to look for those when we are in an older park....The positives of the park are:
1. Lots of shade in some sections
2. A river runs through it--the Peace River....right now it's very low and kind of yucky...But you can canoe and kayak and launch off the park boat ramp. Sixty-seven miles of paddling if you want!

3.There are some little, self-guided nature trails that volunteers worked very hard to make for a pleasant little hike....you just have to be careful if you decide to go on a walk...

4. There are some nice little cabins on the premises--sized small, medium and large...it kind of gives the park a little more of a "cozy" feel....

5.The office has lots of porch swings to hang out on on a hot day.....

6. They have pickleball courts and a bocce/molkky court...Have no idea what molkky is!

And that's the latest on the Peace River Thousand Trails park.....We're heading to the Bok Tower Gardens tomorrow...it's a beautiful place with a carillion (bells) performance....