Sweet Home Alabama

We got an early start out of Wayesboro in the morning so Monday was a long and productive day. Our first destination once into Alabama - only 13 miles east of Waynesboro - was the Coffeeville Service Park. In our Alabama tourist guide it listed the park as having water and electric hook ups, plus showers, a playground, laundry and the list went on. We thought that even though we had only driven 1/2 hour or so we may want to stay the night to get caught up on things. Sadly, as we reached the sign there was a large CLOSED sign. I was surprised because it is listed as open year around. This is the third time that a park has been closed with no warning in the tourist book or on line - just shows that when traveling you definitely have to be flexible.

After stopping in the small downtown of Grove Hill for breakfast we carried on to Monroeville, 32 miles down the road. We planned to stop in Monroeville since Pastor Jerry in New Braunfels mentioned that it was a nice little town.

When I visited the Monroeville website to see what there was to see I found at that is is the childhood home of Truman Capote. Have you seen the movie Capote with Philip Seymour Hoffman? Derek and I actually have seen it and so knew a little about Truman Capote. It is also the childhood home of Harper Lee who wrote To Kill a Mockingbird. So an interesting town with a literary heritage.

The Old Courthouse Museum - the courtroom was the trial scene model for the To Kill A Mockingbird movie

Being Sunday there wasn't much going on in Monroeville and everything in the small downtown was closed. We parked beside the library and after finding the self guided tour maps we headed down the  main street in search of where Truman Capote lived. A few blocks down we found it - well we found the placard and some ruins. For some reason I thought the house would still be there and so I was surprised that there was so little remaining.

Not much left - Truman Capote's childhood home.

All was not lost though because just in behind Derek and I spotted a playground. Now this is important because we hadn't found one since New Braunfels and Cassia has been asking to visit one. Thankfully the playground was at the schools and so there were several for her to play on. After and hour or so she was done and we moved on.

Since we had left the 84 to go Monroeville we decided to take the back roads to Georgiana, our next destination, instead of going back to the 84 and north on the Interstate. So glad we did! 47 and 106 were beautiful back country roads with lots of houses and farms to look at along the way. We weren't sure where we were going to stay the night but thought that we may be able to find a little corner some where in Georgiana.

We were going to Georgiana of course for the Hank Williams Sr. Childhood Home & Museum. Although I am a country fan I had only heard of Hank Jr. until I met Derek who was and is a fan of Hank Sr. So we had to stop!

We knew the Museum was closed on Sunday and would have to wait until the morning to visit but we went to find it when we reached the town. Upon arrival we found not just the home but the fan clubhouse which looked to have rv parking on the lawn around it. We weren't sure what to do since there was no one to ask. But since we couldn't find another place to park we decided to hope for the best and park on the lawn. Well - it was a great overnight. No one bothered us and other then the train that blew it's horn most of the night we were fine.

Today's Interesting Link: Here is a link to the trailer for the movie Capote - take a look - maybe rent it next time you are at the video store.

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