Days 11 & 12: Givhans Ferry State Park, SC

Our optimism about having a string of short riding days ahead has proved to be unfounded.  It was an easy 32 mile day yesterday, but we had thought there was a campground near our route in Francis Marion National Forest.  There isn't, but we should be able to do dispersed camping there (which would be free, but no water or toilet).  It's only about 45 miles away, so that is close enough to the sort of distance we are wanting to average.  If that doesn't work out, there is a private campground about 15 miles out of our way.

Wisteria gone wild: the pine trees are in full bloom!

We are heading into a weekend, so this is where planning our stops is a bit like a calculus equation.  From Francis Marion NF the next closest campgrounds are around the Myrtle Beach area, which is off our route.  As the crow flies, the closest of those would be less than 50 miles away, but there is a large wildlife management area that prevents any road crossings.

More rumble strips.  Staying out of traffic means threading the needle, which
means we have no ability to enjoy the scenery.

Along our route, it is 70 miles to Conway, SC, which is the closest we come to the campgrounds along the coast (they are another 20 miles or so farther away).  So we'll likely do a long day on Sunday to get to Conway, and then drive to a campground.  

We will spend two nights at Givhans Ferry (less than $18 per night with tax, with power and water), then two nights of dispersed camping at Francis Marion.  That puts us on the beach on Sunday night, when it normally would be least crowded (as long as there isn't some special event planned.  After that, it looks as though our camping options should be better for a few nights after that.

Givhans Ferry State Park is an awesome campground, but there is no cell coverage for our Mi-Fi and just barely coverage for our phones.  So we drove about 5 miles east to get this off, and we may not have Mi-Fi coverage for much of the next few days.  So we may not post again until after the weekend.

Lana needs a lift after she found dozens of tiny, sharp stickers in the grass...

We've added a new Target Fridays layer to the route map at the top of our blog.  That should prevent us from getting to Maine earlier than we would like, and it helps us figure out where we will need to make reservations for Friday and Saturday night stays.  We've only added from Alexandria, VA to Moody, ME at present.  We are WAY ahead of schedule from here to Alexandria, so we'll be looking for ways to drag our feet to get back on track.  That will mostly be by spending two or more nights when we happen upon a nice state or national park campground.  As we get those targets worked out we'll add them to the map.