March 24, 2020 - Florida Panhandle

I woke up and headed towards the beach.  I remembered this drive being really beautiful the last time I was here and I couldn't wait to hit it again.  I drove south from Walmart hoping I would just run into the beach.  Nope, I ran into a military base.  I pull up the GPS and I can see the beach on the map directly on the flip side of the military base but I didn't know how to get there.  So I followed on a parallel road until I could get to the water.  Turns out my memory is a little faulty and there isn't a beach road that runs the entire length of the panhandle like it does on the east coast.  There are a lot of intercoastal islands that are closed to everyone except residence and police checkpoints to make sure people adhere.  I was able to drive some of it but mostly it was through a main road that was a mile or two away from the beach.  I did find some really nice resort towns that I expect are very expensive, but I need to take a closer look.  Beaches were closed and state parks were closed and the most I could do was pull to the side of the road and take photos.

I was thinking I'd stop in Panama City but it was still early.  I was trying to dawdle my way across the state, but it was going to fast.  There was nothing to eat up the time.  I finally stopped in Tallahassee mid afternoon.  I had a full charge on the Fire and binged Criminal Minds all afternoon.  I was in a Walmart parking lot and silly me forgot I'd crossed into a new time zone and forgot that Walmarts were all having reduced hours to give them time to sterilize and reduce risk.  I realized this 5 minutes after Walmart closed.  And I was going to need a bathroom before the night was thru.  Decided to wait until it was dark and most of the employees left and I was literally just able to go behind a vacant building when a guy on a bike passed me and went to join a bunch of homeless people behind a bush that I couldn't see.  That was a close call.  I got in my car and drove to a gas station.  I slept not as well knowing that I was surrounded by homeless people.  I'd been driving the back roads and wasn't aware I was that close to the city until I asked Google to take me to a 24 hour gas station.  Apparently I was at the edge of Tallahassee and probably a stones throw from lots of big city things.  



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