Not just talking about the state. I'm mainly talking about the battleship. And the USS Drum, the submarine. Hubby and I have driven by the USS Alabama many, many times on our way to Texas over the years. Every time we did, we would always say, "We should stop." But when you have limited vacation time and it's a two day drive both ways, it's hard to make the time. We stopped this time, by golly. We decided that when we were driving back, we would take a day or so to just hang out. What better place than Mobile and the USS Ala-BAM-a. And that's how we said it every time. After not seeing hubby for 5 weeks, we needed some time to be a complete family. We also needed some time to decompress. It was awesome.
We are not seasoned travelers like many of our friends, but we have our quirks. For instance, we prefer to always stay at a Hampton Inn. It's the free, hot breakfast that really does it. One word should say it all: waffles. When someone who has never made waffles looks at the waffle iron while it beeps loudly and annoyingly, my happy family calls out "Flip it!" Turn it over, beeping stops. Hubby is the king of the waffle iron. Now I have a craving.
We stayed in downtown Mobile. It took us 5 minutes to get to the ship. It was easily navigated and we even found our way back easily. Love it when that happens. We walked to restaurants and shops downtown. And we had a balcony. It was easily one of the nicest rooms we have ever stayed in.
The room was huge. We had plenty of room to spread out. And we made ourselves right at home, let me tell you what. I had to get pics before we turned it into our space. You know I mean trash the place. We were very good. There were no wild parties and nobody broke anything. When we reserved the room, we asked for a balcony. We were hoping for one with a view of the bay. What we got was one of downtown Mobile.
That actually turned out to be just fine. It was really neat to see the mix of very old buildings, not so old but old enough buildings, and very modern and tall.
Hubby and I were very drawn to the white building with the writing on it. We don't know why. We just really liked it.
The top of this building looked like it was made of glass. We wanted to go up there and see the view. Ok, not me so much, but as long as I looked out and not down, we were all good.
This is the coolest building. We don't know what it's for, but the very top floor had us wondering. If you look you can see lights on the top floor on the far right. There are people up there. The first night we were there, we could see several silhouettes. And then someone was taking pictures. We could see the flash. The next night there were people there again. You could see them gather on the balcony. We waved in case they were watching us, too. If you looked down at the street, you could watch people coming and going to or from a night on the town. Some people should just stay home, you know what I mean? We couldn't help but laugh at some of them.
The pics just do not do justice to the sights. This building was very pretty all lit up. Not sure how I cut off the top, but that was the best part. See how I am.
Whenever you take a vacation to a city that has a lot of tourism, you should get a map. We got this one at the front desk.
They were also at the battleship and a couple of the places we went downtown. They proved to be invaluable. It listed the attractions that were close, shopping, restaurants, golf courses. Downtown Mobile also has a free trolley to take you almost anywhere you want to go. The maps tell you how far away, or, in our case, how close things are. We wound up with three of these I think. Many of the roads in downtown are one way. It also showed that. That came in handy when hubby took a wrong turn.
And this we got from the nice lady at the gift shop at the battleship. She was a little tightly wound for some reason, but get her talking and she loosened right up.
Sorry the picture is crooked. I forgot to turn it. But, every time I go to crop a pic, I lose it. It just disappears. Not that that has anything to do with this blog. I'm just working through some frustration. This is a vacation guide to Mobile. Get one for whatever city you visit. Great information in this thing. It made us wish we had a few more days to spend.
We want to go back. There was so much we didn't get to do. We would probably stay at the same hotel. We had the best time. It was great to get to spend some time and just wander with no real schedule. We need more of that. And it's nice to know we can make it there in just a few hours. Lots of places we want to go, but if you are looking for a good time, I suggest Ala-BAM-a.
Have a great day.
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