Arrived at Vero Beach

Sunshine Travel – Vero Beach, Florida

We are between Vero Beach and Sebastian, east of I95.

We were trying to get ready to leave yesterday morning the the rain kept coming and slowing down our progress.  We finally got a break in the rain and were able to leave.  I don’t like traveling in the rain, and was a little nervous.

Our GPS had us going I-4 and onto several unknown roads.   Al felt heading out hwy 39, down to 60 was the better route.  He was right.  We went right across the state on hwy 60 on mostly 2 lanes each way (lew) highway.  We had a few miles of 1 lew towards the end, but it wasn’t too bad.  We remembered traveling that road 20 years ago and it still hadn’t changed.  You would have thought they would have added more lanes in all this time. 

We had mostly dry weather, but did hit a few periods of light rain.

There were lots of orange groves and one place that had 30-40 semi’s full of oranges and grapefruits.  There was some “spillage” all along the highway and if you wanted to, you could collect a lot of fruit!

It was only 132 mile drive and we made it easily.  We headed north on I-95 for a few miles, turned off and Sunshine Travel Rv park was right there.  Not good being so close to the interstate, but at least it was easy to find.

My trusty GPS, Droid and Tire Pressure Monitoring system kept on the right track and safe!

Our first impression was good.  It was clean and nice and the people were nice.

We had no choice in sites and were assigned number 201.  Considering it was going to cost us about $13 a night, we couldn’t really complain.  We paid $199 for the Thousand Trail membership (south east edition), and an additional $199 for 6 extra parks in Florida.  This was one of those parks.  For $398 we can camp 30 nights “free” and after that we pay $3.00 a night.  So the price was right and our site was about as good as any of them. 

Here we are, all set up.

The sites are very close together and very little vegetation.

We have a level concrete pad, and full hook-ups to include sewer. We do hear quite a bit of road noise from I-95, but we can live with it for the price and the wonderful location. 

The pool is very pretty and warm.  In fact it was warm enough that even I was tempted and I don’t get in a pool unless the water is very warm!

This is a very busy campground and most of the sites are full. I’m sure it will start to empty out pretty soon, but with the close proximity to the beaches, I’m sure they stay fairly busy in the summer too.  Their monthly rates here are $840 in the winter, dropping in April through June to $450.  The weekly rates are $240 winter and $199 April through June.  I do not know what they are in the summer.  It is a Passport America park though so the half price rates would apply, but I believe it’s only for 7 days.  It’s a great location for water activities.  You can scuba dive right from the beach as there are some close in reefs.  Wabasso Beach is known for being a good spot to catch lobster.  There are lots of areas to kayak too.  Just a few miles down hwy 1 you will get to Palm Beach and that is an adventure in itself!

Although we much prefer state park like settings, we have gotten accustomed to the monthly rates and sewer hook ups that you find in private campgrounds. We are minutes from some of the most beautiful beaches in Florida, so we’ll “suffer.”

After we did the bare minimum to set up, we headed out to Checkers for some lunch/dinner.

We then made a trip over to Sebastian Inlet State Park and did a quick drive through.  It confirmed our previous opinion that it wasn’t a great place to camp.  It was so windy and cold at the beach and we only had on shorts, so we didn’t stay for many pictures.  We’ll go back and get more on a warmer day.

It was cloudy and dreary, so the pictures weren’t as pretty as they could have been, but the water was a beautiful greenish turquoise color.  Can’t wait for it to quit blowing and the seas to calm down.

A view from the bridge heading to the Beach at Sebastian.

You can see it wasn’t the prettiest day, but we’re hopeful today will be better. 

As soon as I get Squeaky her morning dosages of pills, we’re going to head out to explore.

We can’t wait to get our new kayaks and give them a test run. 

The park is having their annual garage sale Saturday, so maybe we’ll try to sell the kayaks!