My usual Wednesday post never made it last week. Karl and I returned from an eight day camping trip last Sunday. Things were  calm when we left, but day by day we listened to the news, our concern and alarm growing. Though we camped at rural state parks in Georgia and Florida far from known cases of COVID-19 after the second day we stopped visiting local sites and eating out even though all those places seemed busy with locals carrying on normally, and stayed close to the RV hiking and birding. All the parks were completely full, but we noticed as days went by that other campers were friendly as usual but we all stayed at a distance from each other and waved and smiled in greeting rather than visiting each other’s sites. At one point we decided to return early. I spoke with my sister and she suggested we stay. As she said, and we should enjoy the peace and quiet for the next two days. She also said out loud what we were thinking, it might be the last trip for quite a while.

We returned to a surreal world of empty shelves in grocery stores and email boxes that daily filled with emails announcing cancellations of events and at first reduced hours for places and then complete closing. We shopped for groceries, which took two days and visits to several stores to find what we needed, but otherwise stayed home.

Our hearts go out to everyone around the world fighting this disease, and for those dealing the massive changes in daily life. For a time, most of our interactions with others will be from a distance, by reading their blogs, emails and texts. Stay healthy, and we will work on doing the same.

I plan to keep posting, we have some interesting things from our last two trips and updates on Karl’s experiences with the mirror-less SLR. Our photography will be a close to home endeavor for the near future.