2019-12-20  Debarkation and 12 hour drive back to Atlanta:

Now for the most dreaded day of the whole trip!  And not because of debarkation from the ship.  That actually went really smoothly!  We were in the first group after self debarkation and it was called right at 8:15.  With Ken in a wheel chair, we ask a porter to help us with our luggage.  She was really cheerful and full of Christmas spirit.  Once we had our luggage, we were directed to a special customs line---I don't know if that's because we had Neptune suite bag tags or because Ken was in a wheel chair, but we had no wait.  I thought our porter would lead us outside to the curb and Ken would wait with the luggage while I went and got the car, but she lead us all the way to the garage and up to our car.  By about 8:30, we were in our car and ready to hit the highway. 

 Unfortunately, the highways weren't ready for us!  The radio said all cars were being directing off I-95 at Hillsboro Rd, so I figured we'd cut over to the tollroad.  Apparently so did everyone else.  So having lived in the area for a year and knowing my way around the area, I thought I'd be clever and head over to SR7 that runs parallel to the highway 'til it cleared, but there was road construction on it!  Took us about 2 hours to get to I-95 at Boynton Beach (about 15 miles down from the cruise port!)!!!!  Not a good start to what was already going to be a really long day in the car!

The neat sculptures near where we finally got on to I-95.  If I remember correctly, this is actually Boynton Beach---or Delray, just south of West Palm Beach. 

 For some reason, Navigator thought we should stay on 95 and eventually get on I-10.  Seems to me 75 is more direct.  So we switched over to 75 near Jupiter where the 2 highways intersect. We still have our Sunpass from when we lived there, so taking the toll road was no problem.

 Sure going to miss all the palm trees!

 and flowers in winter.

 a load I don't like being behind!

 zipping along on 75 now. 

 Love the way they decorate the sound walls.

 love being able to just drive through the toll booths on the toll road, too.

 Citrus and baby gators!

 up into Northern Florida now.  There are a lot of farms up there.

 fewer and fewer palm trees but more and more moss on trees. 

 a rather odd looking overpass!

 traffic was moving quite well since we got onto I-75

 Not the way I hope our car ends up.

 Horse capital of the World????!!!!  Wonder how they got that title.

 I saw a lot more cows then horses---and a lot more horses in Cobb County, Georgia!.

 tooling right along

Ken's type of beauty (he's the photographer in the car since I'm the driver).

 After about 7.5 hours, we were finally out of Florida. 

 Hello Georgia!  Never in a million years did I think I'd be calling Georgia home---until about 3 years ago.  Since then we've lived in 3 counties of Georgia.

 Never remember noticing all the cotton fields until we spent a year in Middle Georgia.  Now I look for them and peach and pecan orchards.

 Got up to our last former "home",  Perry, just as the sun was setting.  We pulled off the highway to drive by the old neighborhood.  They sure have done a lot of building since we originally moved there 1.5 years ago!  Tried to get dinner at one of our favorite restaurants there in Perry---The Swanson---but there was a 45 minute wait, so we just hit the road again. 

Now we were only about 150 miles from our new "home" in the NW Atlanta area.  We were still making good time until we got to McDonough just south of Atlanta.  For some reason, people forget how to drive when they go through that city and there's always some crazy traffic there!  Today was no exception!  There were cars in the ditch.  At least it wasn't us!  Added another 45 minutes or so to our trip.  Finally got home a little after 9--- over 12 hours from when we left the Port Everglades parking lot.  Guess it didn't help that this was the last weekend before Christmas.  Wonder if that had anything to do with it taking considerably longer to get home then to get there?