Cajun Country

We arrived later afternoon on a stinking hot day in Lafayette, Louisiana, the centre of Cajun culture. Cajuns are 'French' speaking people who were exiled from Eastern Canada after the British won the war against the French there as they would not swear an oath of allegiance to the King. They sailed south to New Orleans, then a French colony and settled in the swamps and bayous to the west. Their food and culture is very distinctive based around crawfish, shrimp and okra. Very tasty though. On our first day there we drove South into the delta to Avery Island, the home of Tabasco sauce. There we saw it being made and tasted it and a nice variant called Tabasco Chipotle Sauce. The MciIlenny family who still run the business also set up a bird sanctuary on the island which is home to hundreds of nesting egrets.





Next day we joined a Cajun swamp tour around some of the local bayous. The temperature was in the mid 90s (35c) as we motored around beautiful swamps in a tinnie.





The usual alligators, herons but brought to life by the great Cajun guide Shawn.

During the four weeks we have been on the road we have had very sunny weather, scorching temperatures and only a few hours rain. After Lafayette we stopped going West and started heading North and will continue north until almost the Canadian border thousands of miles away. It's still very hot where we are now in the state of Mississippi. Our first stop in the state was in Natchez, the oldest town on the Mississippi River. We camped right on the banks of the river with glorious views of the barges chugging up the river. The river is half a mile wide here.

Natchez is a lovely antebellum town and the start of the Natchez Trace - but more on that later.




We visited a National Park antebellum house called Melrose and admired the original furniture and the excellent guide Barney bought it all to life.





There are strange mounds all around the area created by ancient Indian tribes.





It was Memorial Day weekend and the campground was full. It had a lovely swimming pool which allowed us to cool off and meet new friends.

The highlight of this part of the trip was about to start. We were going to go up the Natchez Trace for hundreds of miles to Tupelo, birthday place of Elvis Presley. The Trace (an old French word) was an ancient route first used by the indians and with settlement in the mid west by boatmen. They would sail boats down the rivers to New Orleans carrying cargos for export. Then as the river was not navigable in those days upstream, the boats would be broken up for lumber and then the boatmen would take the Natchez Trace back up to Nashville Tennessee, a long arduous journey in those days. We were following their footsteps along a parallel road. In places the old trace is still visible, sunken 10 feet or more below ground level by the thousands of steps over the centuries.





We are at present in Jackson, Mississippi. Jackson is the capitol of the state and tomorrow we continue up the Trace to Tupelo to discover Elvis before arriving at Memphis. See y'all next week.

Location:Jackson, Mississippi

New Orleans and the Alabama Gulf Coast

We  had a wonderful stay in Alabama at the Lake Osprey RV Park. It had only just opened a few months and and had excellent facilities and very welcoming hosts. It is designed for snowbirds who want a winter residence in the South. One day while we were there we drove along the coast to Fort Morgan, that guards the entrance to the huge Mobile Bay on one side and caught a ferry over the entrance to the bay to Fort Gaines on the other side. They have a lovely estuarium highlighting the shallow water fisheries around the Mobile Bay which is over 2000 square miles.

Along the edges of the coast, there are many harbors right on the sea front, all built high up on stilts to protect against storm surges.

Then alas it was time to move on, so we drove West passing through Alabama, through Mississippi State (which is very narrow along the coast) and into Louisiana. We crossed over the longest bridge over water in the world which takes Interstate 10 over Lake Pontchartrain before shopping on the outskirts of New Orleans. We had a quiet campsite by the banks of the canal linking Lake Pontchartrain to the Mississippi River.

Next day we went for a drive along the Mississippi River, North to see some of the old plantations that were established in the days of slavery. With lovely antebellum houses (antebellum = before civil war) surrounded by sugar cane and cotton fields they were a lovely sight.

We crossed over 'Ole Muddy and came back down the other side to New Orleans.

The campground operates a cheap shuttle right into the heart of the French Quarter of New Orleans which took all the stress out of getting around. So later that day we caught the shuttle into the city and wandered around admiring the old houses, wrought iron balconies and street performers. We toured the famous French Market and had cocktails at a Jazz Bar.

We saw amazing street performers like these acrobats  and even met Homer Simpson on Holiday.

In the evening we had a fantastic meal at GW Fins. The sizzling smoked oysters were to die for. Overall we were slightly disappointed with N.O. Bourbon Street the heart of the French Quarter is quite sleazy  and you have to look hard to find any Jazz being played anywhere. Lots of rock music and strip clubs, but it does have an atmosphere quite different to any other US city we have been to. Very liberal. Very cosmopolitan and living up to its nick name of the 'Big Easy'.

Nest day we went in again early and admired the early sun over the Cathedral of St Louis which is majestically situated in front of Jackson Square. We ate beignets at the Cafe du Monde.

Then we had a special treat, a river cruise on one of the last steamboats on the Mississippi. It is called the Natchez and we had a Cajun lunch on board to the sounds of a Dixie Jazz Band.

After the cruise we caught the St Charles Streetcar and were taken into the Garden District past lovely antebellum homes. We saw very little after effects of Hurricane Katrina. The city seems back to normal again. The weather has been very hot - low nineties (low 30s centigrade) every day and the aircon has been a godsend. Blue skies and no rain.

We have left New Orleans now and are near Lafayette in the heart of Cajun Country. What is a Cajun I hear you asking?.... More on that next week.

FIRE! Fire!

A dramatic week with ourselves and our RV narrowly escaping  fiery death.  We arrived in Ochlockonee State Park in the Florida Panhandle. It was a lovely park - small, quiet and with lots of wildlife around and good 3G and TV reception (rare in a state park).  The end morning we went for a walk and saw a canebrake rattlesnake lying on the road (an omen as we were to discover). Then back where we had come, Wendy spotted some smoke and then a helicopter came roaring over to take a look see. We decided to wander back and as we got closer to our RV saw that there was a raging forest fire in the vicinity, but on the other side of the road to the campground.  We got back and I talked to a fireman who I saw and he said it was a managed burn-off, which is done periodically to encourage new growth. It was quite close to our RV but we were separated by the road (or so we thought). We went inside the RV and had a cup of tea, and then suddenly Wendy say some flames just metres from our RV. We went out to investigate and discovered that the flames had jumped the road and were building quickly into an inferno. We went back inside and tried to gather what valuables we could, but the flames were growing ever bigger.  We were not sure we would be able to get away, so we just grabbed the car keys and headed for the door, just as a firetruck pulled up. They quickly got out a  hose and started watering the base of the flames

We rushed to the car and quickly drove away to the ranger station where we expressed our displeasure at not being notified about a planned burn, as we had left all our windows open and the RV was full of smoke. They offered us a refund and some free boat trips at bother state park which we accepted as a form of compensation and we returned to see what damage had occurred. We were safe but the surrounding park was burnt to the ground.

It took days for the smoke smell to disappear.  Next day we went to Wakulla Springs to take advantage of the free boat tours. Wakulla Springs was where several Tarzan movies were made and also Creature of the Black Lagoon. It is very pretty.

The park ran some lovely boat trips and went on two and were lucky to see wild manatees swimming around and of course lots of gators and turtles as well as lots of bird life. A great day, but it was time to move on along the coast another couple of hundred miles to  Panama City, a popular beach resort. We stayed at  another State Park, right on the beach with the water almost lapping our RV. The sands were gleaming white and the sun continued to shine as it has done for weeks now.

On one day we drove up North to near Destin to Eglin Air Force Base Armament Museum which had a very interesting display on the history of air munitions. We saw cruise missiles, sidewinder missiles and lots of different size bombs as well as a huge collection of aircraft including the Flying Fortress Below.

Today we have left Florida alas, and arrived in Mobile, Alabama.  More on that next week.

Circuses and Manatees

We have been staying in lovely State parks this week starting with the Myakka State Park near Sarasota on the Gulf of Mexico. It is full of wild life and we went on an airboat trip and saw so many alligators we stopped counting.




It has been a very dry winter and water levels are way down causing all sorts of problems. On another day we visited Sarasota and the Ringling Museum which was fabulous. John Ringling founded Ringling Bros Circus and eventually took over Barnum and Bailey Circus. Sarasota was the winter base for the circus and John Ringling built a beautiful winter home on the edge of the lovely Sarasota Bay.




The museum covers the house, his superb art collection that covers Rubens and other masters and a great museum dedicated to circus life. That together with the lovely gardens and setting made one of the better museums we have ever visited.





Then it was time to move on to another state park - Rainbow Springs about 150 miles further north and on our way to New Orleans. The site of the fourth largest natural spring in Florida producing 500 million gallons per hour of lovely clear water. Manatees swim up to the spring every winter because it. Is a constant warm temperature. There were none there but we did see some at nearby Homosassa Springs. They are very large and very unusual about the size of a cow. The picture below doesn't do it justice in terms of the scale. As big as a grown man.





The Homosassa Springs has lots of other wildlife with a very good management by the Florida Parks Authority.




This week we round the corner of Florida and enter the area called the Panhandle so called because it is long and narrow and connected to the pan of the main Florida peninsula.

Location:Florida West Coast