The Deep South

1 May – We filled our propane tank before leaving the Memphis RV park and headed S.E. over the Tennessee/Mississippi border to Tupelo (Elvis’s birth place -  thought we were finished with him!) and the Trace State Park. We have planned to follow the  Natchez-Trace Parkway down thru Mississippi.

2 May – We have had a change of plan and now have decided to go south on the Great River Road, following the Mississippi River. This resulted in a slight change of course to the S.W. thru lovely rolling wooded land. Eventually the hills disappeared and the land became very flat. This area is the Mississippi Delta country. Many of the fields have been recently flooded and are now being harrowed and sown with corn, rice and a little cotton. In the slave times this would all have been cotton. The towns are very poor with many rundown trailer homes. Every so often the ground gets slightly higher and plantations of trees (we think walnut) and juniper bushes? (only because we saw a gin factory.) Here the homes and towns are much richer. The State Park, where we had planned to stay, is now for day use only so we continued on to the Leroy Percy State Park for the night. Here we are supposed to see some alligators but we walked the banks of the lake where they are meant to sunbathe and did not see any. Not sure if that is a bad thing! Another picturesque cheap camp site however.

3 May – We drove further south down the Great River Road. The Mississippi is out to our right but in this delta country the brown water spreads and the actual river is ill-defined. We stopped at a huge Civil War site at Vicksburg. In 1862 this was the site of a decisive battle in the Civil war. We watched a video describing the battle. The Mississippi has some large bluffs at Vicksburg and the Confederate Army (south) controlled the shipping on the river. The Union Army (north) realised they need to dominate the shipping on the river to finish the war and tried repeatedly to storm the well dug in Confederate Army. Eventually the Unionists realised they could not win so they starved the Confederates into submission. There was a 16 mile drive around the battlements and trenches of both sides. There are many memorials to the fallen around the drive. The highlight was a restored

Unionist gun boat, USS Cairo. It had been sunk during the war and been salvaged in 1960. A very strange looking stern paddle steamer with iron plating and bristling with canon. We drove further south to another state park where we met an Aussie couple doing a 6 week trip from Orlando to Seattle. They were interested in our trip and we were able to give them some helpful tips hopefully.

4 May – We are getting closer to the coast and the delta country is behind us and we are back into rolling forested land. Over the Mississippi/Louisiana border and around the very huge urban area of Baton Rouge has brought to within 70 miles of New Orleans. We are at yet another State Park. We have booked a RV Park in New Orleans and will head there tomorrow. We went for a short stroll along some boardwalks over the swamps looking for alligators. Still no sign of them!

5 May – It was only a short drive along the I-55 into New Orleans. At one stage we drove 30 miles on a long bridge over the swamps and bayous. New Orleans is sandwiched between the Mississippi and the huge Lake Pontchartrain and is all very low. In 2005 Hurricane Katrina flooded 70% of the city! Most of the city seems to have recovered now, however. We easily found our RV Park where the hostess welcomed us and told us of the shuttle service she ran into the French Quarter and the City park. All very covenient and cheap. ($10/trip.) We spent the afternoon planning our trip to Nashville and swimming in the pool. (first swim this trip). At 5:00pm we caught the shuttle (which turned out to be the family car) into the French Quarter and immediately were drawn into a bar (La Maisons) by the sounds of traditional jazz.

After a beer and some great music we walked the Mississippi River bank to the tourist paddle steamer and then headed up thru Jackson Square and a beautiful church into the main part of the French Quarter. On our way a youth band was parading down the street playing enthusiastically. The buildings are unique with beautiful ornate balconies. We found Bourbon Street and walked most of its length. We were a little disappointed as it was a bit tacky with many strip clubs and mostly loud thumping head banging bands. Not the jazz we had expected.
                                                   

We had a great meal on a balcony overlooking the stream of people on the street with the music of a Jamaican Steel Drum band from below. We walked back to the La Maison bar in Frenchman Street where we enjoyed another traditional Jazz group before catching our shuttle home.

6 May – Back on the shuttle at noon this time to City Park. (the biggest urban park in the USA). We wandered around a great sculpture garden before walking to the trolley car which brought us back to the French Quarter. On the walk we had an authentic New Orleans fast food lunch and passed some beautiful typical New Orleans homes. Our impression of Bourbon Street was not any better in daylight but we stopped 

at the Legends of Music courtyard where a Dixieland band was playing. Our next stop was a bar with a country rock band. They were very good. We walked a few streets away from Bourbon Street and the class of the restaurants and atmosphere improved hugely. Back to our favourite Frenchman Street and a different bar with a great swing band playing the classics. Our shuttle picked us up at 5:00pm.

7 May – We had booked a Swamp Tour a couple of days ago, so we set off east over the bridges out of New Orleans for our noon adventure. We were issued with coloured wrist bands designating which boat we would be on. 20 to a boat and all the boats split up so we felt that we were the only ones on the swamp.  We sped up the muddy Pearl River and drifted down a series of narrow backwaters into the swamp. We saw racoons, alligators, wild bores, snakes and some great birds.

Our guide was very good with a humorous and informative patter. He feed the alligators which were up to 5 feet long and jumped most of their length for the offered marshmallows. The swamp was beautiful, very peaceful and we have never experienced anything like it. At the end of the tour we passed a Cajun village on the river banks with shrimp boats and craw pots. The 2 hour tour was great value for $25 each! Back on the road and to our next stop at a State park back in Mississippi situated right on the Golf of Mexico again.

We had a great 15 mile bike ride along the beaches. It was good to get on the bikes and blow out the over indulgences of New Orleans.

8 May - We left the State Park and drove along a road following the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. The sand was blindingly white but the sea is still muddy and uninviting. There are remnants of many old jetties presumably swept away by hurricane Katrina. It got more populated as we passed Gulfport and Biloxi with casinos, convention centres etc.

Across some more huge bridges and we joined the I-10 to cross into Alabama. There are a few state borders in this part of the USA as each state seems to want to have access to the Gulf. We bypassed Mobile and found the Meaher State Park on Mobile Bay. This was an expensive state park but we had a great view of the bay and enjoyed the sunset.

 

9 May – We continued along the I-10 east towards Florida. The traffic increased and we crawled thru Pensacola and its beaches. The sea is now a nice blue/green colour and this area is called the Emerald Coast. It is Saturday and getting very hot (90F – 33C) so everyone is off to the beach. Eventually we reached the State park at Henderson beach but the camp was full. Some quick re-planning and we ended up at another State Park at Rocky Bayou. We have booked for 2 nights as we will hopefully renew our vehicle registration on Monday. The camp backs onto a large inlet where we had a swim despite the sign!! It will be a nice place to relax.

10 May – Pancake Sunday, Val is a real dab hand at making them! It’s Mothers Day so I should be making them perhaps.

We decided to go back to the State Park Beach at Henderson where we tried to book into yesterday but just for the day. The beach was spectacular with unbelievable clean white sand and beautiful emerald green warm water. There was quite a crowd enjoying Mothers Day. We returned to “Ernie” for lunch and then back to the beach for more sun and swims. Certainly one of the best beaches we have ever been at. Back to the other state park and a relax in the shade. Probably had too much sun today!

11 May – We headed north away from the Gulf to Crestview, our official USA home.

Explanation: When we bought “Ernie” three years ago we needed a residential address to register it. We “bought” an address from a company called “My RV Mail” and it is based in Crestview, Florida. We were able to register “Ernie” for 2 years saving us all the hassle of getting the registration posted to us. We also called into “home” and picked up our mail in person. Nothing exciting however. We continued north across the Florida/Alabama border and stopped at a Forest Park called Open Pond where we were almost the only campers. We are very conscious of the weather west of us where there have been some damaging tornados. We are on tornado watch!

 12 May – Back on the road north. We need to be in Nashville by the weekend. We drove thru the State Capital, Montgomery. This is where Rosa Parks defied the racially divided bus policy causing the bus boycott which had a huge influence on the civil rights campaign. It’s all in a great film called “The Long Walk Home” starring a young Whoopi Goldberg. We are camped at a huge State Park at Lake Martin. Again there are only a few enjoying the now mild temperatures and this lovely lake. We had a nice swim in the warm water. As there was some firewood at our site we had our first camp fire of this trip.

13 May – We meandered our way north mostly on the “9” thru the beautiful Alabama countryside. The trip was mainly thru forested areas and some cute little towns. There seems to be plenty of money in N.E. Alabama. We have spoken to a few people in Alabama but we have to really concentrate on what they are saying. The southern drawl is very hard to understand. This is our last night in this state and we are at yet another state park at  Fort Payne. Surprisingly this park has internet so we spent some time booking a State Park in Kentucky for Memorial Weekend in 2 weeks. Everyone goes camping on this weekend and finding a site can be diabolical. We went on a 2 mile stroll thru the park where we were meant to see a couple of waterfalls but they were almost dry. The Azaleas were very pretty however. As we have internet we will publish this blog tonight.