deep south

By anders pearson 19 Aug 2003

lani and the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/gerbils/“>gerbils</a> are safely in Austin. i’m back in nyc, and i assume tuck is back in new hampshire by now.

all in all, a fantastic road trip. it would take me hours to cover the whole thing, so you’ll have to settle for the abridged version here.

we packed up the car, picked up tuck’s visa downtown and left nyc around 13:00 on tuesday. after a brief stop at a waffle house for dinner, we got to anthony and heather’s place in chapel hill around 23:00. there we <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0430.jpg.html”>drank</a>, talked, and drank some more late into the night.

on wednesday, we slept it off until <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/“>early afternoon</a> and then hit the road again. we crossed north carolina, marvelled at the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0438.jpg.html”>kudzu</a>, and then took a detour into the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0439.jpg.html”>smoky mountains</a> right around <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0448.jpg.html”>dusk</a> . by the time we got across to Gatlinburg, TN, it was night. <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0458.jpg.html”>Dollywood</a> was closed so we could only drive by it.

lani’s friend <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0469.jpg.html”>Amy</a> lives in the remote little town of Elgin, TN, so we drove up there to crash at her place that night. again, we stayed up <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0472.jpg.html”>late</a> drinking, <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0470.jpg.html”>setting off fireworks</a>, and <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0473.jpg.html”>playing with her puppy</a>. in the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0478.jpg.html”>morning</a>, we <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0481.jpg.html”>hit the post office</a> and then the road. soon, we found ourselves <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0482.jpg.html”>crossing</a> into the Central Time Zone.

we stopped off in <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0489.jpg.html”>nashville</a> long enough to get some lunch, check out the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0487.jpg.html”>grand ole opry house</a>, and see the replica of the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0495.jpg.html”>parthanon</a> that they have for some reason.

reached memphis that night. got a room in the Graceland Days Inn (100 yards from graceland). apparently august 16th is the anniversary of elvis dying on the toilet, so memphis was overrun by <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0500.jpg.html”>fans</a> and <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0498.jpg.html”>impersonators</a>. we went <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0501.jpg.html”>downtown</a>, got some grub, and walked down to <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0505.jpg.html”>the river</a>.

friday we drove through mississippi down to new orleans. mississippi is pretty unremarkable. flat. hot, and not much to see from the highway.

new orleans is fantastic though. beautiful architecture, giant cypress trees, weird palm trees, delicious spicy seafood, and filled with old cemeteries and ghost stories. these days, the city seems to be designed around mardi gras. it is absolutely filled with hotels (most of which are empty during the off season) and touristy shops. it seems to be perfectly legal to walk down the street with a cup of beer (everyone does), and bourbon street is like one giant frat party. i think i’d rather have tabasco sauce ground into my eyeballs than go to new orleans during mardi gras, but any other time of the year it is beautiful.

on saturday, we drove around the garden district looking for the cemeteries. since we hadn’t actually been smart enough to find addresses beforehand, it took us awhile. we did eventually run across Lafayette Cemetery #1. but it had closed an hour before. there was a bookstore next door so we went in and bought a map. we also learned that Anne Rice’s house was right down the street. with the help of our new map, we were able to track down the St. Louis Cemetery #1, which is one of the more famous ones in the city and holds the tomb of Marie Leveaux, the ‘Voodoo Queen’. unfortunately, that one also closed about 20 minute before we got there.

somewhat discouraged, we decided to just take off and head for texas. taking a southern route through the bayou, we followed tropical storm erika west. before sunset, we took a small detour to go check out the gulf of mexico. picking a spot on the map at random, we ended up going through a bunch of sugar plantations to the little port of Louisa. there we found a small state park with a beach. some kids were fishing for saltwater catfish, and the sun was just <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0568.jpg.html”>starting to set</a>. the air was so humid you could drink it, but it was gorgeous.

at that point the one tragedy of the trip occurred. my camera was starting to get full, so i went back through the old pictures looking for ones to delete to make some space. somehow, i managed to hit the wrong combination of buttons when i wasn’t paying close attention and deleted every picture on the camera in one move. i’d copied pictures over to a laptop a couple nights before in memphis, but everything since then, including all my pictures of new orleans and the bayou, were gone.

we stopped driving that night just inside texas in the town of Beaumont. the next morning, we got up early and kept going west through <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0574.jpg.html”>houston</a> and san antonio. we decided that since tuck had never been to mexico and might not have another chance, we should make a side-trip down to a border town. laredo was only a couple hours off our path, so off we went. since we had the gerbils with us and weren’t sure if they would cause any problems with crossing the border, we decided to just park the car on the US side and walk across a <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0582.jpg.html”>bridge </a> over the <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0583.jpg.html”>rio grande</a> to the mexican side. it was about what you’d expect from a mexican border-town. filled with street vendors all trying to sell the same touristy crap and people coming up to us seeing if we were interested in cheap prescription drugs. we wandered the streets for a bit, bought some tequila and turned around. getting into mexico involved paying a 50 cent toll. getting back into the US involved paying a 25 cent toll and showing some id to demonstrate that we were american. the customs guy said that we needed to pay some small taxes on the booze, but the booth where we were supposed to pay was empty, so we just walked past.

had some really bad burritos in san antonio and were finally in austin at around midnight. unloaded the car, met lani’s new housemates, slept a couple hours, and tuck and i were off to the airport to come home.

the south is very hot. especially texas. texas, i felt, was pushing the limits of where human beings could actually live without air conditioning. when you turn off the air conditioning in the car during the day, you can instantly feel the temperature climbing and it reaches unbearable levels in about 10 seconds. i will never complain about new york being hot again. i will also be somewhat less skeptical about reports of spontaneous human combustion, especially if those reports come from texas.

billboards in the bible belt are funny. the pattern basically goes: Christian Gift Store, <a href=”http://thraxil.org/images/2003/08/south/imgp0465.jpg.html”>Fireworks Store</a>, Bible Factory Outlet, Adult World XXX Superstore, “God’s Way is the highway”, Casino (in louisiana at least), Gun and Knife Show, Adult video and book store, Bible Factory Outlet, Discount Cigarettes and Liquor.

Tags: south north carolina tennessee mississippi louisiana new orleans bayou texas mexico austin bible belt road trip