3rd -9th Nov
We left New Orleans on another lovely sunny morning, sailing above the swamps on more of the elevated highways. Water is never very far away in the flatlands of Louisiana. It looks pretty, but something to be admired from a distance. Too many alligators, water moccasins (snakes) and mosquitos for my liking.
Lunchtime coincided with our tourist activity of the day which was to stop off at Avery Island. Avery Island is one of the few elevated areas in this neck of the woods being essentially a dome of salt linked to the mainland by a short causeway, and it is home to the world famous Tabasco sauce. All the sauce is still made here, to the original recipe, with peppers descended from the original seed stock and the company is still run by the same family. I love that. The factory complex was in some beautiful red brick buildings surrounded by gardens and the air was filled with the unmistakeable aroma of hot sauce. Having had a perfect, mildly spicy lunch sat on the veranda of the very pleasant restaurant we did the self guided tour around the visitor area of the complex. It was charming. Chilli sauce and other interesting herbs and spices are so common nowadays, but I remember Tabasco from my youth in the UK: the most exotic ingredient in the cupboard. The Queen likes it too, from the looks of things.
Our next two nights had us in a small wooded site just on the outskirts of a small town called Abbeville. This is known (mostly) for its annual omelette festival when the town has a weekend of fun, music, food and drinking, capped off by twenty or so exalted chefs creating a 5000 egg omelette in a 12ft diameter skillet over a log fire in the middle of main street and serving it out to the assembled crowds.
This is a custom imported from France, from which this area takes huge influence. By sheer coincidence our visit coincided with the weekend of the 34th incarnation of this celebration. We arrived in still blazing sunshine on the Saturday and opted to stay in camp and enjoy the peace and quiet. We broke out the camp chairs, the BBQ and were entertained by the squirrels. Overnight the weather broke and the heavens opened. The campsite became a bayou and we sat inside awaiting news of ommelette cancellation on the Facebook page. Nope. The show was to go on. Happily the forecast was correct, the rain stopped and the town came out to play again. We cycled into town to observe the battiness. We had beers whilst we marvelled at the scale of the task and I bought a commemorative fried egg necklace.
The omelette was more like a parsley frittata, but very edible. Abbeville was a sweet little town; I wonder what happens here on non-omelette days?
After Abbeville we slipped south towards the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. We were to see our 3rd coast of the USA, the southern one. (We saw west and east coasts last year, but I don’t think that we can count the Upper Peninsula Michigan on the shore of Lake Superior as a northern coast. Northern Alaska may be the tick in that box) This land is very flat, created by the sediment washing down from the Mississippi. The road was very straight, quiet and for the most part was set back from the sea by huge tracts of marsh land. Every now and then we passed through a small settlement with a beach, or access to the sea via a channel. These seemed to mainly be holiday houses with some permanent homes, but generally the place was deserted as it is now out of season. Despite the heat and humidity this area is busiest in the summer months when the hoards descend. The other thing that has completely defined and reshaped the human habitation of this coastline is the storm damage it has suffered over the past decade or two, and the constant threat of future events. There really is nothing for miles to protect from storm surges. Those ‘homes’ are now mostly comprised of large semi-permanent RVs, the original cottages and houses having been turned to matchsticks in 2005 by hurricane Rita, and again in 2009 by Ike. There have been multiple hurricanes of note, but these are the two that the locals talk about. Some people have rebuilt their houses, high up on sturdy poles to satisfy new stringent building regulations, but the RV is king. Cheaper to buy than building a home, quick to move in and, more importantly, removable if the weather forecast is looking particularly dicey. To be honest. I think that a lot of people couldn’t afford to rebuild. In a small town called Cameron (small town, but biggest local conurbation)we had a very satisfactory lunch stop at a roadside establishment called Anchors Up Grill. We shared a cheesy spicy bacon and fat shrimp po’boy sandwich and crinkle-cut fries. The words ‘died’ and ‘heaven’ spring to mind…
For the princely sum of $1 a small vehicle ferry took us from Cameron across a small shipping canal so we could continue west along the coast. Our next stop was just for one night at a beachside village called Holly Beach.
This was a veritable ghost town with only a few permanent residents. It was completely flattened by Rita in 2005 and it now is a town on stilts.
After the rain the heat and humidity had returned and the mosquitos were like rabid bats. After total body applications of toxic levels of DEET we grabbed some beers and scurried through the clouds of the suckers to the beach for sunset, which was amazing. The distant oil rigs were a small taste of how the landscape would change as we travelled further west into Texas.
The next day, after another hour or so of travelling along the straight flat coastal road, we left Louisiana by means of a long bridge over another shipping canal and entered Texas. Fossil fuels and their conversion into useable substances are the heartbeat of this part of Texas. There are oil rigs, oil pipelines, LPG pipelines, tankers and refineries all around. Strangely handsome and impressive plants line the roads and canals.
There is work and money here. This oil and gas help fuel the USA’s huge appetite for energy. It makes you realise that changing attitudes and habits to consumption, and the development of renewable alternatives in this part of the world is a humungous task. I try not to feel too hopeless about the future of the planet. Anyway, we continued our journey in our 8.1L V8 petrol vehicle, long since resigned to our 9 mpg mileage, and wended our way along the Bolivar Peninsula to our second ferry crossing of this trip. Here the 20min crossing, costing an even more outrageous sum of $0, took us across the 7th busiest shipping lane in the world to Galveston Island. Despite the traffic there are a couple of pods of dolphins that live in this channel and we were treated to a fine display. Double win!
Galveston Island is home to Galveston, a beachside town with 3 piers, a long prom and the usual serving of hotels, restaurants, bars, fast food joints and urban/suburban delights. It boasts a historic district which we didn’t quite get to and the greatest mini-golf course that we definitely did visit.
Our two nights here were at a beachside camp with a view of the sea from our back window. It was still very hot, 100% humidity and a constant onshore breeze. It was a very pleasant 10 minute cycle down the wide promenade to the nearest pier upon which was situated a restaurant with a sundowner deck.
That was a very agreeable place to spend our first evening. The next day we found the mini-golf and played both courses. It was a fabulously gimmicky and we won a game each, with exactly level scores over the 36 holes. Still level pegging in the Hampson Trans America Mini Golf Challenge. After a brief shopping trip by bicycle for necessities (drawing the usual perplexed looks from the car-bound) we beetled home in the shadow of a large dark cloud that was threatening to unload. It didn’t and we spent the afternoon faffing about before we were treated to another fabulous sunset from camp.
The next day we were on the road relatively early (for us) at 9.30am in order to get to the days entertainment: the Houston Space Centre. We left the island by way of a highway and bridge and headed north. The Space Centre was only about 40 mins away and although we arrived only 10 minutes after it opened it was already getting busy with school groups. The enormity of the carpark indicated how popular this can get as a destination. There are a couple of training jets on poles at the gate, and as you pull up to the main visitor centre building you just can’t miss the life-sized mock-up of a space shuttle piggy-backing the actual transport 747 that used to ferry them about. Pretty amazing.
We started our visit with a tram ride around the Space Centre complex. This took us to the Mission Control building where we were able to see into the training room.
This is set up exactly like the room that flies the International Space Station, but uses simulation to train the operators. It is apparently so life-like that the real operators can’t tell the difference. Next was the building where they build mock-ups of the capsules, vehicles and equipment etc to train the astronauts. There were robots and stuff too.
A big boys (and girls) toys dream world. Finally there were a few old rockets to see and most impressively, a shed containing a real-life Saturn V which was massive. Photo does not do the size of it justice.
Back at the centre we went through the shuttle (surprisingly small) and the 747, and some of the shuttle and moon landing exhibits. We left before the school children numbers reached critical and thrashed through the traffic laden mega highways of the Houston southern ring road before rush hour even considered starting. By the time we arrived at our roost for the night in Katy we were definitely frazzled. This is the worst side of American road tripping, the overwhelming concrete monsters of highways and the stupid driving that often accompanies them.
Katy is really just an extension of the Houston metro area. This was a single night stay to put us within easy striking distance of a significant destination, College Station. Home of Texas A&M University and the location of our first and likely only college football game.
Bring on the fun!