Stopped in LA for Boudin Balls and then had a RV problem near Beaumont TX…

Our next stop on the road was near Lafayette Louisiana in the small town of Duson. We have stayed several times before at Frog City RV Park . It is a nice little Passport America park just of the interstate.  It has pull through sites, a little road noise, a small pool and a great location to try out all the boudin balls in the area.

Next to the town of Duson is a small town called Scott. Scott, Louisiana is smack  in the middle of a region in Louisiana known as Acadiana.  A lot of French influence historically in this area gave rise to the wonderful Cajun culture we so thoroughly love. Scott is a well known tasty stop off of I-10 for some of the best boudin in Louisiana.

There are four places in Scott known for their boudin balls  Boudin balls are a classic Cajun culture food staple. Made from boudin which is a pork sausage made with rice and seasoning usually stuffed into a casing. For boudin balls, they simply remove the casing, roll it into balls (about the size of a tennis ball), bread them and then deep fry them to a perfect crisp.

Healthy? No! But let’s be real healthy food will never tastes this good. We planned to try all four stops at Billy's Boudin & Cracklins, Kartchner’s Specialty Meats, The Best Stop Supermarket and Don's Specialty Meats. We managed to try three out of the four as Don’s was closing by the time we arrived and didn’t have what we wanted.

The winner for us was Kartchner’s Specialty Meats Jalapeno/cream cheese boudin ball and the runner up was Billy's Boudin & Cracklins pepperjack boudin ball. I also had to buy me some cracklings at Billy’s and had absolutely no regrets doing so. Man this was some fine, albeit unhealthy, eating. I am sure I’d be 250 lbs. if I lived near here!

We left the Acadiana part of Louisiana and stopped for one night in another site we have stayed at before in Texas just across the Louisiana border. Near the town of Vidor we stayed at another Passport America park called Boomtown RV Park.

We didn’t even unhook as we planned to leave the next morning. Well that is when things turned sour. As we were preparing to leave one jack would not come back up. I couldn’t retract it manually either since I didn’t have the right sized bit to use in my drill to retract it. We called the office for mobile RV repair guys and both of the ones I called couldn’t get to us for several days.

Not wanting to spend more time in Vidor we called the office again to ask if they had a commercial hydraulic jack and lucky for us they did. A nice young man brought it over on his golf cart and jacked up the front of our RV. Then I simply crawled under the RV and unplugged the Atwood jack. I then removed the four bolts holding it on and removed the jack from the RV.

The nice guy then dropped the RV back down and I tossed the old jack into our CRV. We even made our departure before the 11:00 am checkout time. We were so thankful that Boomtown RV Park worked with us to help get our RV mobile again. Now when we get to College Station I’ll have a longer time to solve this problem.

Hammond LA…

We left Biloxi early in the morning to miss the traffic caused by all the vintage cars at the Crusin’ the Coast rally. Before long we pulled into our next site at Hidden Oaks Family Campground in Hammond, LA.

Hidden Oaks CG is a mom and pop kind of place which hosts lots of weekend events and as such is rather large. It has over a 100 sites and lots of permanent residents living in park models with large shade shelters built over top of them. We can surely imagine this place hopping on one of those active weekend events.

We would only be in Hammond a few days so they put us on a nice gravel pull through. There is an old ox bow lake in the middle of the park and we were parked  where we could see the lake out the front windshield. Also we found some nice trails to walk inside the park including a daily morning loop alongside the little lake and down to the river on the south end of the property.

Another fun thing about the park is that there is a flock of peacocks who free roam around the park. There were about 10 of them and one all white peacock. They often foraged around the motorhome so I am pretty the locals often feed them.

The town of Hammond is smallish but it does have a small college in town and the downtown area has a fairly lively area as well. We even checked out a small brewery, Gnarly Barley, near downtown. They served some really good craft beer and while we were there they also had some nice live music. We also got a kick out of the food truck’s name, photo attached.

Not too far away from our campground there was a nice boardwalk trail out into a fresh water swamp. Sharon loves hiking boardwalk trails so we found this one and even though the hike was short it was a nice afternoon diversion. One thing we saw lots of on this walk was the pinkish eggs of the non-native Apple Snail.

At the base of nearly every Cypress tree we saw what looked like pink bubblegum stuck to the trees. But on closer inspection it was apparent that these bubblegum blobs were the snail eggs. A little search on google told us exactly what they were.

Thanks, Hammond for some good beer, nice hikes and for learning something new!

Visiting Coastal Mississippi…

We really enjoyed our short stay near Mobile Alabama but were also looking forward to our next stay on the coast of Mississippi. However we weren't even sure we would be ablet to stay at the Davis Bayou Campground because it had closed in September to repave all the loops in the park.

We were finally notified that the park would open October 1st so we were good to go. Our drive to the park was uneventful and as we pulled in we noticed the park was full even on the first day it reopened. We found out later it was because we were in Ocean Spring MS during the Crusin’ the Coast event.

This annual festival celebrates antique, classic and hot rod vehicles, nostalgic music and related events. It is the largest event in Mississippi and will have upwards to 9,000 vintage cars registered and on-site for the event. It was fun because everywhere we went we would see all kinds of older cars dating back to the 30’s.

While it was cool to see all these cars it wasn’t cool dealing with that much traffic clogging the coastal Mississippi roadways. Nonetheless we managed to find some fun. Davis Bayou Campground is located east of downtown Ocean Springs, Mississippi, and is a part of Gulf Islands National Seashore so as such we enjoyed several short hikes while visiting.

Our morning walk would take us to a salt marsh and a freshwater marsh where we would occasionally see an American Alligator. We were a little bummed when we discovered most of the hikes were closed as the boardwalks were partially destroyed due to previous storms. Why they are putting no effort into rebuilding them is anyone’s guess.

We also went over to one of the local casinos to play a little video poker. We aren’t big gamblers as we play mostly for fun on the nickel slots. While playing our nickel poker we were served free Heinekens so even though we lost a few bucks we felt we won after having some free beers!

While in Ocean Springs we also found a used bike to replace Sharon’s old beater bike that we had been using bailing wire and duct tape to keep it rolling. The last straw was when somewhere on the backroads of Alabama we somehow lost the front wheel off the bike. We don’t know if it fell off or was stolen but if it fell off we certainly hope no one was injured by it! Yikes!!!

Lastly we also celebrated our 47th wedding anniversary in Mississippi. We knew just the place to celebrate, Bozos! Bozo makes one of the best po’ boys we have ever had and we simply had to return. Sharon and I shared one of the stuffed shrimp po’ boys and a fried oyster basket. Man were we stuffed after that feast! and we toasted to the hope for many more years of wedded bliss…

A few days exploring Mobile Alabama…

Our next travel day would be to our last stop in Alabama. A three hour drive later we pulled into a new park for us, River Delta Marina & Campground. This is a County Park just north of Mobile Alabama in the small town of Creola, AL. The sites aren’t the best laid out but we sure did like the daily rate of $19.80 per night for full hook ups. Then we discovered they offer a senior discount of 10% on top of that, what a deal!

Even better is that the park has a really nice nature trail adjacent to the Tensaw River. This is also a boat marina called River Delta Marina where we saw lots of boaters heading our for a day of fishing. The Mobile River is also reachable by boat from here.

The nature trail is all on boardwalk and isn’t very long but it became a good part of our daily walks as we took in the beautiful swampy scenes, listened to the birds and were always on the look out for American Alligators, of which we saw several. The bald cypress lined river also made for great evening strolls as the sun was about to set.

The park was a great location for us to explore Mobile Alabama and we also wanted to drive over to see Daphne Alabama while here. We have driven through Mobile many times but never ventured to the downtown area. After spending some time downtown we found the city to have a nice vibe and you can tell there is a big push for development. Yet, we noticed a lot of dilapidated structures as reminders of past storms.

We learned that the USA Mardi Gras celebrations supposedly began in Mobile and not New Orleans. However, there is much heated debate about its true beginnings.. Nonetheless Mardi Gras is widely celebrated in Mobile and even in October there were remnants of past celebrations as old beads could be seen hanging in tress everywhere in the downtown area.

The architecture in the older historical parts of town also resemble the architecture seen in much of New Orleans. We really enjoyed our stroll around downtown delighting in the murals and occasional art pieces throughout town. We even found a nice spot to have a cold Alabama crafted beer at the Oyster City Brewery after our long day of exploring Mobile!.

Historical Montgomery Alabama…

Like the last time we visited Montgomery Alabama, the capital city of the State of Alabama, we took a stroll around the downtown area to once again absorb the history Montgomery is known for.

What began as a settlement of the Alabama and Coushatta Indians who lived on opposite sides of the Alabama River, Montgomery became the second largest city in Alabama as it is today. It has a storied past and in the 1860’s when the Confederate States of America were formed Montgomery was named the first capital of the nation and Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as its President. 

This historical house he and his family lived in is still standing today. Montgomery went through a lot after the Union finally came through town. Good times were had until the 1950-s and 1960’s when Montgomery became a hotbed of the civil rights movement.

What started as a seemingly innocuous event on December 1, 1955 when a young lady named Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat to a white man and was immediately arrested, became the catalyst for another well known civil rights event, the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

Also in the town of Montgomery a young charismatic man known as the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., then pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, helped organize the boycott. Shortly after, in the summer of 1956, the US District Court ruled that Montgomery's bus racial segregation was unconstitutional… and so began a legion of cultural changes to the way of life in Montgomery as well as the entire USA..

Several years later in 1965 Martin Luther King returned to Montgomery  where he and other civil rights leaders helped organize the March to Montgomery Capitol Building to petition then Governor George Wallace to allow free voter registration. This event led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (back when Congress worked!) which enforced the rights of African Americans and other minorities to vote.

On our walk to Montgomery's Capitol Building we saw historical markers of not only the events of the Confederate inauguration of Jefferson Davis, the Confederate White House he and his family lived in, the church in which they prayed but in addition a flash forward in history to the location where Rosa Parks waited for the bus, the parking lot for the gathering of the bus boycott and past the church where Martin Luther King once preached. We also learned Montgomery became the state’s capitol in 1847. We had an incredible walk through the history of Montgomery.

We ended our day at Mellow Mushroom, a regional pizza chain, where there always is a nice happy hour. After all that walking we needed a little pick me up!

Hiking in Chewacla State Park and a Visit to Auburn Alabama

As we ambled down the road another 132 miles we arrived at our next destination at Chewacla State Park near Auburn, AL. We only reserved a few days because University of Auburn had a weekend home football game and we had to leave by Thursday or pay a hugely inflated price!

Chewacla State Park is an older park in need of a little love but still nicer than most private parks. We even found an old trail that meandered through the woods which became our morning walk during our stay.

During the 1930s, the CCC built many of the features found at this park. Most notable are the beautiful stone guest cabins, the bridges, and the stunning dam designed such that it creates a nice waterfall feature departing a small lake.

Wanting to see the dam I read about we planned to hike the trail around the lake which would take us by the waterfall. Knowing that we had to cross the tail waters we were glad to know it was late in the season and thus, less water would be leaving the lake making it (hopefully) easier to cross.

The trail started out along the shoreline of the small lake but began to go deeper into the wood where. Loblolly Pine, Sweetgum and various Oaks and hickories abound. A mile or so along the trail we found the waterfalls. With less water leaving the lake they weren’t as impressive as they would be during the rainy season when more water is let out. However, the CCC creation of the dam was exquisitely designed to look as natural as possible.

We found a way a bit down stream to cross the water without getting wet and were able to continue around the lake on the trail. We crossed through a few acres of American Beech thickets and eventually came upon one of the CCC built bridges. They did amazing work back then. The 2.8 mile hike around the lake was a worthwhile endeavor and one we surely would recommend it.

Being close to Auburn we had to once again visit the University. This too made for a great urban hike to explore the campus and the thriving businesses nearby.

We also got in a nice round of disc golf near Opelika Alabama. We can usually find some nice courses in the east so we are playing as much as we can before we arrive out west where they are a bit scarcer.

Historical Macon GA and the Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park

Macon is another town we had yet to visit so we planned to spend a few nights there at the Al Sihah Shriners' RV Park. While the sites aren’t anything to write home about the park was really nice and very quiet.

We hadn’t done a lot of research on Macon so we were surprised to learn of its history. Macon was one of the few southern cities that wasn’t burned to the ground during the Civil War. As a result it has more historic structures listed on the National Register of Historic Places than any other city in Georgia. It was founded in 1823 and it is home to the oldest private university in Georgia, Mercer University, founded in 1873.

We were touring the Mercer Law School, a beautiful building modeled after Independence Hall, when we met a fellow and his kids. He began telling us all about the history of Macon and was a wealth of knowledge. Turns out he was a historian who used to live in Macon, now Atlanta, and was showing his kids the history of Macon.

He told us to make sure to see the Hay House Lovingly nicknamed "The Palace of the South," a 7-level Italian Renaissance Revival mansion built in the mid-1800s. This 18,000-square-foot mansion is four stories and is crowned by a two-story cupola. Construction began in 1855 and lasted four years.

What’s fascinating is that it had hot and cold running water, central heat, gas lighting, a speaker-tube system, in-house kitchen, and an elaborate ventilation system. All of this was done in the mid 1800’s, unheard of at that time. Imagine having running water and air conditioning in the 1800’s!

Another interesting building is the St. Joseph Catholic Church which rises 200 ft. into the air. This church is not only huge but is quite elaborate as well. There are many other fascinating historical buildings in town but I’ll leave those for you to come see for yourselves.

Another day in Macon we decided to check out the Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park. With over 17,000 years of continuous human habitation, this prehistoric American Indian site has an Earth Lodge with original floors dates to 1015.

 

There are hiking trails throughout the park and that is how we decided to tour it. The trails took us through the whole park where we were able to see all the mounds that were built between 900 and 1100. They were crafted out of dirt and clay.

The largest mound is the 55-foot-tall Great Temple Mound where the societal leaders watched over the village and out across its forested-swamp surroundings. There are several other mounds that the trail took us by. In all there are eight earthen mounds there and the remains of a ceremonial earth lodge. It was certainly a worthwhile visit.We are both more than glad we decided to visit Macon.