Mississippi Adventure, Chapter I

Wherein we arrive and eat Big Bufords and squash pennies.

We all arrived late Sunday night .in New Orleans. We dropped off our gear at this great old hotel called The Columns that looks like a movie set brothel [the movie Pretty Baby], in fact was a movie set brothel. We were starving but couldn't find anything open near our hotel in the garden district. So here we are in one of the greatest cities for eating and several of us ended up with the Big Buford Combo at Rally's. A Big Buford seems to be lard, mustard, mayo and ketchup fried, mixed in a blender and served on a substance passing for bread.Next door to Rally's was a place called Flynn's Den, a hopping place Leo found. It had a wild brass band [and a homey Father's Day Buffet]. We only stopped in. I have to admit, I was too tired to party.

The first order of business Mon. morning was sleeping in. Then Joan and I caught a Taxi to the most distant U-haul place in the county (actually in Louisiana they call counties Parishes). Our truck apparently needed maintenance so we had to wait, and wait, and wait. I wouldn't have minded so much except they kept saying it was almost done. We were trapped in this half constructed building near the railroad tracks. At one point I put a couple pennies on the rails but after the train went by, I couldn't find them. At another point, Joan was lying on the concrete floor of the U-Haul building while customers walked around her. We had our first Louisiana food at a little restaurant nearby -- Poboys and beans and rice with a big fat sausage that looked like an intestine.

[KATY: Meanwhile back at the hotel, the other four intrepid travelers try to get in a little New Orleans sight seeing without getting too far away from the hotel and the imminent arrival of Eric, Joan, and the U-haul. In our travels around the Garden District we encountered many interesting things: a little gallery with strangely painted photographs and furniture (I left the owner a Galamander business card); a man who could throw two bricks, in tandem, 15 feet to another man on a second floor; a huge suburban type drug store in which Bob and I bought supplies and tried to find some maps (This "looking for boating charts of mighty Mississippi at the Drug Town" was my first clue that we were in for an adventure.); some delicious iced coffee (According to Mark, a New Orleans specialty); some majestic old houses; and, due to Bob's diligence, a great little hole-in-the-wall lunch place called Leo's Caboose in which, Bob had the Garden District version of red beans and rice with a side of intestine and I had pork chops with a side of mash potatoes. We returned to the hotel just as Joan and Eric had finished loading the truck.]

Finally we got back to the hotel and loaded the truck without problems, even Bob was ready.We headed out with Mark and Leo in "the back of the van" with the gear but no canoes yet. [JOAN: The back of the van proved to be one hilight of the trip. We thought that the van would have continuos air from the cab to the back of the truck, like another moving truck we once rented. But it turns out, the van's cab was its own compartment, and the cargo area was totally closed off with no air supply--bad news since there was no way all six of us could fit in the cab. Mark and Leo, ever the good sports, volunteered for a first turn riding in the back. We were really worried about the air supply and lack of light, but they said they'd be fine.]The temperature outside was in the upper 90's. Inside the van I suppose it was around 120. The humidity was so high there was no need to drink fluids. You simply breathed water. Sweat clung to your skin in a hot and clammy way making you feel like a piece of fly paper. When the door was closed and latched it was pitch dark for about 15 minutes. Then you started to notice a tiny bit of light seeping through at the corners of the door. Almost total darkness and extreme heat along with lots of noise from the truck and the traffic outside provides a surreal environment. Time loses meaning. Also you feel like a dog must feel when it jumps in the car. It doesn't know how long it will be in there and there's not much it can do about it if it wants to stop. I imagine in the future people will pay for this sort of experience.[JOAN: I can't comment on the "back of the truck" experience at this point, as I was riding in the cab. However, I can attest to acknowledging a "rite of Passage" look in the eyes of those who emerged from the dark ride.]Stay tuned for Chapter II wherein we meet inmates of a Mississippi prison.

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