2ridetheworld.com : diary

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26-10-2008

Our first day in Florida!

We spent most of the day off the interstate, for the sake of our sanity and had decided to travel the Gulf coast scenic road – 98 –at least this enabled us to see some of the incredible coastal destruction that had taken place during Katrina. Even now they are still re-building roads and beach walls etc.

The one problem with this road however was that it had very slow speed limits – down to 20 or 25 in some places – and a lot of what we call ‘plastic’ towns.

We had intented to camp but we were looking for the Henderson state park when we'd talking with Thad who'd invited us to stay the night at his and his wife (Ashely) house. Yep, we've been picked up by random strangers again.

We had a good night – stayed up ridiculously late watching a new series that Thad a recorded about 6 episodes…A new show called "True Blood' . Carzily we ended up watching them all, whilst drinking wine. Oh dear – it wont be an early start tomorrow!

27-10-2008

Lisa writes:

Rode down to the KOA arrived late.

We had another long day – we'd left Thad and Ashleys late – very late!! But still wanted to do a reasonable distance today. Some of the beaches looked great – the sand was just so white! But there was still a bit too much ‘plastic’ for out liking. We used part of the coastal route and then dropped off onto the 90, approaching New Orleans, across Fort Pike area. This is where many of the houses were hit by Katrina – there were still remnents of buildings, boats in bushes, piles of windowns and broken bits still in heaps.

The building still recognisable looked like theyve simply been squashed flat by a huge hand! A lot of rebuilding was going on but we were still surprised by the amount of rumble and remain still around considering it happened in 2005.

So we ended up riding the 90 into New Orleans in the dark…..and hitting the interstate 10 in the dark and at the worst time – so much for planning!

God there are some real idiots behind the wheel here, seemngly more than normal but perhaps we're just tired? We had people pulling straight out infront of us – into the sides of us – just not looking – how the hell can they not see us, with our huge lights and luminous strips etc!!! The bike horns got a lot of use and so did a fair share of our collective explietives!

We eventually reached the KOA, (at GPS: N29 58.270 W90 14.035) of course the office was closed. We managed to find a spot and greatfully put up the tent and huddled up in our sleeping bags – it was a very cold night!

I love my sleeping bag and tent!

28-10-2008

So here we are casually meandering around oll' New Orleans, 'as ya do', for another day taking photos.

We wanted to explore New Orleans for years, it's one of these city of modern legend. Inside the USA but seemingly more like another country, distinct and seperate.

We spent the vast majority of thel day in the French Quarter. I didn’t know that this part of town was named in honour of the Regent of France, Louis Phillipe duc d’Orleans. We'd ridden in on the 1100GS via the small back roads, taking River road and then into the Garden district – WOW! Vast white painted mansions sit back from the wide beulavards, each semi hidden behind viels of drapping moss, hanging from vast ancient sized trees.

Most of the homes decked out with all manner of Halloween regalia– there is definately an edgier harder side to New Orleans behind the prety candy floos frenshflavoured surface. Pumpkinds, skeletons, ghouls, spider, hang from every pole and fence!

We parked up close to the Hard Rock café having been given the OK by the security guard. The famous Café du Monde was our first port of call, neither of us had had breakfast (Café du Monde info here)– Café du Monde is open 24-hours and has become an institution, open continusely since 1860. The place is famous for it's cafe au lait's and beignets, square pieces of dough, fried and covered with powdered sugar. Always served in orders of three. We sat back, ordered and tucked in, well when in Rome. Besides it gave us a chance to site back and watch New Orlans life stroll by.

With a quick check of our city map for directions we headed into the main area – past St Louis Cathedral –a small and somewhat stark looking building, the General Andrew Jackson statue, cutting an elegant silhoultte against the bright morning sky.

Time simply drifted by as we wandered many of New Orlans 'must see' strrets, Royal street, Bourbon Street, Pirates alley, Court of Two Sisters, Lafitte’s Blacksmith shop and so on. The unmistakeable waft of cajun cooking around each corner. Toursist spill onto the streets from basement style low lit bars, even in the day-time.

We'd left it late to eat and by ealry afernoon were starving, the constant smell of food that scents the air hadn't helped. The 'Gumbo' restaraunt looked like a good bet, and made the decision of what we were going to eat a little easier...two bowls of Gumbo please. Ten minutes after sitting and we're tucking into two steaming bolws of brown Gumbo, one chicken and one shrimp. Dad you'd have loved it.

Lisa writes:

Carreid on walking till it got dark – as I really wanted to hear some music – we had to listen to jazz in New Orleans! So we decided to go into Pat O’Briens bar – this has been around since prohibition days. After having the Hurricane drink – the Pat O’Briens ‘famous’ drink – we wanted to go to the Preservation Hall but they were charing a $10 cover pp – so we went and found another bar – no cover charge - and sat and listend to some traditional jazz before making our way back to the bike.
We got into the campsite afte - 12.
Cold night.

29-10-2008

Lisa writes:

Meandered around New Orleans for another day taking photos
So – back in the same way along the Mississippi river – which I accidently called a lake the other day!??? Not sure where my brain was when I called it that……..

Simon wanted to go back to a few of the places we went yesterday in order to get some better photos – some of these buildings are beautiful – their wrought iron and cast iron lace balconies.
We finally went to the other areas that we missed seeing yesterday and found a great seafood bar where we had more gumbo and bisque.

We ended up getting back to the tent at dusk and just crashing out – we logged onto hulu.com and watched some progs/ - it was great!

30-10-2008

Lisa writes:

Made a move from the KOA late and rode to Lake Charles 150 to the East of Houston
Decided that we would take minor roads and stay off the interstate – we have really had enough of the bad driving. Erratic, obilivous, thoughtless, aggressive.
So we took the 90 west – got stuck in a traffic jam due to a vans axel crashing – then headed towards Houma where the hurricane Gustav hit just recently.

We rode by massive trees that had just cracked in half whilst others were flattend and still lying on the ground just like they’d been combed down with a big brush!!

Signposts were still lying on their sides and when we passed over bridges, looking down the rivers loads of trees were just lying flat across the water. Lots of clearing up was still going on at the side of the roads – clearing all of the downed trees. We didn’t go into Houma town but carried on bypassing it on the 90.

Once we reached New Iberia we took route 14 across to Lake Charles – it was nice to be off the busy interstates. This road was sooooo straight though – reached Lake Charles in good time and used a motel voucher – had problems finding the motel though – up and down, and around!!

31-10 to 01-11-2008

Not much to write as we've basically spent the last to days cutting across country on the US 59, making southerly progress down towards Nuevo Laredo, one of the smaller border towns with Mexico, where we've decided to cross.

We'll be in Victoria tomorow.

02-11-2008

The idea of divine intervention, fate or a guardian angel isn’t just a cozy idea we fall back occasionally, it’s a belief that is becoming all the more real each day.

We’d spent most of the day planted to the seemingly endless US 59. Our plan, simple ride as far as we can.

OK, so back to the guardian angel. I’ve mentioned it countless times before, just how bizarrely‘lucky’ we’ve been over the last 5-years. Miracle solutions to odd breakdowns in the Sahara to beating the odds and surviving a broken neck for 3-weeks, whilst my c7 vertebrae presses on my spinal cord in the Amazon.

…and today was another example of our guardian angel at work. We’d pulled up and checked into yet another roadside motel. I’d been suffering from what I’d thought was a sty in my left eye. It had been feeling better until 10 minutes before check in when I’d had to pull over from the pain.

As I parked the bikes a young couple had pulled up behind and eagerly started a conversation around our journey. My eye was feeling worse and interrupting my ability to chat. Noticing my dilemma Autumn (her name) mentions off hand that she’s an Ophthalmic Doctor, she’s on call and her surgery is two blocks down the road.

Some 20 minutes later we’re in the surgery and she’s pulling a shard of plastic from my eyelid that had become embedded. The shard has already scratched my cornea and left untreated would have become infected. Had this have played out in Mexico we’d have had real problems.

Autumn and her companion had only pulled over to chat about the bikes – having seen our bikes from the road and intentionally pulled off - but c’mon…what are the chances. A perfect solution to a problem that I didn’t even know I had, come together just prior to the whole situation going downhill in a big way.

We’ll head down to the border tomorrow.

03-11-2008

Victoria to Laredo. Stopped in at a La Quinta Inn and ate at Denny’s.