21 - Sunshine state
We left the Deep South on January 13th, one month before we were due to fly
home. During these last four weeks we planned to visit three more states, but
we were not concerned that this might be over ambitious. We covered two of
the states in one day.
Glorious sunshine greeted us as we unhooked the van ready to leave
New Orleans. Typical, we were going to spend the whole day on the road so
the weather was nice. Still, at least we were not going to be driving on a
massive, featureless road through massive and equally featureless
landscapes as we had done for much of the time between California and
Louisiana. The 90, although still a major road, is nothing compared to the I10
and for the first part of our drive it felt more like an English B road. We were
kept amused by the house names marking the drives for the ramshackle huts
that we passed. Empire Hilton East; Always Under Construction; The Dog
House; Do Drop In, The Passing Wind, E-Z Living and many more. Despite
being surrounded by swamp, miles from any sizable settlement, and looking
like they were just piles of driftwood, almost all of these houses had power
and satellite television. Ah, the wilderness!
We passed beyond these swamp huts and into Mississippi with the same
pomp and ceremony that had greeted us on every state boundary - i.e.
nothing. The part of the state that we were crossing, the southern most tip, is
only about 70 miles wide, as the crow flies, so perhaps state troopers see no
point patrolling the border here. After all any undesirables would have