Day Six - John Parr
After yesterday night's activities not finishing until 5:30 this morning and a requirement to check out of the hotel by 11:00 limiting the opportunity to sleep I expected today to be a hard and tiring slog. After all our strategy for beating tiredness the last few days has mainly involved drinking as much beer as possible, fine on a night out but not recommended for seeing one through a 500 mile drive. Actually it has not been terrible and I even managed a disco nap whilst Alistair was driving.
The first task of today was to swap our rental car after the first one had a problem with its windscreen, specifically what started the trip as a small chip had become a massive crack. Sadly Hertz were only able to give us another white Nissan Rogue which is equally as rubbish as its predecessor, albeit with a complete 'screen.
With that out of the way we were able to hit the road. Within two miles of the airport we hit our first technical hitch, specifically you can't pair your 'phone with the car whilst it is moving so we had no option but to sing Eastbound and Down (from Smokey and the Bandit) which got tiring after the first hundred miles or so. During our breakfast stop this was fixed so we could listen to the version by Jerry 'the snowman' reed which some people might think is better.
Navigation was fairly easy thanks to the free map supplied by the rental car company, this worked perfectly until we ran out of map at the edge of Texas. Luckily it is the same road (i10) from Austin to New Orleans so we muddled through apart from a diversion through Houston where we got a bit lost.
Following on from Houston the drive took us through Beaumont Texas. Beaumont used to be called 'smalltown' but the citizens loved the programme Question of Sport so much they held a referendum and decided to rename the town after the perennial team captain Bill Beaumont. It is also famous as the setting for the film Footloose. Luckily these days music is allowed which was noted by listing to Kenny Loggins (dangerzone) and St Elmo's Fire, the latter because it is a great roadtrip song albeit irrelevant to Beaumont.
Americans seem to love a shiny tanker truck which gives a good photo opportunity, I am still working on perfecting the art but this is one of the truck selfies taken today:
Getting a decent truck selfie requires driver and passenger / photographer to work in concert to position the car correctly and match the speed of the truck. That is probably why this one is a bit ropy.
Moving on from Houston and into Louisiana the highway takes an interesting turn, for many tens of miles it runs over a swamp that looks similar to the swamp where Kermit the Frog lives. There were some truly stunning views over the swamp which made it annoying that there was no where to stop and take decent pictures, so these will have to do:
Arrival in New Orleans was at around 20:00 only to find I had made a small mistake in booking the hotel. Tradition has it that on these trips we only stay in sh*tholes but this evenings hotel is really rather nice and located right on Bourbon street. Not what was expected of me and I am truly sorry / not sorry.
Given the long day's driving and previous days lack of sleep I got ready to go out as quickly as possible, even a five minute sit down could have resulted in an 18 hour snooze. Dinner was taken on a balcony overlooking Bourbon Street, it was great I had Macaroni cheese made of about 3lbs of cheese, I may not need to eat until Friday at the earliest. We also had quite a few cocktails to see if the old drinking to stay away trick would work (it didn't.)
The next venue was one that I have some history with. In 1996 I spent part of the summer backpacking round the USA, I had joked that the venue in which I did my first ever Karaoke performance would still be there 21 years later. It was. Given the excesses of the weekend my body is gradually shutting down including my throat which is in some pain but I had to do a quick song. It was terrible, even by my standards. And it hurt. Still it brought back many happy memories of my previous visit, if only I could travel back and give 20 year old me some of the knowledge I now have he would still be none the wiser about anything.
Given the drinking trick hadn't worked it was no surprise that the next 'failsafe' of going to a duelling piano bar also failed although somewhat amazingly I stayed out until 23:00 before calling uncle on the evening.
Tomorrow we are going to find the Fillet O'Sole restaurant from Live and Let Die then drive to Graceland, Graceland, Memphis Tennessee........
Why not follow me on TWITTER after all my favourite pork scratching manufacturer are a fan:
The first task of today was to swap our rental car after the first one had a problem with its windscreen, specifically what started the trip as a small chip had become a massive crack. Sadly Hertz were only able to give us another white Nissan Rogue which is equally as rubbish as its predecessor, albeit with a complete 'screen.
 |
| Nissan Rogue - in recession white |
With that out of the way we were able to hit the road. Within two miles of the airport we hit our first technical hitch, specifically you can't pair your 'phone with the car whilst it is moving so we had no option but to sing Eastbound and Down (from Smokey and the Bandit) which got tiring after the first hundred miles or so. During our breakfast stop this was fixed so we could listen to the version by Jerry 'the snowman' reed which some people might think is better.
Navigation was fairly easy thanks to the free map supplied by the rental car company, this worked perfectly until we ran out of map at the edge of Texas. Luckily it is the same road (i10) from Austin to New Orleans so we muddled through apart from a diversion through Houston where we got a bit lost.
 |
| Downtown Houston - view from a lost car |
Following on from Houston the drive took us through Beaumont Texas. Beaumont used to be called 'smalltown' but the citizens loved the programme Question of Sport so much they held a referendum and decided to rename the town after the perennial team captain Bill Beaumont. It is also famous as the setting for the film Footloose. Luckily these days music is allowed which was noted by listing to Kenny Loggins (dangerzone) and St Elmo's Fire, the latter because it is a great roadtrip song albeit irrelevant to Beaumont.
Americans seem to love a shiny tanker truck which gives a good photo opportunity, I am still working on perfecting the art but this is one of the truck selfies taken today:
Getting a decent truck selfie requires driver and passenger / photographer to work in concert to position the car correctly and match the speed of the truck. That is probably why this one is a bit ropy.
Moving on from Houston and into Louisiana the highway takes an interesting turn, for many tens of miles it runs over a swamp that looks similar to the swamp where Kermit the Frog lives. There were some truly stunning views over the swamp which made it annoying that there was no where to stop and take decent pictures, so these will have to do:
Arrival in New Orleans was at around 20:00 only to find I had made a small mistake in booking the hotel. Tradition has it that on these trips we only stay in sh*tholes but this evenings hotel is really rather nice and located right on Bourbon street. Not what was expected of me and I am truly sorry / not sorry.
 |
| Four Points - New Orleans 'handy for the bar' |
The next venue was one that I have some history with. In 1996 I spent part of the summer backpacking round the USA, I had joked that the venue in which I did my first ever Karaoke performance would still be there 21 years later. It was. Given the excesses of the weekend my body is gradually shutting down including my throat which is in some pain but I had to do a quick song. It was terrible, even by my standards. And it hurt. Still it brought back many happy memories of my previous visit, if only I could travel back and give 20 year old me some of the knowledge I now have he would still be none the wiser about anything.
Given the drinking trick hadn't worked it was no surprise that the next 'failsafe' of going to a duelling piano bar also failed although somewhat amazingly I stayed out until 23:00 before calling uncle on the evening.
Tomorrow we are going to find the Fillet O'Sole restaurant from Live and Let Die then drive to Graceland, Graceland, Memphis Tennessee........
Why not follow me on TWITTER after all my favourite pork scratching manufacturer are a fan:
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