Day 29 - New Orleans, LA to Mobile, AL

Today turned out to be just the kind of day we love. We got a really early start and rolled out of the New Orleans KOA camp at 8:00 a.m. That may be something of a record for us. Then, not wanting to wait for the GPS to guide me back to Interstate 10, I tried retracing the course I remembered from two days before while Concetta programmed the little device for backup. By the time the GPS was on line, I was approaching the I10 East on-ramp.

Then it was merely sit back, plug in a new novel on disk, and cruise over to Alabama for the night. We really didn't know where we were going to stay for sure, but I had Concetta just choose an address in Mobile and once we were sure we were headed correctly, we turned off the GPS and just rolled.

At least until I happened to see one of those brown point-of-interest signs for something called "Beauvoir," which sounded interesting. Beauvoir was the home of Conferate States President, Jefferson Davis, the brown sign went on to explain, and as I was just then cruising up to the appropriate off-ramp, I gave the wheel a little nudge and soon we were wandering the streets of Biloxi, Mississippi, looking for more of the brown signs.

Thank you Mississippi for doing a great job on this particular point of interest, for soon, almost too easily, we were pulling up to the Beauvoir gate and parking in the shade of a decades-old tree.

I glanced at the sky. Contrary to what we'd mostly been experiencing, the sun was out in all it's glory. So I loaded up with both cameras and we set off for the entrance. Stopping at the ticket office, we paid our senior citizen fee, got a blue wrist band to identify us as "friendlies," and headed to the front of the property where, the cashier told us, a tour would be starting at 11:00 a.m., or in just about five minutes.

Well, evidently no one told the 11:00 a.m. tour guide, I guess, because it was over thirty minutes before this jolly chap appeared with the announcement that he was the 11:30 tour guide. Oh, well, we really didn't complain about his lateness. Beauvoir comes complete with a veranda the size of New Hampshire and at least a dozen sturdy rocking chairs for patrons who'd like to just sit and stare out at the gulf of Mexico in their spare time. I can tell you that you couldn't find a better place to just sit and rock your afternoons away as the cool breezes off the gulf kept the humidity at bay.

Anyway, we had a great time listening to our guide tell the assembled group tales of the Southern Confederacy, Jeff Davis and his family, and, most interestingly, tales of the 4.1 million dollars worth of damage that hurricane Katrina did to the property. Even though the house sits a good sixteen feet above the level of the gulf waters, the hurricane flooded the beach to a depth of seventeen feet. The property had its priceless antiques sitting in a foot of water for over eight hours. Just heart breaking. The docent group had to have almost everything in the house restored, from paint and wallpapers, to antique floors and furniture. Terrible story.

After our tour, we retreated to the motor home and had lunch with the gulf of Mexico and the lovey museum grounds as our foreground. Then, we retraced our steps to the main museum building (photo right) and spent the next 45 minutes watching movies on Jefferson Davis. I've always wondered if I went back far enough if I'd find some common ancestor. His branch of the Davis clan supposedly came to America way back in the 1600s or so. Mine, not until 1873. Still, both Davis families came from Wales. It's possible.

Neither Concetta nor I had ever really studied Jeff Davis before. Though his career in the military didn't get off to a good start (he graduated in the bottom third of his West Point Class), he distinguished himself handsomely during the Mexican War. After that he went on to serve in Congress for the state of Mississippi. He was an staunch advocate for states' rights and when the Civil War broke out, he was a logical choice for President. Later, when the war ended, he was the sole Confederate who did not have their citizenship reinstated by the U.S. government. He even had to spend two years incarcerated. Sad story.

After the movie we toured the library, the gardens, and finally the cemetery. For quite a few years the grounds of Beauvoir hosted a number of structures built to house Confederate veterans. In subsequent years most of those guys were buried, often along with their wives and other family members, in the small cemetery on the property. Here also is a brand new monument for the grave of the Confederate unknown soldier (photo left). Very nice.

After leaving the Beauvoir, we drove another couple of hours and ended up at Payne's RV Park about four miles west of Mobile, Alabama. The WiFi here is, well, you might as well say there is no WiFi here. But my uplink device is working pretty good, which has allowed me to work on the blog. At this park we used our "Passport America" for the first time. The card, which we bought way back in Vadalia, Louisiana, just across the Mississippi River from Natchez, Mississippi, gets you great deals on RV park entrance fees. We had heard about the pass, but thought we'd probably have to wait to buy one on our next vacation as we figured we'd have to have the pass sent to us at home. Not so, the RV park folks in Vadalia told us, they'd be happy to sell us the membership on the spot and give us a temporary pass. Whoopie!

The great thing about Passport America is that the pass lets you pay half price at many RV parks. Not every park participates, KOA certainly doesn't. But that's why you carry a variety of membership cards. Now we have the three: Passport America, KOA, and the Good Sam card. At least one of them is almost always useful.

So, tomorrow we're headed east toward Florida, although chances are good that Mobile will grab or attention for some Fort or Museum or archaeology exhibit. We're not sure where we're destined to land tomorrow night, but with any kind of luck maybe the sun will shine and I'll be able to take photos and show you. This part of the country is so achingly beautiful that it just breaks my heart when the sun doesn't shine and present the landscape in all its southern glory.

But for now, I bid you adieu. My book on the Indians of the southwest is calling me.