Saturday, November 10, 2018
Like a kid on Christmas Eve, I had big troubles getting to sleep the night before. Too excited! Mostly good excited like the Santa expecting child example but also bad excited...worrying about costs, worrying about forgetting something, afraid of not having a good time due to my social anxiety issues, etc. I got maybe four hours sleep. And fitful at that.
Got up at 5:00 am, made coffee, took meds, SSS, you know. Had a single granola bar with my black coffee. Did my final sweep of the apartment and good thing too...I almost forgot the map I made with the directions from the house to I-75. The route Ric took back when we went to Georgia was long and I knew there was a better way. Sure enough, Siri plotted a route that shaved an hour off Ric's. Used nice, wide highways all the way. Tolls, yes, but time and efficiency was the plan, not piddling costs. Believe me, the 6 bucks or so in tolls pale in comparison to other expenses that will go down this week, I'm sure.
Pulled out of the complex at 6:05 am to start what would be a 13-hour trek to New Orleans (including stops). I basically spent the entire daylight day on the road.
Long, and as predicted, quite boring but no problems with the car or even other drivers. Yes, once in New Orleans proper, the usual city drivers weaving recklessly to and fro, but nothing too cray cray.
Some interesting events along the way to make note of here though:
When I decided to stop for a more substantial breakfast and a top off of gas, it was around 10:30 am and I was in BFE well east of Tallahassee and was shocked when I got out of the car. It was freezing! Well, actually, the temp was in the mid 60's but compared to the upper 70's of back home, quite surprising since this was still Florida but not MY Florida for sure.
On the stretch of I-10 between Tallahassee and Pensacola there was mile after mile of massive damage and debris still evident from Hurricane Michael's wrath. That storm made landfall exactly one month ago today. All along the highway there were swaths of felled trees, some extremely huge ones with their entire root system exposed, huge metal road signs lay in twisted heaps in places, some billboards smashed to pieces. And this road is some 30 miles away from the shore where places like Mexico Beach were flattened. Incredible. Here's a couple pics kinda showing some of the debris that I found. I didn't take any pics myself, but I might if, as I think it will, it's still there next week as I drive home.
Just east of Pensacola I stopped for lunch at a Whataburger. I thought I'd never been to one before but just now I remembered that I think I did. Back in 2001 during my Sears business trip to Arizona. I saw this place just the night before checking out some YouTube videos of these frequent cruisers and one of their trips on this same road. Unlike the reaction they had in their vlog, I didn't like my burger much. Too much bread, the meat patty was bland and McDonald's tasting (not good) and the smear of mustard was kinda gross.
I detoured slightly to the beach side casinos at Biloxi, Mississippi. At Harrah's (pictured below) I played $20 at one of those fancy video slot machines and even though I won extra games and a bonus play, I still lost everything except 35 cents within 15 minutes or so. Next I saddled up to a Draw Poker Jacks or Better machine and, after a sweet quad aces won back just over $16 over the $20 I put in. This made my loss for the day only $3.65. Figuring it was as good as it gets, I quickly made my way out of the casino, back to my car and drove back to I-10 to continue my travels.
Once I entered New Orleans just after sunset, I decided to make a quick detour to check out the ol' hood in Gentilly and the little blue house on Spain St.
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| 2007 |
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| 2014 |
Though it had been gutted due to Katrina, it's back to looking very much like it did 14 years ago. The above Streetview pics show its transformation. Looks even better now from what I could see. Those trees are full grown for one thing. No garage though. It looks like the neighbors may have bought part of the left side of the property from Albert since it looks like their house got expanded. Oh, and the roads here were really warped and pot-holed. Like really severely. Not sure if that was due to Katrina as well since back in the day, having no car then, I never drove here before.
Finally after a harrowing white-knuckled ride through the twisted and super-clogged highways of New Orleans (and the scary-high Crescent City Bridge), I arrived at the hotel around 7:00 pm. I nonchalantly asked the friendly desk clerk about the Park and Cruise feature this hotel normally runs and she affirmed it was running and I was eligible. I filled out a form and will be keeping my car here, saving the $140 in parking it would have cost my to park at the port. I didn't mention the guy on the phone when I called a couple weeks ago who said there was no Park and Cruise this week due to "an event." Yeah, the "event" was he wanted to get me quickly off the phone so he could go back to his nap. So cool, I'll order an Uber tomorrow and since it's my first Uber order, should get some discount as well.
This post is live because of the free hotel wifi but since the cruise ship wifi is not free, I won't post again until next week when I return. Nevertheless, I'll keep drafts on this laptop I'm using (the much neglected Omen) for a full day-by-day account.
BTW, check out this free hotel room...Not bad for a Comfort Inn!
