From New Iberia, Avery Island is just a few short miles away. Since our only purpose to come down here is to see Avery Island, we headed straight there as we got ready in the morning.
When we were still in the panhandle of Florida, we decided that, for the first time, we will try to plan a route and itinerary back to California. We knew that if we didn’t at least try to have some ideas of where to go and how long to stay, we would certainly miss my commitment of being in California for a work meeting. Our original plan to be back to California for Ava’s 6th birthday in January was missed by a more than 2,600 miles on the opposite side of the country. We love having that kind of flexibility but sometimes you just have to answer when work calls.
We wish we can stay longer here but because of the Super Bowl, this weekend is completely booked. Well, the fact that half of the campground was not open due to construction did contribute a bit to that I suppose. We talked to one of the grounds person here and he told us that 9 times out of ten, a request to dry camp there would not be a problem. We thought about it but decided to just push on. Even though we still have about a month left before we need to be back in CA, we like the idea of getting closer before slowing down.
Today the clouds dissipated and left us with pools of water once again in the low lying areas around the campground. Our stay here has been a little disappointing as many of the reasons why we liked this place last time were not quite the same. The facilities all seem a lot more run down than we remembered. Half of the campground was closed and slow internet has prevented me from getting a lot of work done.
It was a good thing we made a second trip into the city yesterday as today we woke up to rain. Actually, we have been hearing rain on the Airstream all night. We have been pretty lucky in the bad weather column of this trip in not seeing too much rain but it has finally caught up to us.
The forecast calls for some rain in our future so we decided to take the opportunity to get back into New Orleans to do some more sightseeing before it is too late. Once again, we are taking the bridge in and forgoing the Algiers Ferry. Maybe our next visit won’t land on the perfect storm of tourists in the crescent city and we will be able to get back on that boat across the Mississippi river.
Being back in New Orleans is a pretty big milestone for us. Since leaving Florida, we don’t have many plans to stay anywhere more than a couple of days. New Orleans is the only big city we planned to spend more than a couple of days at until we got back to the west coast. Once we leave Louisiana and head into Texas, there are going to be more transit days and for longer distances.
This morning we said good-bye to our ocean front Walmart parking space in Mississippi and headed west into the state of Louisiana. Our oldest kid, Ava, was super excited to finally cross into Louisiana. There are four places that she really wanted to visit during our current road trip adventure. First was to see our friend Carrie for Halloween (check!), then it was to go to Disney World (check!), then to see mermaids at Weeki Wachee (check!) and last, but not least, was to go to New Orleans… to eat beignets!
Today was a travel day. And not just any travel day. Today we are going to be in four different states. Louisiana –> Mississippi –> Alabama –> Florida.
According to the meteorologists we watched on New Orleans news last night, today has an 80% chance of thunderstorms. That might be a problem because it is our last day in New Orleans and we have things to do and places to see. Being the troopers that we are, we grabbed our umbrellas and headed out into the French Quarters one last time.
We knew rain was coming to the bayou and Dan and I embraced it. It seems like we have been on the go for far too many days. Spending our days traveling, sight-seeing and running errands. Spending our nights working and blogging. On top of tending to two kids. We needed the rain. We needed this break. Well, some of us more than others…
Before you get the feeling, let me just tell you that you are going to get a major case of the deja vous. That’s because today, we did the same thing as yesterday. The only difference is that we actually got to go inside and check out all of the places. Since we got a good lay of the land yesterday while riding around in the street cars, we knew that we could just drive into town instead of relying on public transportation. The 4 miles we walked yesterday really wore us out.
First stop, Lafayette Cemetery #1.