We Don't Have All The Time In The World - Leaving NOLA. Days 10-11

Blog Day 10:

You get out what you put in. I didn't put much in the way of sleep or food last night and was about to reap the whirlwind. Today was the start of a three day push to get to the Mississippi. Now we probably could have gotten further than that in three days, but I had sorted out a couple of things that would be fun to do on day 3 and despite the nagging feeling that I wasn't going to get to go to the Blue Bayou Water Park (I have had a bad run with missing out on water parks. It make me sad.), I stuck to the plan. The weather for the three days was as per usual. 33C/92F (RealFeel Hotter than Hades) and humid but seeing as I can't do much about it, we just have to deal with it. Get with the program. About three miles in, the program got me. I recognised the feeling: complete loss of energy, feeling of dread, pins and needles in the fingers… I don't know exactly what it is, maybe a bout of hypoglycaemia, who knows, but usually this has happened midway or at the end of marathons, not this early! A distress call was put into the USS Enterprise, but as Nads is concerned about the rate we're getting through our internet data, she didn't have her messaging systems online. I walked with my water for a bit and chatted to some people at the side of the road who were also fundraising for the Young Marines and started to run again as I felt a bit of a fraud walking in front of them after telling them about my journey. Fortunately my boiler seemed to have switched from pilot light to at least half power and I was able to finish the 9 mile start leg.

The remainder of the day was fairly samey scenery, down Highway 61, but punctuated with stretches alongside bayous and sugar cane fields. What has struck me so far is wherever you are, whether in the Alabama bayou, the Biloxi beachfront, or the Louisiana highway system is the number and size of the insect life. Huge numbers of butterflies (Swallowtails, Eastern Tigers, Monarchs etc etc) and dragonflies, some of which as pretty huge, as if they came from a land where time forgot and I cringe every time I see them dart across the road, but usually they seem to get away with it and I can get back to stressing about my blisters. Unfortunately a lot of creatures don't seem to be so lucky and while it was a bit of a novelty seeing unusual roadkill to start with, it really bums me out now. Raccoons, armadillos, possums, snakes, 'gators and even an otter today. I try no to think about their last moments, as it just makes me really upset. Now I've only gone and bloody written about it and it's done it again. Especially that otter. I wonder if there if there is any sort of plan to build wildlife crossings, like those pioneered in the Netherlands? Probably not, I fear as while the US loves its outdoor lifestyle, there are a lot of people who don't seem to give much though to it as the littering on the highways is absolutely shocking. I was reminded of the episode of the Simpsons where Bette Midler was doing her bit litter picking and blew up a littering driver's truck with an incendiary discarded Duff can. Now I'm not personally advocating this...but actually... yes, I am. Go Midler. In the course of the day I managed to rescue a butterfly, crawfish and an eastern lubber grasshopper, so I feel I did my bit and the urge to turn right and go into Louis Armstrong Airport was averted.

Start: South Metairie. Finish: Reserve Truck and Casino: 29.43 miles

Now I'm finding out that truck stops are very variable in the ability to get a good sleep. This one, fortunately was pretty big, parking area wise and we hid ourselves away from the scary big rigs, often with their generators on overnight to keep someone's apple pies fresh, but the traffic noise still was a bit of a killer. I need to get some decent ear lugs. I think I'm getting pretty poor sleep as my mind is always racing at night. I know you shouldn't be on a screen late at night, but it's usually the only chance I get to do updates, then I'm worrying about things like: “Is my knee really sore?” “Will we be able to continue after Santa Monica” and so the cycle continues. I woke up however feeling great and had a good running start and when I met up with Nads mid-morning, I had the pleasure of chatting to Khadevis Robinson, two time Olympian (800m in 2004 and 2012) and now assistant head coach at LSU (Lousiana State University) in Baton Rouge. He's pretty inspirational, even down the phone and the rest of the day just seemed to flow well after that and after a brief stop to muck about on some treadmills at Gold's Gym in Prairieville and steal their cool, cool, aircon. I was in great spirits at the end and craving food, which recently, is a novelty. Seeing as I aim to try all of the fast food chains I see, as I've got a cracking excuse, I delved into Raising Cain's Chicken Fingers, named after the owner's Labrador. Cute. I didn't see the connection, but I'm sure he'd eat them. Not that's saying anything, but I can confirm that they were tasty to a more discerning palate. We headed into Baton Rouge to get to an actual RV park for a change and after trying to ascertain how to register in a place where the office was shut, we decided we were due a slice of luck and just picked a spot. Leaving prior to opening hours meant that unfortunately we had a free stay and water fill-up. We didn't brave the RV poo pipe just yet...

Start: Reserve Truck and Casino. Finish: On The Half Shell, Prairieville: 32.3 miles

Big Crazy to the Big Easy. Days 8-9

Blog Day 8-9: Big Crazy to Big Easy

The highlight of the last few hours back from Houston had been driving over a 23 mile long bridge across Lake Ponchartrain, which is very surreal as you appear to be literally driving into the horizon, never to return. Flat-earthers would be petrified, as if ever there was a conveyor belt to oblivion, it would look like this. New Orleans does, fortunately eventually appear and all was well. This had followed a ginormous shopping spree which came to $500-odd dollars and resulted in the purchase of a lot of useful and probably never to be touched items as well as some of that food and drink stuff I probably need. This obviously included a selection box from the Trouble Brewery...

The old advisory notice - “Things in the rear view mirror may appear closer than they are”. The equivalent for us so far here has been “Things take longer than you think they will”. As such we got back to the State border pretty late and the sun was already going down. I quite like running at this time at the night however and at last the heat was less stifling. The proposed 15-20 miles was completely off the cards and I set off into the sunset through the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area across bridges and bayous, until I came to one that seemed vaguely familiar – it was the place where I'd done a swamp tour, last time I was here! I was sorely tempted to call Nads back for the night tour, but I had to keep moving, so on I plodded into the night, using my LEDs for the first time as it got pitch black very quickly. I wasn't worried however as I was wearing very short shorts which allowed me to eat up the miles with the minimum of resistance. We'd arranged to RV at the RV (Nice.) at a bar called Crazy Al's,10 miles away, which I didn't think existed, according to Street View, but it was at the end of a mile or so long bridge so not really an issue to spot the Death Star parked up. Crazy Al's did however exist and after a slightly ulterior motivated decision to ask if we could park in their lot. They were more than happy and after I'd stopped leaking from every pore we went over. This is a proper Southern bar – how you'd imagine it, with a good group of locals all around. Woody and Bea, 72 and 74, married for 56 years, Maria, a Brazilian bait shop owner, Captain Kirk (actually), the local fire chief, pizza guy and reporter (!) with his crew, Anthony, a Harley riding biker who freely confessed his plan to kidnap Nads and the owners, Donna and Art, two karaoke singing Trojans with Art the real showman. Two beers turned into four as they kept buying and we began departure procedures around five times before we reluctantly left.

The fact that we were parked on Highway 90 meant a fitful rest and the local screamybird species got me out of bed for an 8am start, which, of course turned into an 0830 start. This was probably the earliest I'd started but instantly I was looking for any shade the low lying sun hadn't eradicated, including taking lane 8 around the bend. Nads was waiting over another classic girder bridge in Jenny, who fortunately does offer shade, the not-so-little darling. Today was about making progress. I was not exactly angry about the loss of mileage today, but I was conflicted about the need to make a statement numbers wise, if not just to myself. It seems funny saying this when the numbers I'm talking about have certainly been bettered by many stage racers and continent crossers, but I know that these are real big amounts and I'm probably doing them too quickly still, though my camera trigger finger does provide me with pauses, at least. I ran through the Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife refuge, through a massive levee barrier with STOP signs that the though of in action, made me feel quite uneasy, given this areas recent traumatic history with Katrina and flooding and soon the verdant swampland gave way to concrete, flyovers and skyscrapers – the first metropolis since leaving my “hometown” of Mobile. We stopped off at a fast food place that Nads had already reached and was giving assistance in the form of our battery to a battle weary 90's Tioga RV that had broken its alternator belt. This had been remedied, but their battery was now dead as a doornail. He'd gotten some fuel with our help and then used the battery one last time to get moving. Good deed done. I inhaled some fries and nuggets, a litre of Dr Pepper (Forrest's favourite beverage) and was off again, through the eastern 'burbs and on the approach to the French Quarter, I saw our stricken Tioga again, this time surely beaten. I went over to offer token assistance, but I'm no mechanic and I had to awkwardly leave. At least, for the moment, my engine is still going. I passed a stag do (batchelor party), and naturally passed on my wishes for the condemned man not to remember his evening if his friends had anything to do with it and moved on past the markets to Bubba Gump, one again, saying hello to Shannon and the staff (Mike, obviously) and then through the uptown area, stopping off at the amazing Bulldog pub where I was kindly given some Sprite instead of water and a taster of a lovely local IPA from the NOLA brewery. New Orleans is a party town and I would have loved to have stayed for more, as the place was absolutely jumping for the LSU game, but once again I pushed on, only to be offered a cocktail a mile down the road, from Steve, the local wag, I presume. I informed him and his elite-looking cyclist pal, Jason of my quest and they were pretty enthused and pledged to follow, before giving me an excellent reworking of my planned route to include the grand mansions, churches and universities of St Charles' Ave, running down the tram tracks (not scary) before mounting a levee for the final mile or so. I found a very stressed and tired Nads at the meeting point, before a tricky drive back to a truck stop, our home for the night. She's like me – not good when tired and it was tough, with my excitement of having done almost 40 miles and knowing my work was all but done, not to get exuberant when she was definitely still on-shift and certainly not happy about being so. It helped by the fact I was pretty done in after the NOLA excitement had me dipping under 7:00 mile paces (and annoyingly forgetting to stop and start my watch at the required time, meaning both slower recorded paces and also a loss of a mile or two). She cooked dinner and I forced it into my mouth, against my digestive systems will and tried to rehydrate. It was 98F on the van thermometer as we got down to “sleep”. The use of inverted commas, I'm sure implies that this wasn't the way it turned out. 

Start: MS/LA State Border. Finish: South Metairie. 46.86 miles (officially - likely mile or two longer)

Downing Tools. Days 6-8

Now we finished early on day 6 as we'd had a lovely email from Shannon, the head of marketing at Bubba Gump in New Orleans after the Biloxi manager had passed on our impending arrival. We had to be in NOLA by 4:30 to say hi and when we got there we were treated to a slap up dinner and drinks on the house, all served by Mike, the resident FG expert. A good bit of the meal was spent answering trivia questions on the film and I think we just about impressed him, apart from maybe our knowledge of the chronology of the US Presidency! I got to keep my Bubba Gump glass that housed my Sam Adams Summer Ale and Nads bought a box of chocolates (of course). We took a load of photos and headed for a very brief tour of the waterfront and the French Quarter. I'd been here a few years ago on a roadtrip with my old mucker Simon, or Slapish, as we call him. At the time I was asked by a man who appeared a little down on his luck near the Natchez Steamboat to have a bet with him. He bet me $5 that he knew “where I got dem shoes”. Despite Si's protestations I went along with it, as of course he didn't know. “You gots dem on yo' feet”. One-nil, or one-zip (or zip and one?). I told Nads about this as we were walking along and remarked on how you'd love to go into that situation again, knowing what the score as, like when you walk away from an argument and think of something brilliant to say. “Hey man! Nice Nikes! Now I ain't never seen you before, but I bet I know...”. Brilliant. So after, I'd then replied to riddle two that my DAD had had no children, my mum had had them all (accompanied by his beaming smile) and got him with one of my own about how many animals of each species Moses had taken onto the Ark, he was in stitches. I always strugge with the dilemma of whether to give momey to the homeless directly or not, but I think what you at least have to do is treat them with courtesy and if you can brighten their day with a chat or some food/drink, that's probably best. Just be a human.

We headed down Bourbon Street, noting the bar where I'd watched the 2010 Superbowl (Packers 31-25 Steelers) and had too many hand grenades and caught a parade with full marching band and bead throwing on the way to BeerFest where a Sweetwater 420 IPA hit the spot. When we got back to our motel that evening (Hats off to Ken of Motel 6 for being a hero, by the way) I was looking for the card that identified which chocolate was which, but I should have known better. “You never know what you're gonna get.” (Nads demanding credit for comedy supplies) Now, even for a man with a pathological fear of nuts hiding in chocolate, I had to admit that they'd got that spot on! We got our heads down and got ready for the Megabus ($17 for a 7 hour journey – AMAZING) to Houston to pick up the RV.

We decided that we'd stay in the Holiday Inn near the dealer and felt like we in the Ritz after the majority of our previous experiences. A great steak, comfy bed, great staff and no stress. Paid a bit more, but worth it. The next day we headed over to PPL Motor Homes and Randy Lane (What an awesome Texas name!) even drove us to the bank to get the cheque and the staff there, Sharon, Gary, Jules, the parts staff and of course, RV Nana Miss Diana were awesome and we got our hands on Jenny (naturally) Jamboree, our 30 foot, 6 sleeper RV that we're just desperate to have people come and stay in now! Hopefully this will make our lives easier and allow me to start running earlier and go later if weather dictates and mean at least I'll always have a bit of shade! I'm writing this as we're heading back from Houston, on the way to stock the van and hopefully I'll be on the road again at 4pm. Been too long.