Lake Providence, Louisiana

Finally the post everyone and their mother have been waiting for, if only because we’ve said we were posting it next at least two times over 20 days ago.

 

Andy has some long lost relatives that he had never met before, nor had his eastern shore family talked to since a long time ago.  They live in Lake Providence, Rhode Island.  Or maybe it’s Louisiana. We rolled into town on September 9th and did some detective work at the Lake Providence welcome center. Somehow, we were the only tourists that day, which meant we got the full attention of the woman working there. Andy threw out some names and she knew exactly where to send us.  It worked out quite nicely.

Andy’s last relative in the area, Flo Genard, lived in an old plantation house named Arlington, which just so happens to be the last antebellum house in the town. Flo was no where to be found when we arrived, so we took a bunch of pictures, left a note in the door, and headed up the road to Arkansas.

As fate would have it, we were delayed in Eudora, Arkansas by fried food and free refills of sweet tea at the aptly-named Eudora Dairy Bar. When we drove out of a dead zone, Andy received a voicemail on his phone. It was Flo! She graciously invited the second-cousin twice-removed she’d only just met over the phone and some girl into her home.

We sat down with Flo as she filled Andy in on her side of family history. We’ve got some footage of that, but suffice to say that Andy got shafted on the good genes. Apparently they’re all pilots/doctors/sports stars. Oh well.

Before dinner, Flo gave us a tour of the house. Those plantation owners sure had it made. Too bad the Union burned most of their houses down. Arlington survived only because some of Grant’s officers had taken up residence there.

We’d read a little about some of the sordid history of Arlington at the welcome center. Back in the days of old, a girl named Narcissa Jane fell in love with the son of the work-overseer (read: slave driver). Her parents were the aristocrats who owned Arlington (no relation to Flo or Andy) and so, of course, it was a forbidden love. Narcissa Jane’s parents decided to lock their sixteen-year old daughter in the attic, without food or drink, until she renounced her love. Three times a day they climbed the attic stairs to offer her a meal in exchange for her renunciation, and three times a day she sent them away. Apparently, she’d never read the ending of Romeo and Juliet, because she ended up starving to death. Or, rather, they starved their daughter to death.

Naturally, when we saw the attic stairs, we asked Flo if Arlington was haunted. She laughed (everyone asks her that) but was adamant that there are no ghosts, and said if there are, they’re not bad ones. The porch light sometimes turns on by itself, and she and her husband used to think that some spirit might be doing it, but it is an old house with old wiring.

 

The only other potential ghostly encounter that has happened in the house occurred in the room pictured above when Flo’s niece was sleeping there. When everyone woke up in the morning, the little girl asked who the lady in the purple dress was. They didn’t know what she was talking about, but she was sure that the lady had stood at the bottom of the bed and watched them, silently.

Upon hearing this tidbit, what choice did we have but to stay in this room for the night? 

 

Whilst Caitlin sat upon the toilet in this very bathroom, she decided to extend her sympathy to Narcissa Jane for the manner in which she died, er, was murdered. She told Narcissa Jane that if she wanted to make her presence known in any way, that it was okay to do so. Immediately, the bathroom light started flickering and then promptly turned off. Had the bulb burned out? She checked the light-switch, which was still in the on position, and when she flicked it off and on again, the light came back on. Old wiring has eery timing.

Later that night, after dinner, Caitlin went out to the car to get a few things. She had a hard time because it was completely dark outside, and as she was telling Andy this as they stood inside looking out, a light directly over the car turned on and then instantly turned off.

 

 

Andy was pretty skeptical of all this until it was his turn to use the bathroom. The walk from the purple dress room to the bathroom was already creepy at night, but it took you past a window overlooking those attic stairs. He thought he might give talking to Narcissa Jane a try and asked her if she felt a bit foolish for dying over a teenage crush. That’s when Andy heard breathing — consistent inhales and exhales — and murmuring all around him.

Thus ensued a stressful night of sleeping with flashlights and taking bathroom trips together. We weren’t visited by a lady in a purple dress or anything exciting like that. There’s always next time.

The next morning, Flo cooked us a hearty breakfast of egg, cantaloupe, and pork roll. We didn’t mention anything to do with ghosts as we were pretty sure that it’s bad guest etiquette to insist that your host’s house is a portal between this world and the afterlife.

 

Andy took a few minutes to spend some quality time with a descendant of the lizards his ancestors had lived alongside.

 

On a side-note, Flo is a prolific whistler. She could out-whistle a flock of canaries. Canaries whistle a lot, right?

 

Andy and Flo on the balcony. Guess which one is imagining he’s a plantation owner wearing a straw hat and drinking mint juleps.

But, here’s the kicker to the ghost saga. When we went to bed, Caitlin — who is notorious for losing the backs to her earrings — made extra sure to place both earrings and both backs into her jewelry bag. In the morning, one of the backs had gone missing and in its place was a tiny, silver, equal-armed cross that neither of us had seen before. Either Narcissa Jane was giving us an object of protection, or we’d been visited by the Knights Templar. Later, we decided to review the video we’d taken at night in our bedroom. We’d taken quite a bit of footage, documenting our giddy, sleep-deprived fear, but the tape had only recorded a few seconds.

 

Hmm.

 

Next time on The All-American Swashbuckling Wanderlust Romp in F Sharp:

BBQ, the Blues, and lots of homeless people. It’s Memphis, Tennessee!

New Orleans!

It seems like we’re getting worse and worse at writing timely posts. Just to set the record straight, the following events took place between Saturday, September 6 and Monday, September 8. A lot of exciting things have happened between then and now. Here’s a little bit of foreshadowing for disbelievers who don’t think we’re actually doing any wanderlust romping: there are Paneras even in Minneapolis, MN.

When we arrived in New Orleans, residents had been allowed to return just days before on Thursday, so the place was still a little…unkempt. (Read: trees across roads.)

 Below is a nice picture of Cinderella’s castle…

 

 

The princess and her hobo in the heart of the French Quarter.

 

Well, we didn’t actually find the heart of the French Quarter on the first night…but we did find this super awesome bridge! It goes  somewhere for sure.

 

With New Orleans came our first hostel experience (or, as Caitlin has told everyone we’ve talked to since, “hostile” experience). We stayed at a place called the India House. Above is a picture of our room, named The Jezebel Room. It was a colorful place, to say the least.

 

The best part of the India House was a pond in the courtyard with this super friendly turtle, Mr. Toots.  (Name changed to protect actual identity.)

The courtyard.  Notice all the people that want to be our friends.

 

The dining area.  There’s our hero, Andy, and Caitlin’s trusty computer.  It’s blogging time, dudes and dudettes.

 

Careful observers can see Mr. Toots lounging on the log.  It is unclear whether the doors in the background lead to rooms or a secret lounge where all the hostel employees and the guests they thought were cool enough hung out. We had originally thought that it might be fun to get jobs at a hostel (work and clean a few hours for a free room) so we could stay longer and get to know the Big Easy, but everyone there was too interested in pretending to be Buddhists than to make new friends.

 

On our second day, we took a ferry to Algiers.  Africa is much closer than you think.  Here Andy tries to lift a rope.  He is successful.

 

On our first night, we were walking back to the hostile hostel (hahahahahah!) and came across a cat not unlike the one pictured above.  It was skittish.  But Andy attempted to win it over by feeding it Caitlin’s left over shrimp.  It only half worked.  Then, the next day, we learned that a whole family of kitties lived under the pier by the ferry. Andy’s fears were allayed when he discovered that some good Samaritan gives them heaps of kibbles on a regular basis. Andy has been talking about these cats ever since.

 

In the French Quarter, a disgruntled street performer gave up for the day and cast a balloon in the shape of a sword aside. Andy rescued it and turned it into a likeness of the beast that lives at Uncle Kevin’s.

 

Some hobos made a ruckus and caught Andy’s attention.

 

The sun sets on the French Quarter.

 

The skyline of the old and the new. Ooooo.

 

Andrew Jackson?

 

Back to the Magic Kingdom.

 

A nice picture.

 

 

Sweaty and exhausted, we used our Lonely Planet guidebook to find K Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen. We didn’t know it at the time, but it’s owned by Chef Paul Prudhomme, the creator of the Cajun blackening technique. They sat us in the very back of the restaurant, but when we started ordering the strangest items on the menu and asked to film, we went from pain in the ass to high class in their eyes. Who else would want to film their dinner and sample the most unique dishes but very important food critics from a prestigious news source? By the end of the night, we’d received a complimentary order of fried oysters, a guided tour of the kitchen, and a gift package including Chef Prudhomme’s Magic Seasoning Salt (which we’ve found goes very well with baked beans). It was by far the best dining experience we’ve had on our trip thus far.

 

You can’t even tell that’s a man!

 

Another nice photograph by Caitlin Marie Downey Haffert, Esq.

So what did we think of New Orleans? It wasn’t nearly as sinful as we’d hoped. Maybe we’ll go back during spring break.

 

Next year on The All-American Swashbuckling Wanderlust Romp in F Sharp, we explore the bowels of Louisiana and discover Andy’s long-lost relative, and the murdered ghost of a sixteen year-old girl. Stay tuned!

Florida Forever: Daphne, AL

The long drive through the Florida panhandle gave us time to mentally prepare for the backwater horrors that would be Alabama. We readied our cameras to catch barefoot old men playing the banjo on the porches of log cabins, territorial teenagers drinking beer in the backs of moving pick-up trucks, and Conway Twitty.

 

Our contact in the area was Caitlin’s cousin, Debbie (pictured above). We met her at a field where she was watching fenced-in young boys play what must have been some sort of primitive sport that involved hitting a small white ball with a wooden stick. We were unable to deduce the role of this game in the larger social context, but the players spend a great deal of energy to avoid getting “out.”

 

After the game, Debbie collected her child, Mark, and we headed to her residence. It was quite large and the main living quarters were some distance off the ground.  (This detail made much more sense after we learned that there are large aquatic reptiles living nearby). We offered our assistance in procuring the evening meal and Debbie accepted. Andy prepared patties of cow meat which Debbie’s husband, Mark, cooked over burning rocks. The meat was well-enjoyed by all and we were given a room for the night.

Just one of the many carnivorous animals we encountered.

The following night we were invited to take part in a ritual known as “dining out.” We drove to a building curiously labeled “Ed’s Family Seafood Restaurant” and the group of us were given a table to ourselves where servants brought us many strange concoctions involving sea creatures.

 

Andy tentatively samples a local dish.

 

On this evening, the brave adventurers tried such foods as fried okra, fried crawfish, crawfish creole, seafood gumbo, and key-lime and mango pies.

 

Caitlin and Debbie.

 

Debbie’s and Mark’s offspring, Mark and Matthew.

 

Debbie and Mark, well-sated after the feast.

 

The view was agreeable.

 

As the night continued, a young man took the small stage near our table and began playing music on a stringed instrument that is most comparable to what most people know as a guitar. Strangely enough, this musician knew many songs by artists popular in the North, such as Dave Matthews and the Goo Goo Dolls. Surely scholars will puzzle over this phenomenon for years.

What a charming yokel.

 

The lights of some distant city – perhaps Boston or New York.*

 

Although Mark kindly offered Andy a job working on a barge where he would learn to chew tobacco and cuss, we continued on our journey the following morning. Our foray into the wilds of suburban Alabama had left us no worse for the wear, but much wiser indeed.

 

*Upon further investigation by our cartographer, this city was most likely Mobile, Alabama.

Florida Forever: The Everglades

We heard about this neat little park or petting zoo or something called “The Everglades” and decided to give it a visit. It was hellishly hot that day but, apparently, there were little lizards named “alligators” that lived in the park so we sojourned on.

 

Andy standing in front of the sawgrass prairie. No alligators here!

 

A really big bug called a “lubber grasshopper.” They are about three inches long and dumb as rocks. Do you think the alligators will be bigger?

 

 

Caitlin in the Strangler Fig Forest. Plenty of heat and mosquitos, but no figs. Or alligators.

 

Andy takes a moment to collect himself. Caitlin takes a moment to take an unflattering photo.

 

This is, perhaps, the most representative picture of the Everglades. Leading up to this moment, we had been swarmed – SWARMED – by mosquitos. As we walked down a path to a beautiful, placid lake, a cloud of the jerks rose up and nearly sucked us dry. Caitlin ran away and left Andy behind, who just stood there for some reason. We drove a little further to the coast. White sand, turquoise water, palm trees swaying in the breeze and swarms – SWARMS – of those cursed mosquitos. If our computers were cooperating, this is where we would have a video of Andy demonstrating the dire situation by stepping off the path, allowing a cloud of mosquitos to cover him, then freaking out and running away. After retreating into our car, the video would then show this vulture landing on a dumpster. And then another one. And another. And then twenty more. You would see how they surrounded our car and stared at us, patiently waiting our demise. I guess you don’t need the video after all.

Back inland at the pine forest, breathing in the fresh, mosquito-free air. Also, no alligators.

 

Caitlin got artsy with the camera.

 

Is this an alligator? No, more artsy stuff.

 

Caitlin and Andy by the water.

 

A rock.

 

Andy is really excited for some reason.

 

A white bird.

 

A green turtle.

 

And now…what you’ve all been waiting for…..

                          

                          

                          

LOTS OF ROCKS!!!!!!

 

So, the Everglades were beautiful and all that, but we were a little disappointed. Weren’t there supposed to be alligators? All we saw were lots of rocks. Hissing, green, scaly rocks that pulled a German child into the water. Oh well, maybe next time.

The Oh-So-Exciting Okefenokee

Let’s call this DAY 3.  Perhaps it was Friday.  Perhaps it was Georgia.  We know it officially said the Okefenokee Swamp Park.  We also know it wasn’t the Okefenokee Swamp we were trying to go to.  Apparently there’s more than one part.  But it was interesting, to say the least.

 

Our admission tickets included a tour of the park by train. There’s no better way to see the wilderness than to the tune of an aging diesel engine.

This brave Seminole died so that sweaty white people could feel cultured.

Andy loooooves trains!

We saw no birds. No birds!

 

Some tools that help make turpentine! Turpentine is made using sap from trees. Turpentine has many uses. Many cleaning products include turpentine. Did you know that turpentine is used as an ingredient in many cosmetics? 

 

Turpentine!!!!!

A bear made out of dead vines. Sweet.

 

For fifteen glorious minutes, we were allowed to explore a place called Pioneer Island. It wasn’t so much an island as it was a part of the park that we drove by on our way in that is completely accessible by foot or by car.

An indigenous swamp creature. 

Proof that we are taking video, even if we aren’t able to upload it.

Caitlin loved the goats. Andy just fed them boiled peanut shells.

 

Look! An alligator! And it has a second face that comes out of the middle of its upper jaw! Must be all the turpentine in the water.

Caitlin was a differently-abled bear in a past lifetime.

The set for their nature show. It depicted what life was like for the Cherokee Indians who lived in the area before the government sent them on a happy little hike to Oklahoma.

 

“Lure of the Wilderness”? Our favorite movie of all time!

The sign reads, “Seminole Village.” Apparently they were very small.

The reptile handler at the reptile show. He whispered to the snakes.

Seconds later, we were rushing to the hospital.

The tour guide kept pronouncing this as “Haffert,” so we thought Caitlin might be the Okefenokee heir.

 

What a day! We learned so much about so many things. Too bad we’ll never get to come back.