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December 31, 2020

Biloxi, Mississippi

Visited Dec. 27-31, 2020

By Marty

Note:  This is an "after the fact" post as we work our way backwards to catch you up on our previous destinations.

 

Leaving New Orleans we picked up the Beast from the RV storage facility and took a short drive, for us, of 81 miles east to Biloxi, Mississippi.

Biloxi was established in 1699 by a French fella who was sent from French Canada to locate the mouth of the Mississippi River (France wanted to control that riverway to facilitate the commerce of their colonial empire, which stretched from Hudson Bay to the Gulf Coast, and from the Appalachians to the Rockies.) Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville went ashore a little shy of the Mississippi (about 90 miles west on I-10) at the Biloxi River where he established Biloxi.

It would be another 19 years, in 1718, before New Orleans was founded and claimed for the French Crown. Without the benefit of an interstate highway you can see why it would take 19 years to make it 90 miles further west….

(To be fair to the French, take a look at a map showing how the Mississippi River flows into the Gulf. It’s a little confusing.)

 

 

There was a time when Biloxi’s economy was based on the seafood industry. By the turn of the last century Biloxi had become the Seafood Capital of the World. In the 1920s there were more than 40 seafood factories occupying two cannery districts.

Today Biloxi is all about tourism, thanks to its beaches and casinos.

The beaches, as shown in these photos, speak for themselves. The casino story is interesting: in 1990 Mississippi legalized “dockside” gaming.  That is, casinos could ONLY be ON the water (either the Mississippi River or the Gulf of Mexico). That is to say the casinos had to float! I believe this requirement was a concession to the prudish element among Mississippi voters. The casinos provided a major boost for the Biloxi economy until Hurricane Katrina came along on August 30, 2005.  Those floating casinos didn’t fare so well.  Most were destroyed with some ending up on the other side of the highway. The silver lining was that this event led to the legalization of bricks and mortar casinos and a more robust and durable gaming industry in Biloxi. Google told me that the gaming industry in Mississippi generated $25 billion (that’s “billion” with a “b”) in tax revenue over the 25 years from legalization through 2017. The Biloxi city website states that there are currently eight first-class casino resorts in Biloxi.

Interesting side note:  We have found the liquor laws to be more restrictive in the south than in other regions of the country (shocking, I know.) Prohibition was not abolished in Mississippi until 1966, the last state to do so.

 

 



Jimmy Buffett was born just up the road in Pascagoula, MS. His first professional gig was at a nightclub in Biloxi. This is his song "Biloxi":

https://youtu.be/iZXgQrPAgRw

This is the Biloxi Bay Bridge spanning  1.9 miles east from Biloxi to Silver Springs, MS.

It was severely damaged by Katrina in 2005. Check out the extent of the damage here:

 https://thegate.boardingarea.com/remembering-hurricane-katrina-photographs/

The rebuild, including expansion, was completed in 27 months. This compares favorably to the 24 years it took to replace the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge after the Loma Prieta earthquake.


No, we don't have a drone. This is from the Biloxi Bay Bridge above.

Abandoned lighthouse



 We took a short walk on a long pier...


 There's gotta be a way off this island!

AND SHE STICKS IT!!!

(I expect Janell to ask me not to use this photo. If you are reading this it means that I exercised my editorial right to free speech.  I hope this doesn't come back to bite me...)


We spent an afternoon wandering around Ocean Springs.  Cute little town with a few shops and restaurants.  Way more charming than "downtown" Biloxi to be honest with you. We found the Colonel in an awesome antique and curio shop (I only use the word "curio" once every 15 years) .

This is a double sided weather vane for pete's sake!  How cool is that! Turns out that ALL of the original KFC's had one of these.  Most were eventually blown off....  This one is from Nebraska, in great shape, and can be had for $1,900!

The rest of the story (thank you Paul Harvey) is this:  Janell met my sister Mary when they both worked at KFC in Sacramento as teenagers. I later met Janell and the rest, as they say.... is HISTORY!

(A really romantic husband, who didn't appreciate the value of a buck, would have bought this for Janell at any price and figured out how to attach it to The Beast.)

A canvas mural on the wall in another nice shop (no curios in this one though - okay, twice...) Now THAT is a well trained dog!  I may not know art but I know what I like...


When we get to a new town and I revisit my list of things to do there, and do a deeper dive so that we don't miss anything too interesting or cool, I always check for breweries (priorities?)

This was a decent one in Ocean Springs.  Normally you'd get artfully posed IPA filled logo beer glasses and this sign in the background.  At this brewery they gave us our beer in plain plastic cups because we said we were drinking outside. Next time.


You know you're in the deep south when the street is lined with a variety of confederate flags....

Biloxi is home to Beauvoir, the postwar home of Jeffferson Davis from 1876 until his death in 1889. The mansion has been restored and is open to visitors. It is a National Historic Landmark.

Adjacent to Beauvoir is the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library.  The flags line the highway in front of the property. We did not visit either one.


 "A strict compliance with the above is expected..."

 Biloxi was REALLY ahead of it's time.  This notice is from 1918!

 

 Janell signed us up to donate blood while in Biloxi. She is so good about this; finding blood donation sites wherever we may be when eligible to donate again. This site was in a former Champs retail store in the Edgewater Mall.


 Angry are we?

While packing up to move on to Orange Beach this fella seemingly wanted to come along. Janell heard a noise at the closed screen door and looked over to find him clinging to it by all four paws. He wasn't pleased when informed of our no pets policy.






 

 

 

 

 

December 26, 2020

Christmas in New Orleans, Louisiana

 Visited December 16 - 26, 2020
 
By Janell

Note:  This is an "after the fact" post as we work our way backwards to catch you up on our previous destinations.

 

"I'm on my way to New Orleans this morning ... " 🎜

Amazingly, on our drive towards New Orleans, on the morning of December 19, our music library randomly chose to play "Ramblin' Man”, by the Allman Brothers! Coincidence?

Driving over the Atchafalaya Basin, LA -- so weird to see trees in the middle of a body of water

Our first glimpse of New Orleans; see the Superdome on the right?

 

We spent three nights at the French Quarter RV Resort, right on the edge of New Orleans' French Quarter. It was an ideal location except for its proximity to I-10: super close! There was constant freeway noise and near-constant (it seemed anyway) sirens! 

The French Quarter is the oldest neighborhood in the city of New Orleans.

The French Quarter RV Resort; notice the quaint lamp post that each site has

 
St Louis Cathedral on Jackson Square


Andrew Jackson in Jackson Square


Also Jackson Square

 

Joan of Arc

Why is there a statue of Joan of Arc in New Orleans' French Quarter?

France erected the statue in 1972 as a gift to New Orleans, whose namesake, Orléans, was one of the towns Joan of Arc (1412-1431) defended from the English during the Hundred Years War (1337-1453).

 


Beignets and coffee au lait at Café du Mondé are a must when in New Orleans!



Near the waterfront in the French Quarter


In the French Quarter


Bourbon Street


We bought a souvenir!


 

Matt and Garrett were supposed to fly into New Orleans and join us in an Airbnb for the week of Christmas. Unfortunately, once again Covid-19 messed up everyone's plans. Due to increased outbreaks, hospitalizations and restrictions, flying them to New Orleans was a no-go. We were so sad and bummed about not seeing the boys!

It would be just the two of us in the Airbnb for Christmas: a little bungalow on N Villere Street, right across the street from Louis Armstrong Park in the Tremé district.

By the way, if you haven't seen the show "Tremé", which takes place in New Orleans (right after Hurricane Katrina), we recommend it. It's by the same director as "The Wire".

If you look closely, you can see Marty peeking through the door of our bungalow

 

Louis Armstrong Park

 

The Bywater neighborhood has several of these cute little homes

  

New Orleans, as seen from Crescent Park in the Bywater neighborhood

Oddly enough, even though it looks as if the city and Crescent Park are on opposite sides of the Mississippi River, they're on the same side. The river makes a turn in the shape of a crescent right at New Orleans; thus one of New Orleans' nicknames is "Crescent City".

 

 

We visited the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Besthoff Sculpture Garden, both located in City Park. 

This cloud-like exhibit in NOMA is called "Mending the Sky". It has thousands of actual needles hanging down! (and signs warning one to be careful!)

 

These next few pieces are in the Besthoff Sculpture Garden

I bet this guy's pretty good at Scrabble!



 
 

This exhibit looked so cool! Imagine the photos Marty would've taken if we could've gone in!

But alas, it was not allowed due to . . . Covid


A balcony in the French Quarter - New Orleanians really get into their decorations!


The architecture in New Orleans is so fun to look at! These beauties are on Esplanade Ave.



The National WWII Museum, in downtown New Orleans, is designated by Congress as the official WWII museum of the United States. After touring it, we could see why it is the "official" museum! It's a massive, multi-building museum with very comprehensive coverage of World War II. There was so much to see that we'll need to go back.

But why is such a monumental museum located in New Orleans? Well, we learned that there are two key reasons why this is so.

First of all, New Orleans played a critical role in World War II. Local shipbuilder Andrew Higgins, who had designed special vessels to navigate shallow Louisiana bayous, realized they would serve well to deliver soldiers and material onto shallow beaches. Think of the D-Day scene in “Saving Private Ryan”, where these boats landed on the beaches of Normandy. “Higgins Boats”, as they came to be known were built in local shipyards by a racially integrated workforce of men and women. The boats were so successful that General Dwight D. Eisenhower described Higgins as “the man who won the war for us.”

Secondly, the founder of the National World War II Museum was Stephen E. Ambrose: American historian and biographer, author of many bestselling including Band of Brothers and a longtime professor of history at the University of New Orleans. So there you have it!

They did a good job of keeping everyone Covid-safe, but in military fashion

A clever touch!

 



 

We rode the streetcar and had a lovely afternoon in New Orleans' Garden District on Christmas Eve.

The St. Charles line


Lafayette Cemetery in the Garden District was closed due to ongoing repairs

Notice that the tombs are all above ground. The water table in New Orleans is very high. Dig a few feet down, and the grave becomes soggy, filling with water; causing the casket to float. The early settlers placed stones in and on top of coffins to weigh them down and keep them underground. Still, rainstorms brought the water table up and those airtight coffins would literally pop out of the ground! Imagine the fright that would create!

Even now, unpredictable flooding still occasionally lifts coffins out of the ground in areas above the water table, which are generally considered safe from flooding.



We finished watching "The Queen's Gambit" while we were in New Orleans. Loved it so much that we wanted to start playing chess again (I barely remembered how, so Marty had to re-teach me. It had been over 25 years!). Our AirBnb had a chess game in the cupboard, so we played a couple of times while we were there.

Our AirBnb owners were such nice guys! I was very pleasantly surprised that they had decorated the place for Christmas for us! And they had recently gotten champagne as gifts, but they don't drink, so they offered us a bottle. We drank it on Christmas Day while playing chess!

The bungalow owners loved this photo Marty took so much that they asked if they could put it in their AirBnb ad!


We had so much fun in NOLA, that we can't wait to come back!