Riding the Bus, Seeing the French Quarter, and Looking for Lucy.

Eric wanted to see Mammoth Caves, so we stopped at Cave City, Kentucky at spent the night in a community that came together as a tourist trap to surround nature’s glory. It’s the American Way!

In the interest of full self disclosure I will confess at this point that I have a slight case of claustrophobia.  Not the serious kind where you break out into a sweat whenever you are in any kind of closed in spaces, but I don’t like feeling trapped and I don’t like having to crawl through tight spaces. I agreed to go because Eric really wanted to go with me and with a name like Mammoth Caves the place has to be pretty big, right?

Somewhat right. Mammoth, you see, refers to the fact that there are so many caves under the ground in this area. It does refer to height or grandeur. This is too bad as height and grandeur were pretty much what I was counting on.

It wasn’t an onerous hike by any stretch of the imagination. Between the metal door that marks the “New Entrance” of the caves (built in the 1920s) and the metal stairs and walkways that you must stay on throughout the visit you are pretty far removed from any true spelunking experience. Nevertheless, there were times when I had to bend over in order to get through a very low ceiling or bend around a rock outcropping. It was during these times that I reminded myself that I survived the Christian catacombs of Rome and the underground cistern at Mycenae in Greece. I also reminded myself to breathe...and not poop. Every time Eric looked behind to make sure I was okay I would smile and say “Isn’t this fun?”

After Kentucky, we found ourselves in Alabama and the small town of Wetumpka. It is here that they filmed many of the scenes in one of our favourite movies, Big Fish. It is no secret that I enjoy visiting the sites of television programs and movies. I will often punctuate my blogs with these visits and post them on facebook or on twitter. But, while they do interest me, these are mere excuses to get off the main highway and explore the country side. As Eric and I went in search of Wetumpka, we enjoyed a very unique countryside where ramshackle trailers share the lush scenery with old plantation houses. Some places are abandoned and others probably should be soon. Still others are in pristine condition and it is obvious that the owner, whether low or high income, has taken great pride in their home. Lush pastures are interrupted by marshland and punctuated by lone trees that spread their limbs far and wide.

By the time we arrived in Alabama the humidity was something we had never experienced before. It is all encompassing. When I took the photo of the house in Wetumpka I thought it was blurry, but the humidity had fogged up the lens on my camera.

We moved on to Montgomery and visited the Rosa Parks Museum. This was an incredible experience. You know the story just like we did when we walked in the front door, but this museum took great pains to contextualise the situation for us. It told us that, while segregation was an overarching issue, nothing humiliated the black community more than the segregation policy on the busses in Montgomery. A black person was required to sit or stand in the back. If they were sitting in the front section of the bus and no seats were left available, a black person was required to give up his or her seat to a white person and move to the back of the bus.  Of all the racist policies in this city, this one galled the most.

The museum is situated at the spot where Rosa Parks got on the bus. After a brief film we were led into a room with a bus in it. As we stood outside the bus, we watched as the events unfolded on the bus in an brilliant use of film being shown out the windows. We watch, in real time as Rosa Parks enters the bus, sits, refuses to give up her seat and is eventually arrested. We watch the tension rise, we experience the awkwardness of waiting for the police to arrive, and we bear witness as she is led off the bus.

There were other aspects to this museum, but I must say that this part is the one that I carry with me.

After Montgomery we headed over to Monroe, Alabama, birthplace of Harper Lee and where Truman Capote spent part of his childhood. The two were friends and used each other as inspirations for characters in their novels.  Lee was the basis for Idabel in Other Voices, Other Rooms while Capote was Dill in To Kill A Mockingbird. The highlight of this place was the county courthouse from which the set form the movie of Mockingbird was based. In fact, it is identical. I have to admit, as an English teacher, this was like a sacred space for me. At one point I turned away from the witness box and looked up into the second floor gallery and could almost see Jem and Scout looking through the banister.

I did have one complaint as I left Montgomery. There were so many details about the private and professional lives of Harper Lee and Truman Capote, but absolutely nothing about Capote’s homosexuality. Nothing about his partner of many decades. Nothing about the other loves of his life. While this did not necessarily surprise me, I was still disappointed in such blatant...editing...in 2012.

Knowing we were going to be spending a more time in Tennessee, we sped through that state and into Louisiana. We took the scenic route through Brixton and enjoyed the Gulf Coast, along with its palm trees, fine old homes, and casinos.

New Orleans is a place unto itself. It really is. With its Spanish, French and Southern history it is truly one of the most unique cities I have ever visited. The French Quarter is beautiful, to be sure, but this is not why people go there. They go there to party. Every night Bourbon Street is closed off and it looks like on of those crappy teen party movies from the eighties. Drunk young people being stupid. Eric and I were not fans. We have no issue with drinking, or being young, or even being stupid. But having all three at the same time and involving about five hundred people at every city block it was just too intense.

During the day, though, we enjoyed a tour of St. Louis Cemetery #1 and wandering through the streets full of antique stores, art galleries, and wrought iron balconies. We found the St. Louis New Orleans Cathedral to be quite unique and found the people to be incredibly polite and welcoming. We had beignets and frozen coffee at Cafe du Monde, ate gumbo and crawfish, and dined at the premiere jazz club Snug Harbor on Frenchman Street.  We also had a great time at the Jason Mraz concert. You may recall that this concert was the excuse we used to have this road trip.

My only real disappointment with New Orleans was the fact that the St. Charles Streetcar was not in service and was replaced by a bus. Ugh.

We left New Orleans and headed towards Mississippi, but not before visiting the Destrehan Plantation. This is very well preserved and Interview with a Vampire did some filming here.  What was most interesting about this place was the garconniere. A garconniere, we learned, was where the plantation owner placed his sons when they reached the age of 14. Now considered a man, these garcons would have a place of their own to whatever they pleased just outside of the family home.

Something for you parents out there to consider.

We made our way to Natchez, Mississippi where we stayed the night at a beautiful bed and breakfast called The Burn.

Natchez was a picturesque little town on the shores of the Mississippi River. We ate at Biscuit and Blues where we had the best biscuits known to man. Sweet Alabama and Succulent Gerogia Peach Juice, it was a biscuit truly worthy of God! I had something else to eat but I cannot for the life of me remember what it was because it only interrupted my serious attempt at eating six biscuits in a row. 

Unfortunately, Eric was in the way so I only had three.

A wierd thing happened while we stayed at The Burn. We checked in and found our room in the converted garconniere (!) and settled in. While doing this I happened to look out the window and see a small girl walk through the garden out back. When we left a moment later she was gone but I didn’t really think much of it. That night I had a terrible sleep. I was restless and woke up often feeling anxious. I kept dreaming of being under mosquito netting. I had seen a lot of netting at Destrehan which was used to protect against Malaria and Yellow Fever so I figured it had gotten stuck in my brain somehow. At one point I woke myself up, along with Eric, by calling out “Where’s Lucy? What happened to Lucy?”. Eric told me to go back to sleep.

The next morning we went to the main house for breakfast. While waiting for it to be served we looked around the house and admired the antique furniture, the photos and the books. One photo held the picture of a little girl whose name was Lucy Walworth and who died of Yellow Fever.

Now...

Any girl could have wandered into that garden. The back yard was quite large so it is not impossible that she was simply out of sight when I left the room shortly after seeing her.

I have a vivid imagination so the netting dreams could very well be about seeing the mosquito netting earlier in the day.

And...I suppose the Lucy call out could have been about Lucille Ball. But I gotta say that that just doesn’t feel right.

I don’t know for sure what happened, or if it is just a weird set of circumstances. What I do know is that Eric just dropped the subject and didn’t encourage further conversation so I know that, at the very least, it was odd.

You decide.

We left Natchez, and Lucy, and headed north to Tennessee. We had a date with the Grand Ole Opry, but first we needed to seek out a famous bridge, stumble across an historic gas station, and bear witness to an assassination.