Day 32: Memphis, TN

My second day in New Orleans I managed to find a really nice Vietnamese man that was willing to keep an eye on my laundry while I rode my bike around the city and did a bit more sightseeing.  By the time I got back my laundry was done, and all I had to do was fold it up and pack back onto the bike.  I went back to the hotel and changed into some freshly laundered clothes, then hopped a shuttle down to the 'quarter again.  Following a suggestion from one of the locals never to eat at a restaurant on Bourbon Street, I wandered around until I found a nice little seafood bar a few blocks from the cathedral square.  It was an upscale place nicely maintained in the original art deco theme, but they had seafood and okra gumbo for only $4.50.  I followed the suggestion of a hand-painted sign on the wall and ordered a Dixie Beer to go with it, which was ice cold and absolutely delicious.  The gumbo was better than mine, and maybe better than Celestine's, but I doubt it was the best that the city had to offer.

I wanted to sample some more gumbo, so I wandered around a bit more looking for a place called The Gumbo Shop, but couldn't find it.  I did, however, wander into a place called K Paul's Louisiana Kitchen.  Apparently it's a pretty famous place, but I didn't puzzle that one out until I recognized the chef's picture on the wall near the bar.  They had some kind of chicken & sausage gumbo on the menu, but I was too intrigued by a couple appetizers to even think twice about the gumbo: pan fried rabbit tenderloin with a creole mustard sauce and sauteed spinach, and buffalo fried frog legs with onion rings.  I couldn't make up my mind so I ordered both.  They brought out a plate with a little southern biscuit (basically a really sweet cornbread muffin), a jalapeno roll, a plain white roll, and a molasses walnut muffin.  The southern biscuit was probably the best of them, but the molasses walnut was the most unique and interesting.  The rabbit tenderloin, frog legs and onion rings were all fried in what appeared to be a traditional southern buttermilk batter.  It was the first time I'd ever had rabbit.  It was like the best piece of chicken I'd ever had.  It has the texture of white meat, but the richness of dark meat, with none of the greasiness.  The buffalo sauce was more of a glaze, like it was made from hot sauce & honey instead of hot sauce and butter, like the buffalo sauce I'm used to.  For dessert I had half a slice of pecan sweet potato pie.  It's like a pecan pie, but instead of a custard filling it had a sweet potato filling.  It wasn't as good as Jason's pecan pie, and it wasn't as good as Sandra Dee's sweet potato pie, but it was good, and quite unusual.  Apparently it's so popular that people have it shipped all over the world, like Oprah and her Ezel's fried chicken (also good, but not worth express shipping from Seattle to Chicago).  As I wandered back in the direction of my hotel I walked directly past the Gumbo Shop that I was looking for, but was far too stuffed to even consider it.

The next morning I headed to the Cafe Du Monde for breakfast.  It was highly recommended by a freind (thank you Liz). The cafe is at the end of the French Marketplace, across the square from the cathedral.  It was the best cup of coffee I've had since I left California, but I couldn't convince them not to put cream in it.  I can't even remember the last time I had beignets, and these were hot and delicious, and covered in a mountain of powdered sugar.  I have to wonder how many 50 lb sacks of confectioner's sugar that place goes through in a single day.  It wasn't even a weekend and the place was packed at ten o'clock in the morning.  I wanted to stay in New Orleans one more day, but just couldn't afford it.  There's too much good food and good drink, and the cost of a comfortable bed is pretty steep.  So I headed north, toward Memphis, Tennessee.

After 4,900 miles and 31 days of traveling I ran out of gas for the first time out in the middle of the swamp about 40 miles outside of New Orleans.  I was feeling cheap and didn't want to fill up near the airport, thinking it would be less expensive to wait a couple more miles.  Eventually I started to get nervous and took the first exit I saw, which was for a town called Ruddock.  I saw the sign, and I saw the little dot on my map, but when I got off the freeway all I saw was about two dozen people fishing in the swamp under the overpass, and a a little side road going north.  The only signs around pointed back to the freeway.  I headed north for a few miles on that side road, and there was no indication of civilization anywhere in sight, so I turned around and headed back to the fishing hole apparently known as Ruddock.  I asked one of the fishermen if there was a gas station near by, and he told me there was a fueling dock in Manshac if I just kept following the side road north.  I turned around again and just as I was in sight of a few houses on my right and a big bridge in front of me the engine died and I coasted to a stop right in front of the houses.  There were no signs indicating where I was, and the only paved road aside from the bridge ended in front of the third house.  There was a little gravel road that crossed some railroad tracks toward a couple of boat houses, so I followed that, wondering if one them were the fueling dock.  One of them turned out to be a wildlife observation center, where a couple of guys were working.  They were kind enough to give me a ride across the bridge to the fueling dock, and let me use one of their gas cans to carry enough juice to get me to Ponchatoula, where they had a proper gas station.  In all my travels so far I've never met such friendly people as live out on the bayou.  It's really remarkable.

I hit a little bit of bad weather and got pretty soaked before I even had a chance to pull over and put on my rain gear.  Louisiana thunderstorms aren't like Texas thunderstorms, where they're over in 15 minutes, and you're dry again in another 15 minutes.  They're a lot more thorough, and the humidity ensures that it stays with you.  I stopped for lunch in a town called Amite, at a place advertising 'Old Fashioned Goodness Since 1947'.  I was standing around waiting for my fried catfish po-boy (which turned out to be about as big as my forearm) when the rainstorm caught up to me, and with renewed viciousness.  I ate my sandwich and drank my tea and stood around for a bit, but it showed no signs of letting up.  I was afraid that at this rate I'd never make it out of Louisiana before dark.  So I piled on all the rain gear and headed out into it.  It was coming down so hard that even with my jacket on and the rain gear over that, the droplets were stinging my arms and I could barely see anything but the lines on the road and the tail lights of the car in front of me.  I eventually outran it though, and about the time I reached Mississippi even the clouds were starting to break up.

As soon as I crossed the Mississippi state line I had a county sheriff 'escort' me all the way to other end of town, where he turned around and headed back the other direction.  He didn't pull me over or harass me, but I didn't exactly feel welcome.  Mississippi has some beautiful country, with rich red earth, rolling hills, tall pines and lush green pastures.  Coming down out of the hills the river delta is beatiful too, with ravines and islands covered in trees which are themselves draped with vines and blanketed with ivy.  The people though are distinctly unfriendly in comparison to the folks on the bayou, and the small towns throughout the farm country along the river don't really have anything to offer.  Many of them don't seem to have a functioning gas station, or even a restaurant.  Just a lot of churches and a lot of mobile homes and occasionally a liquor store.  I thought maybe my poor impression of the place was just my own experience, but it was confirmed by an off duty sheriff that I ran into in Memphis.  He told me that law enforcement there is a good old boys' network, known for their profiling, and the people really distrust outsiders.  I had intended to spend the night in Greenville, but it wasn't a very pleasant place, so I decided to try one of the smaller towns up river.  The sunset was beautiful, but none of the towns I passed through appeared to have any kind of motel that hadn't been shut down for thirty years, and the people weren't getting any friendlier.  When the sun went down the bugs got so thick it was like riding through rain.  I could see them swarming in the headlights and hear them pinging against my helmet.  After cleaning my visor for the third time I decided to just head for the interstate and get to Memphis as fast as I could.

Memphis is a great place, with a lot of history and a lot of character.  It's a very industrial town and very proud of its heritage and its music.  I spent some time wandering around the south end of town looking for Graceland, and eventually found it.  I thought the house itself would be bigger, but the grounds are pretty expansive.  He built his own gymnasium and raquet ball court, with a full bar, of course.  I think there were 7 bars in the house, and one more on each of his two jets.  The house was built in the thirties, but most of it was remodeled in the seventies.  Not as classy as Don Corleone's mansion, but not quite as tacky as Tony Montana's.  Elvis's jet is about a hundred times more luxurious than Jimmy Carter's Airforce One.  Twentyfour-karat gold buckles on the seatbelts.  Suede upholstery. Two televisions, a galley, a bar, a lounge, a bed room, and a dressing room.  Probably as much square footage on his plane as my old apartment.  I got to see his motorcycle collection, or at least what's left of it.  A custom built chopper, two custom built Harley Electro Glides, and his orignal 1965 Honda Dream.  I stopped at the cafe and ate a grilled peanut butter & banana sandwich to round out my tour.

After Graceland I headed into downtown Memphis searching for Sun Studios.  I'm a bigger fan of Sam Phillips than Elvis, so I was pretty determined to see it before I left town.  Last I heard it had been shut down, but the building was still there in more or less original condition.  I was happy to find out that it's since been reopened as a museum, and then a few years ago once again became a fully functional recording studio.  The tour at Sun cost about a third as much as Graceland and involved a real human tour guide.  It was really a lot of fun, and full of new facts and legends about the old kings of rhythm & blues and rock & roll.  We got to listen to some clips from Sam Phillips' personal recording library, out takes from recording sessions with Elvis and Carl Perkins and such.  It's odd that even though Graceland was Elvis's home, the recording studio that made him famous felt much more connected to his true personality, maybe because it had none of the layers and layers of opulence and glamor that he later surrounded himself with.  I guess it's easier for me to identify with a 21 year old kid putting all of his passion and energy in to the one thing that he loves most, instead of a fat, aging man in pursuit of the newest flavors of decadence.  Perhaps ironic then, that I bear more resemblance to the latter?