Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez

Get ready for the longest post ever!

After a delicious breakfast with the Houston branch of the Jimenez family, Billy and I started our drive from Houston to New Orleans. We were driving on the I-10 for about an hour, when I hit dead stopped traffic. Not crawling traffic, but just STOPPED traffic. We sat there for about 20 minutes and had inched up maybe 100 feet. Billy told me I should drive to the shoulder then cross the grassy median and get on the service road. We had seen someone else do it, but there was no way I was going to do that. So Billy and I ran around the car and switched seats, and HE drove over the median. Right after we did that, a few people followed suit. But it turns out the cops closed down the I-10 compeletely and they were forcing everyone to exit onto that service road. But Billy's quick thinking probably saved us about an hour. Unfortunately, because of the detour off the freeway, we ended up sitting in an hour's worth of traffic anyway. We found out that there had been a pretty bad accident that shut down the freeway for a few hours.

The drive from Houston to New Orleans was beautiful. The swamps were unbelieveable and the highway is basically just bridges that go for huge stretches over the swamp and rivers like the Mississippi.

Before hitting New Orleans, we did a quick detour in Lafayette, Louisiana and stopped at the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve - Acadian Cultural Center. What a great stop and totally unexpected. We watched a really informative and interesting documentary about Acadians (otherwise known as Cajuns) and what their ancestry and history is. It was so interesting. There is also a great exhibit about Cajun life and I also learned that Filipinos lived in Louisiana as early as the 1700s. Don't believe me? Click here.

Also at the Acadian Cultural Center, there was a very in-depth exhibit about Gilbert du Motier, marquis de La Fayette, who is now Billy's hero. The marquis de La Fayette was involved in the American revolution, was a great general, adopted by George Washington, and an abolitionist. This was a great informative stop, and the ranger was very helpful.

We finally made our way to New Orleans that afternoon and got to our hotel, the Place D'Armes in the French Quarter. We got a totally great deal since it's summer (low season), it's the middle of the week and I don't think tourism is back 100% here. The Place D'Armes is this really cute 9 building hotel, very quaint with gaslight lamps and it has this fantastic courtyard in the middle of the buildings. It's like straight out of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (which now that I think about it, didn't that take place in Savannah. Whoops!)

After settling in at the hotel, we made our way to Bourbon Street and had dinner at Pat O'Briens Courtyard Restaurant. The food was pretty good but the atmosphere was excellent. The courtyard was actually like a wide alley sandwiched between two great buildings. I had the crawfish cakes and Billy had the jambalaya.

After dinner, we did a small Bourbon Street crawl and hit a few of the bars. We went to Famous Door (where we enjoyed some live music and drinks, and where a hilarious older gentleman made me dance to Bon Jovi with him), Cajun Cabin (where we watched Sportscenter, drank and listened to some Cajun music) and Absinthe House (where we drank and enjoyed the great atmosphere). Bourbon Street was a little dead but I think it was because it was Monday night.

The next morning, we hit my favorite place in New Orleans...Cafe du Monde. Cafe du Monde is an New Orleans institution and it only serves coffee and beignets. Since we don't drink coffee, you can guess why we go. Beignets are French-donuts, but to better explain it, it's like funnel cake with powdered sugar dumped on it. It is yummy, yummy, yummy. Also, the atmosphere at the original Cafe du Monde is wonderful. It's all open, so you can people watch and listen to someone strumming their guitar outside.

Next, we took a walking tour of the French Quarter, looking at the architecture and reading about some of the historic buildings. Like this one, known as the Haunted House, where a woman was found to have tortured and chained her slaves in the basement. When the town found out, they ran her out of town and she escaped to Europe, but it's said that the slaves still haunt the house. The French Quarter has such a great vibe though and it's really awesome to see all of the different types of houses and buildings.

For lunch, we met up with our friend Farrah for lunch and she took us to this great restaurant, Gumbo House in the Quarter. I had the chicken and sausage gumbo and Billy had the hot roast beef po' boy. I kid you not, when I tell you that Billy's sandwich was very possibly the best sandwich I'd ever eaten. It was delicious. And actually my gumbo was pretty awesome too. I would definitely recommend this restaurant. It had the best food that we ate in NOLA, it was affordable and it had a great ambiance. Check this place out!

After lunch, Billy and I made our way to the Garden District to check out the stately old mansions. This was originally the American part of town (the Creoles thought that the homes here were garish and tacky). It's also now the home of Anne Rice, author of Interview with a Vampire, Peyton Manning, John Goodman and Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. The houses here were beautiful and worth the hour walk it took to get there. (Well, we weren't going to walk, we were going to take the streetcar. But turns out the streetcar isn't running all the way down the street anymore. So we needed to take the bus. But we didn't have change for the bus. So we had to stop and break a $20. Then we needed to wait for the bus. But we kept walking in between all of this. So by the time we caught the bus, I think we were only like 3 blocks away from where we needed to be. It was hot and nasty and tiring.) But it was worth the terrible walk!

After this, we needed a break, so we went back to the hotel and took a dip in the pool. When we had recovered we walked around the Quarter looking for a place to eat and ended up at Arnaud's Remoulade. Billy had the meat pies which we pretty tasty and I had a shrimp po' boy, which was good but nothing special.

I was exhausted so we went back to the hotel around 10:30 and just hung out.

The next morning, guess where we had breakfast? Cafe du Monde, again. LOL. Sorry, I love beignets. How can you beat 3 beignets for $1.59???

We checked out of our hotel and started our drive to Biloxi, Mississippi. The drive on the I-10 was pretty sad. Destruction from Hurricane Katrina and Rita was still evident in places and you could see trailers everywhere in people's driveways. We stopped to get gas, and the gas station was the only thing that was open. Restaurants and stores were boarded up and closed. But New Orleans really felt like people were trying to get on and doing a good job of it. And the Quarter seems like not much had changed.

Anyway, we drove to Biloxi, why else, but because of the casinos! All of the casinos were completely demolished by the hurricane (Biloxi is right on the Gulf Coast), but they rebuilt them right away because they are such a huge part of the economy there. All the casinos were brand spanking new! We hit Imperial Palace first and came away $160 richer, the hit the Hard Rock where we lost a little. Both casinos were gorgeous!

Biloxi was very sad. You could tell so much had been destroyed in the hurricane, but I'll tell you what -- all the casinos were booming! The beach was also really cute. Maybe Billy and I will come back.

After Biloxi we made our next stop - Atlanta. We didn't get in until 10 at night, but we are thankfully staying with Billy's family who so graciously took us in. They have a beautiful house north of Atlanta and it was great to catch up with the whole family!

Tomorrow...Charleston!

I can't believe we will be back in Ohio in a few days.

So who knows what the title of the post means?

Pictures here! Click here!

Life is a Highway

So I just wanted to do a quick post on the sounds of the road. We brought our iPod, ready to listen to it on the whole trip, but we've barely broken in out in the last two weeks. Why, you ask? Because we forgot how good radio can be.

The rule of the Hobbs car is always, whoever drives, controls the radio.

So that means, when I drive, we're listening to country. When he drives, we're listening to rap.

But sometimes we do agree on music, like Bryan Adams, or 80s songs, or classic rock or Lionel Richie. And NPR. We've listened to a lot of NPR while we drive...who doesn't love All Things Considered?

We've also noticed that the same 3 songs are always on the radio, no matter what state we're in:
1) Because of You by Kelly Clarkson and Reba McEntire
2) The Heart of Rock and Roll by Huey Lewis
3) Power of Love by Huey Lewis

The lesson learned on the road: I guess people of all races, cultures, creeds and states love Huey Lewis.

A Comment on Comments

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Deep in the Heart of Texas

Well, we stayed in Fort Stockton yesterday, where we slept pretty well, even though there was a pretty strong wind whipping the tent around.

Billy drove through West Texas, which has to be one of the most boring drives ever (well, I'm guessing since I was asleep through most of it). No little towns, no stops. I woke up and Billy was exiting the I-10 to get gas. Whoops, the gas station is a mile away. Oh well, we'll drive the mile. We get there and it's a bunch of junk on the side of the road, 1 pump and the sign is on the ground. Ooooookay, maybe we'll wait for the next stop and risk running out of gas, because this place looked like something out of a horror movie.

Also, side note, no cell phone or internet service from Carlsbad Caverns, AZ all the way through West Texas.

Next stop, San Antonio, Texas! Billy has been looking forward to this stop for a while because the Mexican food there is to die for. Mom and Dad Hobbs used to be residents of this fun place, so we had visited before and knew exactly where to go for excellent eats.

We went to Market Square (a little mercado with shops and restaurants) in downtown San Antonio to eat at Mi Tierra, this fabulous restaurant/bakery/bar. Mi Tierra is huge, has tons of atmosphere, great service and even better food. I don't love Mexican most of the time, but this is Mexican I could eat all the time. I had the Huevos Rancheros with a pork chop (mmmmm!) and Billy had an Enchilada and Taco combo. Both were unbelievable. But what's the best there are their flour tortillas. We got a melted cheese dip with chorizo and had it with the tortillas. Super good!!!

Then, we took a trolley from Market Square to the Riverwalk. San Antonio makes it really easy for tourists to get around with trolleys that cost $1. Our driver was super helpful and very nice. He is originally from Illinois and breeds Siberian Huskies. Including one that was pure white with green eyes! Green eyes, can you believe it? Maybe we'll get a brother for Nyah from him.

After that, we strolled the Riverwalk. If you haven't been to San Antonio, you really should go, even if it's only to eat and walk the river. It makes you wonder why more cities don't do things as nice. It's this great stretch of San Antonio, where there are tons of restaurants, bars, cafes, hotels and shops all lined up on both sides of the river and winding around downtown. It's fantastic. And some of the architecture around the Riverwalk is amazing.

Before getting in the car again, we decided to go back to Mi Tierra, but this time to the bar. It has a great bar, even though they didn't have Billy's favorite beer, Sol. So far we haven't found it anywhere around the border, which is odd.

Since we had been to San Antonio before, we had done a lot of the great sites like visiting the missions, taking a Riverwalk boat tour, etc, so we decided to move on from San Antonio. And we know we'll be visiting again soon because Billy and I both like it there a lot.

We got in the car for another 3 hours and made our way to Houston, TX to my uncle's house. They graciously let us stay with them and I got to dump two loads of laundry in. Also, it's been about 10 years since I visited Houston last and about 10 years since I saw my cousin Justine and Michelle, who are now so old! Justine just graduated from high school and is on her way to Baylor and Michelle is in eighth grade (she was a baby when I saw her last). Those two are hilarious--they are exact carbon copies of my sister and me. Justine looks just like my sister and Michelle reminds me of me - she's crazy!

We had a great family dinner, where we met a waiter from Strongsville and a diner from Mayfield Heights that went to Kent. Small world!

Thanks again, Uncle Art and family for having us and thanks, Justine for letting us crash your room!

Today's photos are here. Click here!

Big Trouble in New Mehico

With a busy day ahead of us, we skip visiting Las Cruces (even know Leslie met a couple from Columbus that loved it and wanted to move there). So we pack up our camp again and head North into New Mexico.

The mountains are still amazing in New Mehico, but when we reached White Sands National Monument, we are floored by its pristine beauty. Acres of white sand dunes that look like snow roll in every direction for hours. The gift shop at the visitor center sells sleds that you can use to "sand surf" throughout the park. You don't move as fast as you do in snow, but it's still fun. We were a little frightened by the fact that slipping off the sled would throw you into the hard sand, but we knew we had to take advantage of this once in a lifetime chance. Just standng on top of a dune and seeing noting but pure white hills for miles was enough.



After leaving the White Sands monument, we continued north to the historically monumental town of Roswell. We quickly found the International UFO Museum and jumped inside for a free tour of the history behind the crash in the 1940s. But of course, it wasn't free anymore as they just started charging $5 per person because they are constructing a new facility. But anyway, the museum was pretty basic but actually quite informative and they make a good case for the crash and cover-up by the U.S. government. Maybe I shouldn't have said that. Maybe the government is monitoring this and will soon "relocate" me to an unknown facility. Maybe the only one who will save me is good ol' Jack Burton. Speaking of, check out this guys awesome hair. As soon as Leslie saw this mullet, she whipped out the camera and snapped the shot. It's all in the reflexes.


By the way, the exhibit talked heavily about Wright Patterson Airforce Base in Dayton since that is where the alien was taken. For some reason, Miamisburg was circled on a map on one of the displays. I'm not sure if they think Wright Pat is there or what, but it was pretty cool to see my home town gettin some recognition aside from being the place where I grew up. Check the pictures on the link below if you dont believe us.

We stopped in the Not of This World Cafe and decided there was nothing we wanted, so we were on the road again for Carlsbad Cavern. Once we reached the park, we traveled a few more miles into the park up another twisty, windy path. All the tours and the Natural Entrance were closed but the "Big Room, was still open. The temperature was quite a bit cooler 750 feet below the Earth, but again, the scenery was amazing. As Leslie and I keep saying to each other, it's as if everytime you think you've seen the most amazing sight, the next thing you see tops it. The enormous cave was full of incredible formations and interesting information. The most amazing face was that the loop we were on was about a mile and a half, but the entire cavern is over 3o miles long. And that's not even the largest. Apparently, there is a 100 mile long cave that is off limits to tourists. Does everyone remember their elementary school lesson on the difference between stalagmites and stalagtites? The "t" in stalagtites stands for top, and that is where they grow from.

After leaving the caverns, we grabbed some Sonic and drove another long leg to Fort Stockton, Texas where we camped under the bright Texas stars. It was windy, but a good night's sleep that we will need since the next day is a long drive to San Antonio.

More Pictures

Fudge Pucker

What a great experience! Camping out in the middle of a secluded desert in beautiful Saguaro National Park just outside of Tucson. Leslie didn't like it much, but I really felt in tune with the earth and nature. You can call me a tree hugger for that comment, but there weren't any trees around, just cacti. I tried hugging one, but it hurt me. What a prick! But I got the point.

Well, once the novelty of "roughing" it wore off, we walked to the bathrooms a few feet a way and brushed our teeth and I took a shower under a water spiggot. That was...interesting. Leslie decided to go extreme outdoorsy and not shower at all. She loves the rugged lifestyle of living off the land. She's already talking about selling the rest of what little belongings we have and finding ourselves in the mountains, eating berries and squirrels and extracting water out of bear dung.

Anyway, today we went to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum where they had many exhibits about the inhabitants of the Sonora Desert which spreads from Arizona to California and Mehico. There were birds, fish, insects, mountain lions and a lot more.

Next, we made it to Tombstone, the fake city built to replicate the awesome movie of the same name. Or maybe the town came before the movie. We're not sure, but it's not important. What is important are these two things:

1. In every post I write, I intend on making some sort of Kurt Russell connection

2. There was a wonderful shop in Tombstone that sold homemade fugde called Grandma Fudge Puckers

The town was actually pretty cool, even with the heavy tourist-catered gift shops. There was a building called the "Bird Cage" which was once a brothel and it is largely untouched from how it was in the late 1800s. There are still bullets in the wall from that time period. After eating lunch and having a local beer (Nimbus) at Big Nose Kate's Saloon we went to the main event - the O.K. Corral shootout. As time grew closer to high two (it wasn't at noon), dark clouds formed overhead, portending of the chaos that would ensue. It really was movie-esque, but then it actually rained and the gunfight was delayed. I'm not sure how accurate a rain delay in a gunfight is, but we went with it. Once we finally saw the academy award winning performance, we learned that Wyatt Earp seemed to be a little bit of a bully and that most of the outlaws killed were unarmed. But it was still fun even though it cost more than renting the movie.

Next (we did a lot this day), we traversed the winding Arizona roads to Chiricahua National Monument. Along the way we saw a pretty sweet hawk on the side of the road. This park was absolutely amazing. If there was one place I would most like to come back to so far, it's here. The rock formations are unbelievable and the drive to the mountain top is breathtaking. The wooded area at the base of the mountain is also beautiful. The pictures will not do it justice. Leslie could hardly enjoy it however, due to the steep drive up and down the mountain. (A side note from Leslie: I've really learned I have an aversion to driving on steep, winding roads on this trip. I think it's becoming a phobia.)

Finally, after several more hours of driving (in thunderstorms), we crossed into Texas and eventually set up camp in Las Cruces. By this time it is about 12am so we are tired and quickly fall asleep and our adventure continues into our dreams of making the next Kurt Russell reference. Will it be Overboard? Or maybe Captain Ron. Stay tuned to find out.

Picture time! Click here.

The desert really is deserted...

After a fine, fine night's rest at Jake's house, Billy and I took drove around the Tempe area. We checked out Arizona State University and their cool little strip downtown, which is like a High Street for you OSU-ers or an upscale Court Street for you OU-ers. We then went to the Tempe Lake area where we were going to rent a kayak, but remembered it was noon in Arizona, which means the temperature was 2 degrees away from the sun. So we skipped any outdoor activity.

After that, we had a fabulous lunch with Jake at a Mexican restaurant at Tia Rosa's. They had great lunch combinations and an even better cheese crisp (good suggestion, Jake!). It had a great atmosphere - you should check it out if you're in the area.

We then left Jake and Phoenix behind, and made our way to Casa Grande National Monument. This was a fantastic park that has an amazing four-story Native American ruin from a civilization that has been around since the birth of Christ. Who knew? Anyway, this civilization built this amazing ruin and most of it is preserved. It's between Phoenix and Tucson.

A travel tip: Buy a National Parks pass. For $80 a year, you and your family can have free admission to any national park or national monument or forest. This is a real bargain, when you consider the admission to most of the large parks is around $25.

Anyway, we made our way to Tucson, where we were going to camp for the night. We ended up staying in Saguaro National Park. It's not far from downtown Tucson, but we rounded the corner of this mountain and BANG! It was the most beautiful landscape I've ever seen. It was like something out of a movie. These huge saguaro cacti dotted the landscape and the mountains provided the backdrop.
Our campsite was in this park and when we got there, it was pretty much completely empty. There were about 100 sites and we saw maybe 2 occupied other than us and there was no one manning the ranger station (it's off-season in Arizona right now). Now, the forest is pretty deserted. And now the campgound is really deserted. And that makes me really scared. The whole campground was beautiful, but I had visions of a) a serial killer getting us in the middle of the night or b) a wild animal (i.e. coyote, rattlesnake) getting us in the middle of the night. No one would ever find our bodies. I'm sure of it. Did I mention there were no lights and it was completely dark. Yeah.

Anyway, Billy loves that sort of remoteness so I sucked it up and stayed awake pretty much all night waiting for something to creep up and get us.

I forgot to mention that after setting up camp, we drove back into downtown Tucson and had a really fabulous meal at El Charro. El Charro has gotten great reviews in USA Today and other national publications. And the food was fantastic. They're known for their carne seca, which was so tender and flavorful. It was a really funky little restaurant. I believe it's the longest running family restaraunt in Tuscon.

Great day! Great scenery and great food!

I also forgot an excursion from yesterday so I'll just tell you about it now. In between the Grand Canyon and Flagstaff is Wupatki National Monument. It is a ruins of the largest ruins from 800 years ago. By the time we got there, the visitors center was closed and no one was there. But you can still access the ruins so we walked over to it. As we were walking, it was windy and raining, and completely desolate. It was really eerie out there, with the rain and these really old ruins. The wind was whipping around and there was even thunder crashing. Unbelievable. Even more eerie, when we got into the car, the radio was playing Native American chants. Creepy. But very cool.

Click here for today's fantastic photos.