Gators, Casinos, and the Big Easy

First allow me to apologise it's been a wild week! We've been going solid and haven't had the battery in depth story action lol. So, where to begin. Upon leaving jeromes we encountered that old issue of really enjoying a place and not wanting to leave, and we got a late
start on the road and didn't even make it out of Alabama. We rolled until dark and ended up camping out behind a church and not even pulling out the tent or bed rolls. We figured an early start was a good idea and had a solid day of skating through a little bit of rain and made it to the Mississippi border by about noon. A few miles down the road we were hurting for water and stopped at the only place around which ended up being really cool. At Gulf Coast Gator Ranch and Tours we got to see and even hold alligators and take an airboat ride around the swamp. We found out that gators love marshmallows and that they can grow up to 19 feet, though the biggest we saw was 16 feet, which is still huge. They gave us directions to a convenience store down the road with great chili cheese dogs and after loading up on chili cheesy goodness we carried on. The next town was called Pascagoula, a town known for it's ship and oil rig building industry. Josh scouted around the area and we found a camping spot under the bridge and even though it was a little windy it was a good spot. That next morning was a great skate: nicely paved roads with decent temperature and plenty to look at. We skated through a small city called ocean springs and then across the bay into Biloxi. Now Biloxi is a casino town and this becomes apparent as soon as you get halfway up the bridge. Immediately after the bridge are three casinos, the Isle, the Palace, and the Grand. Thanks to some intel provided by a freind and fellow traveller, Sean "Rickshaw" Robinson ( rickshawusa.blogspot.com ) we were able to find a spot in a field between them with power and water. Sean has been riding his rickshaw across the country with his dog Coop in the back and has had the good fortune of meeting some of the same cool people as we have. In Mobile he met Bucky (the bartender / photographer) and got to see some cool things in Mobile thanks to Bucky. Anyway back to the Biloxi part of the story. We skated around Biloxi that night and took pictures that I edited with an app I got that can apply different lens, filter, and developing techniques to make the iPhone camera capable of some incredible pics. From Biloxi we took off down the boardwalk and sidewalks along the beach through Gulfport all the way to waveland which is next to Bay St. Louis. waveland was ground zero when hurricane Katrina hit back in 05 and the damages are still very apparent. In neighborhoods that used to have houses everywhere there are now maybe two or three in a block. There are still stilts but not houses, since they were washed away by the storm. The plan at this point was to go to buckingham state park and shower up, but unfortunately that wasn't an option: it wasn't open yet. Damages from Katrina wrecked up that park so bad that it's 5 years later and it's just getting ready to open. Due to our unholy stink from sweat and road grime, we needed showers, bad. We stopped in at the travel express inn and we got s special rate because they were cool people. We stayed overnight but upon awakening Josh was sick and it was raining so I paid for another night. That day I got to know the cleaning lady and decided to cook dinner for her since she was hurting for money. I made a big pot of chili with fresh ingredients and a new secret ingredient (spinach). The next day we took off again towards New Orleans along roads heading through the bayou. With some luck and ALOT of pushing we made it into Nawlins and got to roll around the French quarter. While taking a break we ran into Joshua (not trip Josh) and he ended up finding us a place to stay, buying us dinner, and hanging out with us. I'm gonna cut y'all off here and do the next post starting from this point in a few days so that nawlins stories stay together. Anyway y'all take care