The Last Leg

We met up with my old uni mate, Gav, in Bakersfield for a coffee, then on to Oakland for our last couple of nights, and last hurrah - Alcatraz:

Wow, I've always wanted to go! Really creepy as you pull up in the boat. Great set up with audio tour of the cells, plus we had a great tour with Ranger John.

We also really enjoyed Chinatown in San Fran:

And the sealions of course:

Then it was home and time to plan the next trip........

Repeater

As we hurtle back towards San Fran, we nipped in to a few of our favourite places: Macy's veggie coffee house in Flagstaff was a success:

Williams was a great Route 66 stop to grab some souvenirs:

We stopped over in Kingman on Route 66, having some funky local IPAs and local community supporting pizza! Then on to Mojave Park for another nights camping surrounded by Joshua trees:

"Continue 670 miles on I40"

Having done about 1200 miles in 3 days, we slowed down a bit and headed to Sante Fe, staying in a state campground. After picking our camp spot, we went for a tasty Japaenese. On returning we found someone on our spot. As it was the last available spot on site, like true Brits, we said we could share  the site! Turned out to be a blessing in disguise as we had a lovely breakfast with our neighbours the next morning. Really interesting couple, the guy even came 12th at London Olympics in cycling!

The temperatures have really dropped, the night in Sante Fe dropped to 3C. So we are heading back south and taking a more direct route back. We did stop off in Albuquerque for THE BEST cinammon bun EVER in Frontiers. We did giggle as we got on I40 and sat nav said "continue for 670 miles on I40"!

Although we are rushing back, we are still seeing some ace things like the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. It is a site where there used to be a tropical forest, which is now full of mineral traced logs and some amazing layered rocks and big canyons like mini Grand Canyon:

5+5+5

With Sara heading home, we are in our home stretch now. We've got Alcatraz booked in for our last full day in US in a week and a half, in which time we need to get from New Orleans to San Fran. To try and get a chunk out the way, we decided to do three days of 5 hour drives each.

Day 1 - up through Louisiana to the port town of Shreveport, next to Texas border. Casino car park strikes again!

Day 2 - drive through Texas, via a quick stop in Fort Worth to see the Longhorns walking through street:

We also had a wander round Billy Bobs (oldest honkey tonk in world):

We spent our only night in Texas near Abilene ..... In a rest stop! Oh yeah!

Day 3 - after brekkie in cool local place, we had a look round the Dr Seuss statue trail and headed out of Texas to Roswell in New Mexico. After a look round the odd shops and sights, we camped up for the night in a much nicer RV Park.

Red stick

We moved across to the capital of Louisiana, Baton Rouge, literally meaning red stick. On route, we stopped at a Plantation house used in the 19th century, which was interesting.

Then on the other end of the scale, we went to the Tobasco Museum where we got to taste A LOT of different flavours including soda and ice-cream!

We went on a driving tour up to Natchez via lots of pretty scenery of woods and farming, with occasional glimpses of the Mighty Mississippi. Although we preferred the drive back down through Mississippi state proper after Natchez.

We headed back to N'Orleans for our last night with Sara, basically involving a lot of food and a few beers: lunch at the place Obamas go to.....

.....coffee and famous beignets (doughnutty) in City Park, amazing oysters and beers in local bar.

Thanks for visiting Sara, we squeezed in way more than normal and really got under the skin of Louisiana!

Swamping around

We used Lafayette as a base to go on a couple of day trips. First stop was for a swamp tour, Lake Martin looked truly impressive, almost mirror like at times:

Plenty of bigger gators:

Then the next day, after brekkie in our favourite, Waffle House, we headed over to Opelousas where we looked round an eerie museum with automated toys and a mocked up Vieux Village.

We spent the next night in Breaux Bridge, in themed cabins and went out for awesome crawfish in local place, Crazy Bout Crawfish.

Nawlins y'all

Sara joined us out in New Orleans for a week. Our first night in the city was also our first night doing Airbnb in USA. It wasn't the most successful, with us spending most of the night catching roaches the size of the ones we saw in China! Nice!

We looked round the French Quarter and went up and down St Charles st on the tram:

We visited the Mardi Gras museum which had some impressive models:

Then we headed back across to Lafayette, where Livvy gave us another first:

Rain, rain go away

After the big three of San Antonio, Austin and Houston, we moved into Louisiana (state 6). We stayed in a casino car park just over the border! We had to have a bet on the slot machines each time we went to the toilet!

Then the heavens opened over night. The next day felt really fresh, but it was super dark and the rain continued as we carried on driving. It was difficult to drive in such heavy rain and we could see the exits off the freeways getting flooded and cars being abandoned, so we stopped up for the night in Lake Charles. We did stop on the way in Sulphur in a real local place for a gumbo-ey pork with yams and sweet beans, very Louisianan.

We chilled in a suite apartment over night, we even turned the telly on for the first time to watch the weather channel!

Thankfully the weather had improved by the next day, so we had a look at the 'gators in Cameron Prairie Refuge:

We enjoyed the drive towards New Orleans, looking at all the flooding:

We stayed in Lafayette KOA campground, playing retro games in their games room and crazy golf.

We had a super nice brekkie in French Press in downtown Lafayette, celebrating Selina's birthday. We had proper gumbo and granola. Then it was on to Nawlins to meet Sara.........

Weird Austin, Houston we've had a problem

We met up with Sara's friend, Ash and her husband Stefan for lunch in the oldest hotel in Austin. Later, we walked round near Capitol building, enjoying the live music:

Next stop was camping in Houston. We visited the Space Centre, an impressive place. We were able to see the Mission Control as it was back in the 60s:

Saturn V was super impressive:

Livvy was even able to touch the moon:

Olive in front of the Olive capsule: