Apparently I really needed some rest as I slept 12 hours last night, from 10 to 10. I could not believe it was 10 when I got up. I thought Bill was playing with me and changed the wall clock. I knew I had been tired for the last month and then with the driving but would not have thought I needed that much rest. Needless to say, I felt pretty good all day! To thank Bill for letting me sleep (and because it is Sunday) I made Canadian bacon, toast, fruit and eggs for breakfast. By the time we ate, showered and left it was almost noon.
First stop for today was Chalmette Battlefield and National Cemetery, which is actually part of the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park. The city of Chalmette is just east of New Orleans so it didn’t take long to get there. It was SO hot today that just getting from the car to the visitor’s center I was soaked. The original visitor center was destroyed 5 years ago by the hurricane so a new one is almost complete. In the meantime the visitor center is in an old plantation home on the property called the Beauregard House. It was built in the 1830’s and has survived several hurricanes and the Battle of New Orleans, which was actually in Chalmette and was the battle that won the War of 1812 for the US. It’s really a very good story. The battlefield isn’t terribly impressive, just a canal and embankments but great strategy on the part of Andrew Jackson.
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| From observation deck at National WWII Museum |
From there we headed into New Orleans to the National WWII Museum. By now we were pretty thirsty so we stopped in the coffee shop adjoining the museum so I had a frozen Granita and Bill had a coke and we both had a scone. I guess it was a mini lunch as we ate so late. We were at the museum til it closed and they told us it was time to leave. Bill really enjoyed it and learned some new info about WWII that he didn’t know. That surprised me since he reads about it and watches so many movies on it, I thought he knew it all. We found out that the Allied Forces used inflatable jeeps and boats, etc as decoys to make Hitler think we were going to invade elsewhere. Also we didn’t know how important various animals were in the war. I must say a lot of the photos were a bit gory for me. Then I get all emotional about it and thinking of what those families went through when their sons were never found. Then there’s the family who had 5 sons all enlist and serve on the same ship and none survived.
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| Ready for dinner |
Bill really wanted beignets so we drove back down Peter St. and he dropped me off in front of Café du Monde and while he circled the block I got beignets to go. Only waited a couple of minutes on the curb for him to come back for me, then we headed to a suburb called Metairie to eat dinner at a seafood place called Deanie’s. There’s one in the French Quarter but we decided parking was easier and it would be less crowded there. Our landlord recommended it. No problem getting there but from the signs on the building it was a seafood and bait store. I waited in the truck while Bill went in to make sure there was a restaurant and the one half of the building was a nice restaurant and bar. Bill was happy the TV was on and there was a game to watch! They brought way too much food. Instead of putting bread on the table, they brought a bowl of red skin new potatoes and butter. The “thing” is the potatoes are cooked in something spicy and boy, are they good. We each ate 2 and brought home the other 2 in addition to half of Bill’s baked potato and most of my dinner. He had crab au gratin and really liked it. Not being much of a seafood person he is pretty picky on seafood, but he thoroughly enjoyed it. I had the Crawfish Quartet. I ate my dab of slaw, passed on the huge pile of fries and got right into my crawfish etoufee, yummy! Then I nibbled on some of my fried crawfish and brought the rest home with all of my crawfish au gratin and 2 of my crawfish dressing balls. They kinda looked like hush puppies but were crispy on the outside and kinda mushy in the middle. Guess I have my dinner ready for tomorrow. The beignets were our evening snack. They'd have been better fresh.
On the way back we stopped at the RV to get Xena to ride with us to Wal-Mart. I truly did need to get AAA batteries for my mouse, spray paint for my cactus, a scoop for the cat food, but what I really needed to get was a supply of Hubig pies. I was beginning to think the decadent coconut Hubig pie was going to elude me, but Wal-Mart had 4 racks of pies, mostly apple and lemon. I hunted through them all and was victorious with 6 pies. I will have to carefully ration them to one a day. Might find room in the freezer to squeeze one in for a really stressful day ahead.
Back at the RV, Bill hooked up his nasty hose and drained everything for our trip tomorrow. I should be putting things away but since I’ve gotten it down to a science, will wait til morning. Too bad it won’t be another 10 AM wake up, it will be 7 at least. Ah, sweet coconut dreams….
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