Wednesday 26 November, 2014

St Francisville is the oldest town in the Florida Parishes of Louisiana. It is 2 miles long and 2 yards wide. Again, a very small town and probably the smallest on this trip, population of 1500. It lies on a ridge formed by dust storms in the Glacial period.

It has many antebellum homes and we think we've seen enough of these!

It had a shopping centre and we did get a bit excited until we saw only a grocery store and dollar shop! Walked around town, found a lovely coffee shop and then headed back to the boat.

We saw many of these beautiful trees with lots of Spanish Moss hanging from them.

This afternoon we headed to the Angola Prison. 18,000acres and close to being self sufficient in growing wheat, corn and soybeans (4 million pounds of vegetables). They also raise cattle, train bloodhounds and drug dogs and refurbish wheelchairs to send to underprivileged areas. All physically abled inmates work at some job. Sadly 90 % of the crimes committed by the inmates were done under the influence of drugs or alcohol.  The better their behavior the more privileges they have. Many of them mentor others, including the "at risk" kids who are brought to the prison to try to rehabilitate them early.

In the past this prison has been known as America's most dangerous penitentiary.  Today it is known as a model facility and takes great pride in its faith based rehabilitation of its 6000 inmates 83 of whom are on Death Row. Louisiana has mandatory sentencing, if you receive a life sentence, you serve life. The average sentence in Angola is 92 years.

The change has been attributed to the new warden. He had trained as a teacher, taught 3 months and didn't like it so applied for a job in a correctional facility. It is said he thinks outside the box and because he had a teaching background had a different skill set.

One difference is that each year they have a series of rodeos in which the inmates participate in the events. The rodeos sell out more quickly each year and has resulted in huge expansion to the grandstands! About 15,000 people attend the rodeo!

An area of the prison that is no longer used is the solitary confinement

Warden Cain has begun a theology school at the prison, ensures all inmates are literate and healthy. Many other states are now following the programs that Angola has implemented with great success!

Tuesday 25 November, 2014

Natchez today! Can't believe what people did in the 1700's. The flatboat men brought goods downriver to the city of Natchez for further transport to New Orleans then they walked home...444miles, now known as the Natchez Trace to Nashville!

Natchez was made wealthy by Cotton. In 1860 it was the richest city in the US as so many plantation owners lived here.

Most of these towns are very small and easy to walk around, however the Hop on Hop off busses are great as they give you the history of the town.

Can't see this ever happening in Brisbane! They have erected a Christmas Tree in the middle of an intersection and people have to drive around it! Amazing!!!

This is the home of Regina Carboneau, who is the Culinary Director and Chef de Cuisine of the American Queen. 

Not a lot to do in this town so we just walked around, had a coffee and visited Stanton Hall, built by a cotton broker, Frederick Stanton, on an entire city block. It is an Antebellum Classical Revival Mansion and was bought by the Pilgrimage Garden Club to preserve its historic significance.

Lovely view of the sunset on the river

And before we sailed

And of the calliope as we leave Natchez.

  

Thanksgiving, Thusday 27 November, 2014

We are docked in front of Nottoway Plantation, the most magnificent remaining antebellum mansion. Believe it or not, now owned by an Australian, Paul Ramsey! Nottoway was built by John Hampden Randolph in the mid 1850's for his wife and 11 children. When he married his wife, her dowery was $22,000 and 25 slaves ($250,000) in today's money! He used this money to buy further properties for cotton.

This place was stunning and so much ahead of its time. It took 6 years in the planning, cutting down the cypress trees from their other property, curing the timber and soaking it in water to curve it and making all the bricks on site. It was designed in Greek Revival and Italianate style.

The ceilings are 15 feet and doors 11 feet tall. There are 64 rooms in this mansion including 165 doors and 200 windows!

In the entry the handmade moldings all had significances: the very top portrayed hands praying to show that the family was a religious one, the eggs meant life, the arrows death.

This house had three things that were not in any other house at the time: flush toilets, hot and cold running water and gas lights. Randolph had one of his slaves make the gas from the waste of the sugar cane (bagasse), water and calcium carbide. The chandeliers were Baccarat Chrystal!

And hand painted porcelain doorknobs

The dining room table sat 16 and had beautiful China.

The white room was as it names implies all white. Randolph wanted it this way so it would show off the colours and lavishness of the women's gowns.

It even had a mirror that was curved so the parents could see their children in any corner of the room without making it obvious that they were keeping an eye on their behaviour!

At the age of 13, the boys had to move into another part of the house that was still connected but more remote so that the boy's friends would not be able to associate with the girls of the house.

It was rude in those days to even speak about ankles! They were called limbs and were not to be seen. They even had a mirror in the entry for the girls to check the length of their dress to make sure that their ankles did not show. As this view was so forbidden, boys had to walk up the right set of entry stairs while the girls walked up the left so the boys would not see the girls ankles as they walked up the stairs!

The ladies parkour was on one side of the entry 

and the men's on the other. No female was allowed in the men's room, not even to clean!

During this era, to "brag" unobtrusively that you paid off your house, a hole was drilled in the stair bannister and the deeds to the house put in then sealed with a porcelain knob! As Randolph had paid $80,000 cash (in 1959) upon the completion of his house, he did not "brag" but certainly the size of the house showed everyone that he had money. He had started in cotton but then realized that the future was in sugar cane. After changing over, he tripled his money. During the civil war, he could not do anything as the Union had stopped all the river traffic and had stolen their cattle and horses, so he took his slaves and all his valuables, left his wife in charge of the house and went to Texas to continue growing sugar cane.

The home is now a resort after Ramsey invested $14million to refurbish the entire plantation. You can stay, eat or book rooms for functions and weddings!

Monday 24 November, 2014

Many of the trees look so lovely when they change colour! It has been a strange season this year...winter chills coming much earlier than normal. The states are due for their third winter storm in the last two weeks. Buffalo New York had over 2 metres  of snow in a few days.

Today we are in Vicksburg, settled by the French in 1719. Many of its citizens were wiped out by Yellow Fever in 1819. 

We stopped at the Old Depot Museum, where they had a video and diorama about the Civil War (siege of Vicksburg) and many model trains, boats and houses. The museum has the worlds largest collection of ship models.

We then walked to the Anchuca (Happy home) Mansion which was an antebellum home. An antebellum home was built before the Civil War...this one in 1819.

We also stopped at the Coca Cola Museum as Vicksburg was where Coco Cola was developed by a man named Pemberton, in his backyard! It was named by the bookkeeper, Robinson, who designed the script. Pemberton died and left the business to Chandler who felt advertising was the key to selling. Coca cola sold at the soda fountain for 5cents a glass. It was first bottled in 1894 in the below machine.

Rob then went to the Old Court House Museum while I went to the doll museum. Was an amazing display of dolls of all years since the 1800's!

The levy built to protect the city has a wonderful series of 32 murals that depict the history of the city. Amazing that there was no graffiti on them nor in any part of the city for that matter. Each mural had a plaque explaining the artwork.

In the afternoon we took the optional tour "On the Front Lines of the Civil War". It was an excellent way to learn about the Civil War. We started with a video and then hopped on busses to tour the National Military Park, a 16 mile road that travels through the 1300 markers and monuments that mark important victories or milestones. We saw the Confederate and Union lines...they were so close together (less than a mile apart). The Civil War was between the Northern and Southert States over the issue of slavery. The South wanted slavery and was ready to form the Southern Union of states, while the Noth wanted to free the slaves. Over 700,000 men died during the 4 year war, a real tragedy. Only the Unionists killed in the Battle were allowed to be buried in the Military Park. 17,000 are buried but only 4,000 were ever identified. The Confederate men were buried in town ... About 28,000 of them. Such a sad loss to the communities.The Battle of Vicksburg, won by the Unionists was key to shaping the country.

This was a view of one area of the battlefield.

Illinois built this monument in memorial of the 36,000 men from this state that fought and died in the Civil War at Vicksburg.

The Cairo was an iron clad gun boat that sunk in 12 minutes but all the men were rescued.

The boat was ready to leave Vicksburg but had to lower the stacks to go under the bridge. Was that amazing to watch!

Saturday 22 / Sunday 23 November 2014

Today is our last day in Memphis. After breakfast, we lined up with everyone to get our boarding cards and have our phots taken for on board security. We then had to wait in line for our dinner seatings. All was going smoothly and reasonably quickly until a tour director decided she needed to place all her tour members together. So 45 minutes later we could confirm our seats and then decide what we were going to do until 4pm when we caught the bus to the American Queen Paddlewheeler!

I thought we'd go shopping until I found out that the Mall was a $50 taxi ride away (each way). So we decided to walk over to Mud Island which was a museum on the Civil War. As we started to walk over the bridge we were met with a steel gate.. It was closed for the winter! So we walked back to the hotel to see if we could get an earlier bus to the boat but they were all filled so were told we could get a taxi if we wanted to go over earlier. So several hours to still fill in until 3pm when we could board so we thought we'd walk along the Main Street Mall. Saturday morning and you could shoot a cannon down the street and hit no one. 

Not only was the city deserted, there were so many shops that were empty. And yet we were told the place is doing so much better than 15 years ago. So we came back to the hotel to have a coffee shop as we couldn't find a decent one on Main St and met up with Bill and Diane. We decided to ride the bus around the part of town we hadn't yet been to as we had a free pass. Not much better than the rest of town that we had found unappealing for most of the way and then we passed some new looking units to the south of downtown but that was it. Back to the hotel for a bite of lunch and then we decided to take the free bus to the wharf. That worked out great as we got there before any of the hotel busses and could board without the crowd as they were expecting 400 on the boat! They had a brass band playing as we boarded and we were met by the captain and about 15 staff offering some savory snacks. 

We thought we would be next to Bill and Diane as we have consecutive cabin numbers but it turned out they were on opposite sides of the boat. 

After the obligatory fire drill practice 

and after I unpacked, we went to explore what was on the boat. The interior of the rooms (dining, lounges and saloon) is beautiful! Our cabin is a decent size with doors out to the deck and nicely decorated.

We have opted for the early sitting for dinner at 5:15 which is a bit early but better than the 7:45 which is certainly too late! Dinner was 4 courses and several choices of each. Everything was excellent. I had the best, most tender steak I've had in a long time. But we decided we can't do 4 courses each night!

After dinner we went to the Grand Saloon for a Bluegrass show...2 groups of sisters performing together and they were terrific!

We sailed at 9:30pm for Vicksburg, Mississippi. I don't know how far it is but we will be cruising the river all day Sunday.

We woke up to a rainy and foggy day...a good day for lazing around! After breakfast we had a tour orientation to give us an overview of the procedures for docking and the Hop on Hop off bus. They also gave a short description of the optional tours and costs.

We then got in line to book one of the optional tours before heading for the dining hall to have a small lunch. I had a half cup of delicious cream of broccoli soup, a very small salad and the smallest brownie I could find! Rob had a bacon and cheese hamburger...I don't know how he did after the huge breakfast we ate.

Headed for the room to read for awhile but when I went to the bathroom, the room had a couple centimeters of water over it that was seeping onto the carpet. So, rang the pursers office and it only took a few minutes for someone to come. Evidently the toilet needed a new water pump so the guy went off to get the new part. After he finished another guy came to vacuum up all the water and disinfect the floor. We now have a blower drying the floor!

Dinner again was great, Rob had 4 courses (again, don't know where he put it as the rest of us only had the main meal with dessert. Hard to resist as the desserts are so good!

After dinner we watched the "Bourbon to Beale" show, "a musical journey from New Orleans to Memphis to celebrate the musical heritage of these cities." Again very good!

Friday 21 November, 2014

Warming up, 6c when we set out and probably got to 10c. Never thought I'd be excited to see 10c!!

Today we walked several blocks to catch the hop on hop off bus and we waited, and we waited and we waited. Thankfully we were at an information centre and they rang the dispatcher who said it would be about 20 min more. The driver was apologetic and said he was sent to pick someone else. He dropped us off at the Saint Blues Guitar Factory. 

 

They even had some guitar like instruments made of cigar boxes. They said that they were kind of like a guitar, banjo and ukulele! We then walked down to Sun Studios where Elvis started his recording career. Diane and Bill stayed on to go on the tour while Rob and I walked about a mile or so to see the National Civil Rights Museum.

Martin Luther King was killed at the Lorraine Hotel. After his death the hotel fell into disrepair. There were many people who felt that it was such an important place that it should be preserved so a public private partnership was formed with the city and the result is an amazing museum about the history of the African Americans and their struggle for equality. It was horrifying to see how poorly they had been treated.  I recalled reading about many of the scenarios as I was growing up.  It was extremely well done with lots of visual displays, videos, murals, theaters and simulated scenarios. They even had kept the room that King had stayed in as it was. 

Across the street they also kept the bathroom where they felt that the shot that killed King had come from. The displays showed the timeline and the investigation into the murder of King. It also had all the forensic information and several scenarios that they thought were plausible. To this day, they are still not sure if James Earl Ray killed Martin Luther King by himself or if it was part of a conspiracy.

We then walked to Beale Street to get a bite to eat. 

Can't say I am impressed with Beale Street or Memphis for that matter. 

Everywhere we have walked, we have been met with beggars or pan handlers as they call them chatting and being very friendly then asking for money.  I feel I need to look over my shoulder wherever we walk. Streets and footpaths need repairing and cleaning. So many of the shops are empty. Memphis has an unemployment rate of 10%. There is no building going on...quite different to Nashville which was clean, friendly, active and there was construction happening everywhere.

We looked at several of the "dives" on Beale St and ended up at an Irish place called Silky's. They had a pretty good live band and the food wasn't bad either.  

Stopped at another place for ice cream cones on the way home! 

Waited 15 min for our hop on hop off bus ( another disappointment) and ended up taking the city bus home ( very cheap at $1 a ticket!)