The road to Mobile

May 25^th

 Tourist in Old pharmacy in New Orleans
Spent some time in New Orleans browsing around the French quarter and enjoying the sunshine and atmosphere.  We visited a pharmacy museum; the French are proud of the fact that Pharmacy was widely practiced in New Orleans before other States.  Part of the reason is that in the early days, there was a lot of disease in Louisiana because of the mosquitoes, swamps and humidity.  Yellow fever outbreaks were particularly bad.  Some references to voodoo here because of the early association with Haiti - another French colony.

Paddle  steamer awaiting passengers in New Orleans
The road from New Orleans took us over Lake Pontrachain , which is really a large bay, and then we drove around the coast to Mobile.  The beaches are beautiful with very light coloured sand and almost no people about.  We noticed some evidence of hurricane damage as some houses have not been repaired yet but the majority are looking good. People told us that most of the coastal houses between New Orleans and Bilroxi have had to be rebuilt.  We noticed that they were all on very high stilts, presumably because of the likelihood of flooding. Or alligators.

 David on the beach near Biloxi, Gulf of Mexico.
There is a little bit of black sand polluting the light sand and it is claimed that this is a result of the BP spill.  We did hear that the people have done very well out of the compensation paid by BP and there were lots of shrimp boats out in the bay.  It would be nice to come back here and stay for longer.  It’s still hot and humid but we head north tomorrow after our final car exchange, so we should be cooling down soon.  Lots of tornado warnings.  And the giant hailstones are after us again.......