March 7 - New Orleans

Walked to canal and was amazed to discover manually operated gates on the flood control wall which allow cars to pass to the river side of the wall. Obviously these gates must be closed by hand if a flood is expected. Wow. There’s also a huge pump station located in the park to lift flood waters over the wall. From talking to locals, the station here is a small one. Wow again.
A neighbor, Louisiana native, invited me to join them form some Jambalaya they made at camp for lunch. Very tasty.

Headed to see the Lower Ninth Ward where the worst of the Katrina damage was reported to be. On my was exposed to some additional ethnic diversity – a minivan came along side me that was blaring some sort of Muslim sounding music very loud and had a large sticker on the rear window written in Islamic text. It was a middle aged woman driving with a couple younger kids in the back seat. Got into the lower 9th ward and saw a many block area of missing, destroyed and re-built homes. There was a strange traffic jam on the small torn up streets in the area of the environmentally friendly houses constructed by the foundation Brad Pitt is involved with. I overheard someone say that Spike Lee was a block over filming something and there was a large group of people gathered together waving flags. That may explain the sports car in the picture.

The destruction was somewhat shocking. Amazing the power water can have. I learned the original breach of the dike protecting the area was caused by a run away barge that broke loose.

Drove to the Garden District, found a parking spot and Sunny & I went on a walking tour of the area. Lots of beautiful old houses with ornate iron work. Saw the Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, which has the typical New Orleans above ground graves, but the gates were locked since it was Sunday.

Heading back across the river on the bridge, I ran into a traffic jam. Pretty interesting to sit on top of the bridge over the river. As I got to the far side of the bridge the cause of the traffic jam was a wrecked minivan laying on it’s side. I saw a sticker on the rear window which told me it was the same van I had seen a couple hours before….

Traveling along the expressway through Gretna I saw a cemetery which I thought I had read about so I backtracked to find it. Stopped, walked around and took pictures. Turns out it was the Hook and Ladder cemetery located in Gretna. Very interesting. Headed back to the campground and caught just a glimpse of the white tails of a couple swamp rabbits.