East Coast to Texas
Road Trip USA – Epic Journey 2016-18 Part XII
East Coast
We have passed the big cities whose names we are all familiar with. From New York via Philadelphia - Washington DC - we leave to the right - we drive south. And we arrive in New Bern.
New Bern, North Carolina.
Here we spend a night on an official campground. On the east coast, it is not as easy to camp wild as west of the Mississippi. Much more populated here, many more people and cities.
Now comes one of the highlights of this trip, at least for me. From the first time I caught a glimpse of a photo of this creature, I knew that's where I wanted to go!
It is located very close to Charleston, the capital of South Carolina. But when we arrived, we were faced with closed doors. It has been fenced off. Not to charge admission, but to protect against vandalism.
However, when ten o'clock in the morning strikes, the gates open and we are allowed to enter. Not just us; many other visitors want to see it up close, touch it, and feel it. Take pictures, that too.
She is rustic, mystical, immense. She is the Angel Oak Tree, the highest of all the angels of the oaks.
Her branches, thick and twisted, must be supported to keep her as she grows. What a mighty tree. I am beside myself with awe. Only the many people and their cell phones cloud the atmosphere a bit.
We have seen many superlative trees, including some of the oldest and largest Redwoods in California, also the 3000-year-old Cypress in Tule, Oaxaca, in Mexico, but none were like her; the Angel Oak of Charleston.
Enough of the gushing. Our journey continues down the east coast of the U.S. to Savannah, Georgia, an interesting, warm city. Many bars and restaurants attract us. We are allowed to sleep here together with other campers in the spacious parking lot of the tourist center.
Florida
And then we arrive in Florida. Finally, we are allowed to use our tarp. It is thundery. After heavy showers during the night, the sun shines from the next day on. It is the end of October and pleasantly warm.
We spend a few days on a beautiful overgrown camping site, which is looked after by, may we call them that, a hillbilly family, as it is written in the book.
Don't misunderstand, they are lovely, hospitable people. Just don't bring up politics, it won't do any good. They are convinced people.
After the cold north, we enjoy the humid jungle of Florida. Add full moon and fire, a magical combination.
In the south of the state are the Everglades. Unfortunately, a large part of the national park is closed.
A month ago, Hurricane Irma hit the Caribbean, leaving a trail of devastation in its wake. A large part of the park's infrastructure has to be repaired first.
We get an impression of the wide water landscapes of the huge park, see alligators and many water birds. We are almost the only visitors.
Miami and Key West
But now we also want to see Miami. In Fort Lauderdale, we have already stopped many times on our way from North to South America or vice versa, but at the most, we got a little bit of the sultry Caribbean air.
Well, once we drive over the Miami Beach strip, so we can tick that off as well. On the left high hotel facades and many restaurants, on the right the beach.
We are much more interested in Little Havana, where we stroll down the street to Cuban music and Spanish conversations, watch the old señores in the park playing their popular game of dominoes, and sip mojitos. Of course, we like the Caribbean flair. And so we also take positive memories from Miami with us.
Key West in and of itself was not on our itinerary. I am much more curious about the road there.
It's special because it leads over countless bridges across the Florida Keys to the southernmost point of Florida. As the crow flies, the distance to Havana, Cuba, is shorter than back to Miami.
The nest Key West is a popular vacation destination and party place with many bars and festivals, souvenir stores, and colorful people.
We especially like the sunny warmth, the Caribbean sea, the old wooden houses, gnarled trees, and jungle plants.
From here the road leads only northward, back to the other Florida. In the northern part of the state, we are in dark red America. Conservative, Trump, redneck. You know the part.
Pretty quickly we continue west. Only briefly we touch Alabama, spend the night somewhere on a free campground in Mississippi, and then reach Louisiana. The "Deep South" of the USA would interest me as well, I am attracted by almost all regions of the world because I want to gather personal impressions of the different places and people living there. But time is starting to push again. And there are more important places we want to see.
New Orleans
For example, New Orleans. The city inspires us. So many cultures and people meet here; a motley mix of smells, tastes, and sounds.
We eat Cajun Jambalaya, a kind of Paella à la Louisiana (I skip the alligator burger) visit the Louis Armstrong City Park, and go on a bar tour in the evening. Live music plays in every corner of the city. It pulsates and almost bursts at the seams with joie de vivre. And we are right in the middle of it.
One of the few times we don't sleep in our van. Not far from the center, we are allowed to surf on a couch for which we are really grateful. In the heat here it would be no fun in our tin box.
A little south of New Orleans lies the swamp of the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve. I love nature here on the Mississippi Delta. We are surrounded by water and the creatures that live in it.
It is teeming with alligators, snakes, sea eagles, and many other creatures. We walk across wooden bridges through the swamp and can observe the alligators up close as they sunbathe peacefully.
After New Orleans, we drive along the Mississippi River to Natchez, which was recommended to us by our hostess in New Orleans. She also gave me a history book about the mighty river in which you can learn how the Mississippi was used in the times of the wild west.
Those were hard times. Bandits sought your life, waves of yellow fever took countless lives, and life on the river was not idyllic as I would like to imagine. In the book, American history is portrayed very vividly; the push to the West, and the Civil War, in which Natchez on the Mississippi played a key role.
The town is small and very quiet today. You can admire the big river that separates the east from the west and take nostalgic steamboat rides on it. That would also appeal to me. Seraina, however, is not enthusiastic about it, her desire for freedom goes beyond ships.
Texas
So we drive on. West of the Mississippi and Louisiana begins the Lone Star State, the largest state in the USA after Alaska: Texas.
We drive hundreds of miles through the plains with Austin as our destination. The city attracts us because it was advertised to us by different sources as the Mecca of live music and, untypically for Texas, as liberal and progressive.
But somehow we are not in the mood. Austin is alive, we see many young people in the streets, but we are on the road with the camper. And it's uncomfortable every time we have to sleep on the street in a city. I'd find certain cities exciting to live in for a while, to experience them more deeply by working or studying there. But not today.
Big Bend
The next morning we leave the city and go back to nature. And we find it in the magnificent Big Bend National Park right on the Rio Grande, the border to Mexico.
What a wonderful park! Red rocks, barren vastness, stony valleys, the green oasis at the Rio Grande. And again and again, this infinitely deep starry sky that stimulates our imagination. For one week we visit the different corners of the national park, hike, bathe in the hot spring, throw stones over to Mexico and cook on a lonely campsite. Lonesome, just us, the desert and the stars.
Now only the southwest lies ahead of us. We have visited New Mexico and Arizona on previous trips, so we know our way around there a bit. We are driving towards the end of our epic road trip. Not much more, only about 2000 miles separate us from our starting point and destination in Northern California.
Epic Journey 2016-18
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Epic Journey 2016-18
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