4/6 – 4/7/19
4-6
To save money, I had decided to stay in the suburb of Jefferson, just west of New Orleans proper. Counting on the weather to hold, I would ride the ten miles or so from my hotel to the city center, tour the main attractions by bike, and cycle back in the evening. This proved easier to plan than to execute.
Initially, however, all went well. As I rode out from my hotel, I found that a dense fog had settled on the river overnight, limiting visibility to about a block. I made my way through the cool mist to the Mississippi River Trail, which runs along the levee tops east of New Orleans. From the trail, I could see that the river had risen to about ten feet above the level of the streets. The scattering of houses along the river side of the levee were surrounded by floodwater that reached more than halfway up their brick piers. The inhabitants, however, didn’t seem to be fazed; as I watched, a man led two small goats from the porch of one marooned house, and turned them loose to graze along the levee.
I turned into the city at Audubon Park, whose lush vegetation matched the already tropical humidity. Beyond the park, I rode down streets lined with narrow “shotgun” houses – so called, supposedly, because a bullet shot through the front door could sail clear through the house without hitting anything. I continued on through the Garden District, famous for its Gilded Age mansions, and spent a pleasant half-hour cruising along shady St. Charles Avenue, admiring the monumental extravagances on both sides.
Riding on through downtown New Orleans, where the tops of the skyscrapers were still draped in fog, I was nearing the French Quarter when half my right pedal abruptly broke off. Adjusting as best I could, I continued into the Quarter, already buzzing with tourists. I walked around Jackson Square, and took the requisite photos of the cathedral and street entertainers. Then I cruised up and down the adjacent streets. I was unsurprised to find that, much like the Vegas Strip or Amsterdam’s Red Light District, Bourbon Street had a distinctly hungover feel in the cool light of day.
Balanced precariously on my maimed pedals, I continued west through the Marigny neighborhood, pausing to gawk at the spectacle of seagoing freighters bobbing twenty feet above the level of the streets. After lunch at an excellent barbecue place in Bywater, I turned north to visit the St. Roch Cemetery. In a pleasant change from the carnival atmosphere around some of the city’s better-known burial places, St. Roch was deserted when I arrived. After peering into the Gothic chapel at the heart of the complex, I paced the aisles of sun-bleached mausoleums, footfalls ringing. A sudden breeze sent dried leaves rattling past, and carried the lonely sound of a distant train horn.
Back among the living, I continued my ride, pausing in shady City Park to search for a bike shop that could replace my pedal. I found a place, had the job done, and set off again. The weather was perfect for a ride; and New Orleans was a pleasure to explore. I was enjoying myself immensely, so it was probably inevitable that, less than an hour after leaving the bike shop, I would have a nasty flat in a remote and impoverished neighborhood. Having heedlessly neglected to bring a spare tube, I decided to find another bike shop and have the work done there. My phone informed me that the nearest open shop was about two miles away, and I duly headed in that direction. As I approached, however, I found my progress blocked by a sprawling festival that filled the streets for blocks around the address. I meandered and pleaded and fought my way through the crowd – and finally discovered that the store had closed early.
I had, I decided, two options. I could call an uber, lock my bike somewhere inconspicuous, and come back with the car to retrieve it; or I could simply walk the ten miles back to my hotel. The cost of an uber and (more importantly) the real possibility that someone would cut my cheap cable lock while I was gone made the first alternative unappealing. That left the long walk home.
If nothing else, the endless walk back to Jefferson gave me ample opportunity to see New Orleans at a leisurely pace. I headed back down St. Charles Avenue, envying the passengers of passing streetcars. After a long stroll through the humbler neighborhoods near the river, I stopped for an enormous shrimp po-boy, washed down with ice-cold root beer. Onward, then, in the shadow of towering riverside gantry cranes, through Audobon park – filled with people sunbathing, playing volleyball, and boiling crawfish – and back onto the levee.
As I continued along the River Trail, the sun set behind the massed refineries and barges on the river, lights flickered on in the city below, and the slenderest of crescent moons rose through a gathering fog.
4-7
Having blistered my feet and crippled my bike the previous day, I decided to spend my morning in the car, exploring the antebellum plantation houses strung out along the banks of the Mississippi between New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Soaring over the fog-shrouded river on the Huey Long Bridge, I turned onto a two-lane road that paralleled the south levee. At first, the scenery was an industrial mélange of looming gantry cranes, hissing refinery towers, and rust-stained oil tanks. Between these colossal facilities, however, were scattered memories of a quieter past: withered villages, crumbling cemeteries, and – of course – sprawling plantation houses. The most famous of these is Oak Alley, named for the spectacular avenue of live oaks that frames its colonnaded façade. I couldn’t stomach the admission charge; but I could, and did, walk to the end of the famous avenue, and admire the view as Spanish moss waved in the breeze overhead.
After stopping to photograph a few other plantations and stroll around the rather decrepit town of Donaldsonville, I reached the outskirts of Baton Rouge – and was stopped there for more than an hour by work on the approaches of the I-10 bridge. If nothing else, this gave me an excellent view of Louisiana’s 34-story state capitol building, built to match the monumental ego of Governor Huey Long.
Back in New Orleans, I had my front tube replaced, parked my car near a convenient Walmart, and rode back to the French Quarter to meet a cousin for dinner. As I cycled back in the cool evening air, I carefully avoided every dip and divot in the road, half-convinced I would somehow manage to destroy my new tire before reaching the car.