ROAD TRIP 2006, WESTWARD: ADVENTURES IN EAST TEXAS

Day 9 (6/15): “Y’all might be shot”

All good Southern mornings start with a 12-pack of beer. Unfortunately, this one just involved buying one, to replace the one we finished off the night before. That and a tall iced mug of my actual drug choice. I avoid Starbucks like the plague in real life, but on the road, its the only reliably adequate cup of coffee to be had.

New Orleans was devastated, as advertised. Houses, department stores, all kinds of places were still little more than rubble, but the rebuilding effort was in evidence everywhere. We took a detour off the interstate to touch the Gulf of Mexico, and along a lonely road through marsh and estuary, the washed out shreds of whole towns were strewn among the reeds.

On the beach, the water was impossibly warm. As we were leaving, this guy emerged from behind the pickup he had pulled up to the shore and began a-hollerin’ and a-waving’. As I got closer, I heard him bellow over the wind, “Come over hear and see buzz!” Confused, I got closer, but he just repeated himself, waving more enthusiastically. Buzz turned out to be a dead three-foot alligator he had adorned with over-size sunglasses. In true Southern fashion he told us a long story of how Katrina had washed the sea over the dune and into the nearby freshwater marshes, killing much of the vegetation and wreaking havoc with the whole food chain, resulting in starving gators that now ventured over the dunes and onto the beach to feed on the carrion in the wrack. Unlike most Southerners, he omitted the entirety of his autobiography, for which I was grateful.

Between Louisiana and Texas, the oil industry was in evidence. Off shore rigs and massive refineries seemed to be the only human structures around, which felt alien.

We had dinner in Houston with one of Dave’s former students, whose family owns many restaurants in the state. Merely OK, not a patch on Leetha’s.

Went searching for a campsite in the outskirts of town, and found an RV park with a couple tent sites. Finding the office closed, we were about to find a site when the night manager pulled up in a beat up old truck. He told us to follow him to a site and we could check in in the morning, but,

“Y’all want to stay out of the RV area, ‘cuz y’might get shot.”

“. . . uh-huh.”

“Y’see, last year, we had this one fellah got drunk, shot up the inside of his RV, then shot up his neighbor’s RV.”

“. . . ok”

“So y’all stay out of the RV area.”

“You got it.”

When we got to the site, he pointed us toward the bathrooms, the laundry, let us know the nearest places to eat if we were hungry, and told us to make sure our tent was zipped up because there were water moccasins in the canal behind the hedge.

We survived the night.

Day 10 (6/16): Omnipappas

Next day we again dined with Dave’s student, this time with said student’s Dad, again in one of said family’s many restaurants (Pappas Burger). Pappas senior then kindly showed us around the his fancy steakhouse next door, through the kitchens and everything. It was my first time actually getting to check out the inner workings of a nice restaurant, but it was from a totally different perspective than I might have imagined. The dad was a businessman through and through, and all conversation was about supply chains, customer experience, consistency, not ingredients (well, a little), artistry, novelty, or any of the other artsy fartsy things I value in a restaurant. Not that I am bashing the business approach. Every restaurant is a business, after all, and the slim success rate of most restaurants probably results from neglecting that fact. The Pappas family’s multigenerational success in the restaurant business speaks to their savvy. Touring the place and listening to the man talk was a very, very interesting experience for which I am quite grateful.

Then we were westbound to Austin. We stopped at Bastrop State Park so I could finally experience something other than urban Texas. We decided we didn’t want to pay the entrance fee for an hour or two of tooling around, but I did manage to noose a common spotted whiptail (Cnemadophorus gularis) by the gate. Cute little guy. I figure a new lizard can keep me fueled for a day or two of urban touring.

In Austin, we checked into our rooms and, for the third meal in a row, dined at a Pappas establishment (Pappasitos), a decent Tex Mex place. Spent the rest of the night sipping Jack Daniels and watching Starship Troopers, which, in case you were unaware, is a cinematic masterpiece.