The day we've waited for: Leaving Texas after 14 days of churn and burn, we are ready to get this huge state behind us in search of smoother roads. Roughly (no pun there) 19 miles east of Kirbyville lies the Texas/Louisiana border. We pass through Bleakwood, Texas (no lie - it is just a gas station/store, with broken down cars everywhere, and logging trucks screaming along road #363), then Bon Wier, Texas. and then:
We licked you Texas! OK, so you licked us that day from Sanderson to Del Rio, you and your righteous weather, sissy lightening strikes, sideways rain and your wimpy tornado watch! But we got out with our lives, so we declare us the winner, not you, Texas. Don't be crying to momma now, Texas.
Note the "what was I thinking" hand gesture.Just after the state line marker, we passed over the Sabine River which shadows the boarder between the two states. With Texas out from under our tires, we continued into beautiful Louisiana, noting on the map that we'd pass through DeRidder, Louisiana in another 24 miles or so. That would be around our lunch time, or second breakfast time, 10 to 11 am. Knowing McDonald's was ahead of us, I started thinking about a BIG MAC and fries, the vision singing to me for miles and miles. We passed through a short rain squall, a good soaker but with 80 or so degrees temp, rain was no big deal.
Louisiana has parish roads, not county roads. Louisiana is different in so many ways, all of them interesting and peculiar. DeRidder, Louisiana is a nice little town, with an interesting story about how it got its name: (http://www.cityofderidder.org/):
The History of DeRidder
The story of DeRidder goes something like this. In 1893, railroads were being built in the United States, and one of their builders was Mr. Stilwell. There was an international financial crisis that year, and Mr. Stilwell could not raise the $3 million needed to finish constructing a railroad from Kansas City down to the Gulf, about 800 miles. Since he could not raise the money in the United States, he decided to go to Europe for aid. He first tried England, but failed. He then went to Holland for assistance. He was at a loss while in Amsterdam, and then remembered a young coffee merchant he had met while on a previous trip to Europe with his wife.
The story of DeRidder goes something like this. In 1893, railroads were being built in the United States, and one of their builders was Mr. Stilwell. There was an international financial crisis that year, and Mr. Stilwell could not raise the $3 million needed to finish constructing a railroad from Kansas City down to the Gulf, about 800 miles. Since he could not raise the money in the United States, he decided to go to Europe for aid. He first tried England, but failed. He then went to Holland for assistance. He was at a loss while in Amsterdam, and then remembered a young coffee merchant he had met while on a previous trip to Europe with his wife.
Mr. Stilwell went to the Coffee Exchange for their list of members, and found the name of the young merchant, Jan Dehouyen. Mr. Stilwell found Jan Dehouyen and told him about his plans for building the railroad in the United States. These plans intrigued Jan Dehouyen, so he raised the $3 million needed for this Kansas City Southern Railroad. Then Mr. Dehouyen decided to change careers from coffee to railroads, and traveled to the United States with Mr. Stilwell.
Jan Dehouyen kept an office in Amsterdam, Holland, and there was a map in his office showing Kansas City in the north and the Gulf in the south. Occasionally, Mr. Dehouyen would be asked to name a place, which might be of interest in the future, which was located along the railroad. Mr. Dehouyen had a sister-in-law named Ella DeRidder Dehouyen. She was a beautiful girl from Belgium, and was a favorite relative of Jan Dehouyen. He named our city “DeRidder”, in honor of his sister-in-law.
Any town named after a beautiful Belgian girl is OK by me, no problem. Plus they have a McDonald's. McDonald's is not everywhere you'd think, and when we saw the golden arches on a billboard or in person, we knew we'd again reached civililization. We were about 15 minutes early for the breakfast menu to flip over to the lunch/dinner menu. We cleaned up, dried off a bit, and froze in the MAX AC that seems to blast in every building you go into in the south. It tricks you into thinking that the heat/humidity is not so bad (at least for about 5 minutes) then, when you exit buildings after a prolonged stay indoors, the heat is a welcome change and feels good as the goosebumps flatten out, giving way to the sweat pores.
We ate every last fry, licked the cheese off the wrappers and wet-fingered stray salt and sesame seeds into our mouths, knowing that once the trip was over, McDonald's would not see our shadow for a while. Shivering, we stepped outside and sat on the curb to digest a bit. A nice local gentleman walked up and asked how the ride was going. We both agreed it was going great now that we were out of Texas. He then asked where we started from that morning.
Uuuhhhh . . . .
both our brains locked up. We could not push the name of the town we'd started from just 4 hours ago to the fronts of our brains. Simultaneous dementia set in. The fatiguing, day-in, day-out riding made us road weary and brain dead, like a rock star yelling "thank you Phoenix!" while standing on a stage in Tucson. Life on the road is not always a party, if only it were a heavily edited version of MTV Road Rules. The man then shot us a look that said "druggies" as he passed by us into McDonald's.
37 miles to Oberlin, Louisiana. Dad and Phyllis headed back up from Houston, and we'd meet them later on arrival. Phyllis found an RV park with a CASINO. Casino means buffet to us, slots to others. We arrived at the motel early afternoon. Called dad and he picked us up for dinner. The 5 mile drive between the motel and the casino revealed some interesting land clearing. Bulldozers gathered shrubs, brush, sectioned trees and tree roots into huge piles. These piles were then set on fire with a strange blowtorch-like vehicle backing up to the mountain, expel heat and flame, starting the tree pyre. The smoke coming off the dozens of piles looked like the last day on earth. The remaining day light filtered and dimmed through all the smoke and we regret not having taken a pic.
Buffet was of the sort where you could actually damage yourself if you lost control of the Four Horsemen of the Appetite. There were separate, huge buffet lines for each:
Italian food
Chinese food
American food
enough deserts to feed an army
Cajun and seafood (the word Cajun is derived from the word Acadian, note a brief history below)
Le Grand Dérangement
The huge exodus of Acadians that took place from 1755 to 1762 by order of Governor Lawrence was known as the Grand Dérangement (the Great Upheaval or Great Disturbance)
The Acadians were forced to leave Acadia (Acadia was colonized by the French in the eastern region of Canada in 1604. It was the first European colony in North America).
They were forced to leave for three reasons:
- Most Acadians refused to pledge allegiance to the King of England. (right on!)
- The English were worried about the very high birth rate among Acadians.
- Getting rid of the French-speaking Acadians made room for more English speakers.
The majority of Acadians settled in Louisiana (Acadie Du Sud). The Grand Dérangement is considered the most important event in Cajun and Acadian history.
Harsh.
over and out
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