Austin, Texas to Patterson, Louisiana

Tuesday June 5

Daily Miles: 475
Accumulated Miles: 3,300
Day 13

IMPORTANT CHANGE: PHOTOS NOW ARE THUMBNAILS. CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE.

Ray was one of my best friends during high school in Ravenna, Ohio. After high school graduation we took different paths. We have not seen each other for over 50 years. He is the reason I went to Patterson, LA. We had a great evening. He introduced me the fine art of eating crawdads, crab legs, onions and potatoes. All of these were boiled in a common pot with seasonings. The crawdads are like tiny lobsters. A person removes the tail and then cracks the tail with their fingers to get at the meal. The tradition is the table is covered with brown shipping paper and the shells are thrown on the table. After the meal, the server simple gathers up the paper and places everything in the trash. What a mess – but very tasty. Wish i had a photo of that table.

He designed and built his home. Since he has been without a spouse for several years, its layout was designed with the man in mind – it has a kitchen, one bathroom, one bedroom and a massive workshop. End of story. There is not even a room with a sofa and television. In the photo of Ray in his workshop, notice the large table in front of him. That was my bed last night. Thank gosh I had my sleeping bag.

There is a bayou only a few hundred yards from his house. This contributes to the humidity, which is very high. This time of year, the humidity runs from 40 to 70 percent (that is assuming it is not raining) The photo below is Ray standing in front of his house. Notice the green on the siding – that is algae. Algae is everywhere.

The photo of the tree – look at the rectangles in the middle of the trunk. Those are bricks. It is an oak tree that is over 150 years old. It was split in half when hurricane Andrew went through the area in the early nineties. In an effort to save the tree, the exposed area was given a coat of concrete and a layer of bricks.

The photo of the old home is a plantation home next to Ray’s house that was built in 1850. It is incredible the number of old homes (over 100 years old) in the area. I can’t even image that our current house would be standing after so many years.

The followng photos are images of the bayou near his house.

After leaving Ray’s house, I stopped at a local cafe for breakfast. Needless to say it was full of local people. I got the impression that they wondered why was this bikers guy was in their restaurant and when was he leaving. Just my paranoia going into overdrive.