Not a Mercedes in Sight

Day 21 April 22, 2011, Not a Mercedes in Sight

Route from to Coushatta to Paragon RV Park Marksville, LA

118.6 miles averaging 13.9 mph

Bottom line reads "Trip Dist 118.63"

Best Moment – There is a MacDonald’s on the right hand side of the road just as I was turning into the RV Park about 6:30.  Oh my gosh, did it ever smell wonderful.  I nearly stayed there, but “home” was very close so I passed it by.

Worst Moment – These off the route campgrounds are beginning to be annoying.  Last night’s Red Shoes campground was about 6 miles off the route and tonight’s was nearly 10 miles out of my way.  That means that I rode 16 more miles today than planned.  However, in order to get all of the hook-ups for the RV, we’ve had to go a bit further.  When I was planning the route, I didn’t know just how far some of these sites were nor how big an impact it would have.

Today’s route was mainly agricultural.  I am pretty certain that this is a rice paddy.  There was another area, where the farmer was in a skiff with some sort of machine attached.  He was apparently working the soil underneath the water.  Then there were acres of grain and hay.  Doesn’t the second photo look like someone left giant marshmallows in the field?

I can see why they need signs like this.  The topography is flat.  I’ve also seen Hurricane Shelters.  Sort of makes what I’ve read about these monster storms more impactful than before.

One of the things that I’ve noticed is that I haven’t seen a Mercedes, BMW, Audi, or any other luxury type car for the past several days.  There are Japanese, Korean, and American cars with lots of Toyotas, Nissans, Chevy’s and Fords, but no German cars.  This is not an affluent area.

People really do talk differently down here in Louisiana.  It is almost like they are speaking a foreign language.  The words are spoken very slowly, but all run together making it difficult to understand.  In the store in Washington, LA where I stopped to get water two high school girls were behind the counter and asked me “Hoow  faar dju ryide?”  At first I really didn’t understand what they were asking and must have sounded as foreign to them because I’m fairly certain that Oberlin is pronounced differently here than the way that I say it.

One last observation of the area is that dentistry is not top on the priority list.  I’ve seen a lot of folks with missing teeth, crooked teeth, and neglected teeth.  It really makes Neita and I appreciate all of the things that our parents did for us – not only in dentistry, but the encouragement that we were given to get our education, and to aspire and achieve more.