E to F: South Florida to New Orleans, LA

We headed north in order to start our journey back west on December 29. Our plans were to make it to New Orleans for New Years, but wanted to break up the trip into two segments. Emily had found some potential state parks to spend the night, but had to change plans when she realized that they all closed their gates at dark and you had to make a reservation before 5pm in order to gain entry later. She finally found Lake Talquin, a recreation area west of Tallahassee that has campsites run by the National Forest Service and by Leon County. After visiting two of these sites (one was locked, the other was totally empty and the bathrooms had no water) we found a third site where the camp host allowed us to stay the night, despite our lack of a tent.We got up and out early to make the rest of the drive to New Orleans after taking free hot showers. Still on the quest for good BBQ, Emily found the unassuming Anjacs in Gulfport, MS through research on chowhound.com. We devoured the rack of ribs, savory hush puppies and pork and beans and didn't notice that it had started raining quite hard during our meal. With the roof still leaking, we wanted to get back on the road quickly so it wouldn't take on another gallon like it had in New Jersey. We drove along the coastline of Mississippi, through some of the areas hit by Katrina. It seems that there had been a lot of building in the past five years, but the vacant overgrown lots right on the waterfront were a pretty glaring reminder of the devastation the storm brought to the area.Immediately after arriving at our friend's house in the Irish Channel neighborhood of New Orleans, we piled into her neighbors car to get lunch (yes, we had just eaten BBQ, but figured we could stuff in some fish tacos). It seemed that our friend and all of her friends all had friends in town for New Orleans, and there were about 17 of us to celebrate the New Year together. We usually do not roll so deep, as it always seems that the more people you have in a group, the harder it is to make decisions and do anything. Not this group. Everyone seemed to have the same singular goal of having a good time, and that's how our weekend in New Orleans turned out.Our first night, we all went out to a small jazz club and saw a great brass band that played in the middle of the dance floor. The next day (New Years Eve), the group rallied again and headed out in the afternoon towards the French Quarter. Max and I walked the two miles by ourselves while they took the street trolley and had fun checking out the different neighborhoods and marveling at how green New Orleans is. They have beautiful street trees lining the boulevard, which so nicely complement the iron work on most of the buildings. We met up with everyone at Harrah's Casino and then pushed on to a group dinner at a restaurant that could miraculously host 17 people at the same table. We spent the rest of the night walking throughout New Orleans with our pack of new friends, visiting house parties and street parties and ringing in 2010 with aplomb.

On New Year's Day, one of our new friends who lives in New Orleans hosted all of us for a New Year's Day meal of black-eyed peas and collard greens, which are supposed to bring prosperity and wealth to anyone who eats that meal in the New Year. It was then decided that we should all go to the Ernie K-Doe Lounge, a shrine/bar to the late composer of "Mother-in-Law", and we instantly filled out the small room and had a great evening checking out the old photographs of New Orleans musicians and digging the jukebox.

The day before we left New Orleans, our friend took us on a driving tour of New Orleans, including a visit to the lower ninth ward, which was devastated by Katrina. We never saw this neighborhood before the storm, but it was apparent how empty the neighborhood was just by counting the number of concrete slabs where houses used to be. We drove past some of the "Brad Pitt" houses - eco-designed dwellings built for those that lost their homes in the storm. We didn't take pictures, because people live there now, but it was neat to see the brightly colored buildings amongst the vacant lots.

Links: Leon Co. Parks - Tallahassee, FL, Anjacs BBQ -

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