Louisiana, baby!

I have to enjoy this feeling of cruising through the states quickly, before I hit Texas.

I fully ignored the warnings about "possible" severe storms that "may" produce large hailstones, and got a nice early start. It was quite a lovely day, until the storm clouds gathered while I was navigating through Bogalusa, LA. I considered taking shelter at one of the many churches I passed, or maybe the library, but I opted for getting as far away from that armpit as possible before the giant hail hit. That place gave me the heebie jeebies. Everyone was looking at my bike and gear like it was a shrimp po'boy, and they were starving.

I managed to get a few miles out of town before it started raining. It started gently, and the thunder and lightning seemed to be moving away from me, so for a while I entertained the fantasy that I was skirting the storm. Then it started pouring for reals, right about the same time that I saw an open garage/storage shed thing right by the road that had just enough room for me to pull my bike in and stop for lunch. There was no giant hail, nor any tornadoes that I saw, despite the tornado watch, and the rain passed shortly. The sun came back, and I got back out there.

I was moving through some kind of camping dead zone, headed for Franklinton. The sole hotel in town was a little more than I wanted to pay, so I kept an eye out for stealth camping, but that didn't pan out. Following the lead of someone from crazyguyonabike.com, I called the Franklinton sheriff's office to inquire about camping, because that guy had been allowed to set up his tent in a fenced area behind the police station. Either he is more charismatic than I, or he just got lucky with who he spoke to, but when I tried it, the guy just suggested I go to a campground about ten miles further than I wanted to go, a few miles off my route, that "might" be open. Well, at least I tried. I had enough daylight to get there, but wasn't sure I had the fortitude. I decided to call them for info, since a lot of campgrounds are flooded right now, and a place with "bayou" in the name didn't seem too promising. I didn't reach an actual human, but their machine only mentioned RV sites, so I gave up and went to the hotel. It's a decent place. I got excited when I realized it was Thursday, and I could watch must see TV, but sadly, it has been taken over by ER, so it's a Comedy Central kind of night.

I managed to save a few bucks picking up supplies at the Dollar General and the scavenger grocery store or whatever it's called that are right by the hotel, so I can feel a little better about the money I spent.