My family and I spent a week in Long Beach, Mississippi and the surrounding area in August. We rented a house that I found on the Internet (vacationrentals.com). We enjoyed our week on the Mississippi gulf coast - I think that’s quite an accomplishment given our three sons are 16, 18, and 20 years old. The Mississippi gulf coast is a good place for a family vacation. It has tourist attractions like casinos, jet skis, and a water park inside a community where people live outside the rat race. I contrast the Mississippi gulf coast with that of Alabama. We have [View Full Entry]

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Every now and then while traveling I stumble into a treasure. Such is Pass Christian Books. I was driving to the gulf coast as I came through the town of Pass Christian and noticed a used bookstore. I like used bookstores as I am never sure what I might find. This one is called Pass Christian Books. I went inside and saw the usual rooms with little signs on the doorways announcing the topics of the books in each bookroom that seemed to be a converted bedroom. The treasure was in the room titled Mississippi Writers’ Room. I didn’t realize how [View Full Entry]

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As I travel, I seek out places that have high-speed internet access at little or no cost. My stay on the Mississippi Gulf Coast led me to search the downtown area of Long Beach, Ms. I found a locally owned and operated coffee shop in what used to be the bank. The photos show that this was a Hancock County Bank Building. Now there is a hair salon upstairs in the back, and a coffee shop downstairs where the bank tellers used to be. This is a wonderful place to sit, drink coffee, and do internet business. The coffee and pastries [View Full Entry]

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We at lunch at Steve’s Marina Restaurant in Long Beach, Mississippi. This is a real restaurant with a broad menu of seafood, steaks, and Italian dishes. The restaurant is literally on the gulf on poles next to the Long Beach Yacht Club’s pier. Our meals included roast beef Po-Boy sandwiches, fried catfish, spinach and artichoke dip, and eggplant in a shrimp creole sauce. These dishes were on a lunch menu and cost $7 and $10. Dress is casual and so is the atmosphere. This is a good place to eat if you are in the area for one day and are [View Full Entry]

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We ate a couple of meals at The Cajun Crawfish Hut. This is a small place with indoor and outdoor seating. The food is good. They have a variety of Po-Boys (really good sandwiches served on loaves of French bread) and they specialize in seafood Po-Boys - catfish, oysters, shrimp, and alligator. They also serve good ham and roast beef Po-Boys. These guys serve can’t-close-‘em Po-Boys. This means that you can’t close the French bread around the meat and dressings. I’ve never seen this kind of Po-Boy before. It was a new and enjoyable eating experience. In addition t [View Full Entry]

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I am spending the week in an area north of Albuquerque, New Mexico. One of my favorite foods in this area is the green chile cheeseburger. People in this area make your basic cheeseburger and then smother the cheese with green chiles. I am not an expert on various chile peppers, but I love these green chiles. One of the hallmarks of New Mexico food is green chiles. I asked one of the locals here where I could find a good green chile cheeseburger (everyone here sells them - even McDonalds and Burger King). He pointed me to the Owl Cafe. [View Full Entry]

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The highlight of my Father's Day Weekend swing through Louisiana was attending a wedding. My niece married a young man in the small town of Palmetto, Louisiana. The two were wed in front of 50 relatives and close friends in the same small church that my brother-in-law and his wife were wed. This was a small wedding followed by a wonderful garden reception in the backyard of another relative. The weather - always a concern in Louisiana this time of year - was perfect, the bride beautiful, and the attendees happy. There were tears from many of the young ladies in [View Full Entry]

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One of the toughest things about travel for me is the separation from high-speed internet access. It is a pleasure to find "free" high-speed access in a town on the road. It is a joy to find it in a place that I would visit anyway. Such is my joy this morning. I am writing this from a CC's coffee house in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. I have some embarassment for CC's. It is based on Community Coffee - an old Louisiana brand of coffee. Community, like several other Louisiana brands, serves a mixture of coffee and chicory. Chicory is a root [View Full Entry]

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We took my mother to lunch today at Don's Seafood and Steakhouse in Hammond, Louisiana. Don's restaurant in Hammond isn't one of a kind, but it isn't a chain either. It is a family owned group of restaurants that grows as the family grows. Lunch was great. We've been to Don's half a dozen times in as many years. The service is good, the Landry family members are hospitable hosts, and the food is as expected - great. The atmosphere is casual, but not picnic-table casual. I had fried catfish and fried shrimp, my wife had a lunch-time seafood platter, and [View Full Entry]

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