Blogs from Louisiana, United States, North America - page 73

Well after a good night on the booze it was time to see New Orleans by daylight. I was up at 12noon and Tommy and his other housemates are working from 3 ish onwards till 11.30 ish, so i called Darryl the Cs amabasdor and arranged to meet up and Darryl suggested we head out and do some biking. Darryl came over at about 1.30pm and we headed towards a bayou area and we follwed a mountan bike trek near to bayou and near the swamp it is was a 4 mile trail and was fairly easy going and great scenery and then we got back to the car and loaded the bikes up and chatted some and went along to a paved cycleway and cycled and chatted along as we cycled by the missispi and ... read more

Besides the hard work and educational aspect, the trip also included some fun!!! Highlights included: Karaoke on New Years Wolverine Bowling on our last night Haikus Union Breaks... read more

December, 1977 - New Orleans, Houston I flew to New Orleans and took a Greyhound to Houston. New Orleans is different. It is like a piece of Europe. I saw the Duelling Oaks in City Park. Duels were fought there. It was also in this park that I beheld the Tutankhamen exhibit. These pieces were discovered by Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon in 1922 in Egypt's Valley of the Kings. They are over 3,000 years old but many of them look amazingly contemporary. I met a masseuse from San Francisco. She massaged my neck and shoulders. We saw the exhibit together. We sat on the floor like two hippies. We left the park on a city bus. When we got to my stop, I gave her a kiss and jumped off the bus. It was like ... read more

First off I would like to THANK ALL THE PEOPLE WHO SUPPORTED ME ON THIS TRIP!! This entry will be about the background to the trip and the next one will be the actual trip. Some Background information: Hurricane Katrina swept through the Gulf Coast of the United States in August 2005, causing at least 1,836 deaths and over $80 billion in damages. (For more information on it check out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Katrina) A group of 18 Montreal students were chosen to participate in Hillel’s Hurricane Katrina Alternative Break, a week long exploration of hands-on service, education and community building. During our winter break, we traveled to New Orleans to rebuild houses with students from Montreal, Toronto and all over the United States. I spent my days painting, puttying, and learning. It has been over two years since ... read more

Louisiana highway eighty-two slopes south of Abbeville to the Gulf of Mexico. The raised and shoulderless byway uncovers a lifestyle, dramatic recent destruction, and geography that the parish seat quietly conceals in its more densely populated setting. It is the gateway to the expansive wetlands where waterfowl and fearsome reptiles far outnumber human inhabitants. “There’s a gator!” cries out Alison, my newly-acquired guide from the Chamber of Commerce. I am too busy keeping the car on the two-lane road, knowing full well that any significant error will land us in a waterlogged ditch. I nonetheless peer off to try to catch the glimpse of one in the natural rectangular ponds. At fifty-five miles an hour, I can make nothing of the wooden sticks that protrude above the surface. I am still unconvinced that I saw one. ... read more