Day 2

Mile 527
Lat 30 18.84N Lon 8914.81W
The best Shrimp Po Boy on the Gulf Coast

DAY 2

 

Only 180 miles to New Orleans. For me I’ve always known that this was going to be the most critical. Will I, after traveling 350 miles in 13 hours the previous day, be able and willing to continue? It would be easy to stop here and would even be notable to say that I rode a Zuma from Jacksonville to Pensacola. Quite to my surprise, I was not only willing to get going but even more eager than yesterday. As for bring stiff and sore. I wasn’t. The only area that was the least bit sore was some neck muscles from holding the helmet and keeping my head forward in counteracting the wind resistance.

The plan was for Mary Jo to leave about 2 hours after me and we would meet in Pass Christian, MS. There is a small cafe’ there that we found several years ago. They serve the best Shrimp PO Boys I believe I’ve ever eaten. The main thing is they pile on the shrimp. Harbor View Cafe’( 30 18.49 N 89 14.81 W). The owner is Barbara Hirsch. She will treat you like family. Go out of your way to eat there. Closed Tuesday.

 

 

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We met as scheduled and eat lunch. Mary Jo then followed me the remaining 50 miles into New Orleans. The experience of having her follow me those 50 miles was revealing. One of the first one or two questions people ask is whether I’m going to have a support team with me. I knew I didn’t want this but until now didn’t realize why. My whole mental attitude was entirely different knowing that someone was no more than a mile or so behind me. This whole thing of riding this scooter, wind blowing, scenery up close and personal gives one a tremendous Illusion of Freedom. This "chase vehicle" greatly diminishes that feeling. Its all too secure. I mean that I admire these people that swim across oceans and walk continents with a horde of support staff in toe but to me it takes away the challenge by knowing that if you so much as stub your toe someone was there. For this leg I didn’t even give my gas situation a second thought.

We arrived in New Orleans around 4:00PM and found Ed and his wife waiting for us.

(About gas. The Zuma holds 1.3 gal so I could count on getting 60 miles to the tank. This makes for a lot of fuel stops. There are plenty of gas stations. The difficulty is having one at just the "right" place. So, before leaving from New Orleans I invested in a plastic two gallon reserve can. It fits nicely on the floorboard between my feet and was held in place by a bungee cord. This worked out great. I would run the tank empty, put in a gallon and when the gauge indicated almost empty the second time I’d start looking for a station. Only buying 2.5 to 3 gallons at a time, I never gave price a thought.)

 

THE WORD GETS OUT

 

Believe it or not, I’m kind of a quiet person and usually keep my "doing" "close to the chest" as they say. So was the original intent as to this escapade. (And I am certainly no writer as evidenced by this literary "masterpiece." I don’t think Hemmingway is in danger of being replaced ). Other than family members, I really had no thoughts of expounding on this trip to any one. But, things happen. On the break between day 2 and the continuation of the trip it all just mushroomed. First of all, short of ending up in Boothill, I knew I was going to complete the journey. So when the topic came up, instead of closing the conversation down, I would provide all the details. Interest rapidly grew. People were genuinely interested and honestly excited. I now had a "following" of well wishers. As crazy as most figure I am, I think somewhere deeply repressed behind ones rational mind, many really wished that it were they on Scoot. Anyway, I was going to get to have all the fun the least I could do was keep all informed. That’s when I decided to put the whole thing on a WEB page. That way anyone interested could follow the blow by blow details.

My son is great. It didn’t take him long to put the WEB site together. (http://www.qsl.net/k1pns/). Granted I am biased but its as good as any I’ve seen. Then at the end of the day I would send him my notes and pictures. He, in turn, would load them on to the WEB page.