• Despite the luxury and comfort provided by our room full of pillows, we opted for an early start because we had the better part of 6 hours of driving to do. This hotel didn’t provide breakfast anyway (current rating: 5 pillows, 0 bagels), so we figured we’d pull in somewhere once the sun came up. Once we successfully made it through the overpass / underpass maze that is New Orleans highways, we were on our way!
• Found a Chevrolet Equinox on a tilt tray, and knew something looked familiar. It’s a bloody Captiva wearing another name badge. Looks like they suck here too.
• Heading further west (and a bit north), we came across a little place called Baton Rouge and figured that it looked worth checking out. Turns out it’s the capital of Louisiana. Not sure why New Orleans gets all the glory… from the very brief time we spent there I thought Baton Rouge was a much nicer city. Also, they have a castle. We found a little cafe full of eclectic furniture and I got a spiked coffee at early morning o’clock which felt very naughty indeed.
• More driving in a Westerly direction, enjoying the scenery. Plenty more swamp driving around Baton Rouge and corn has reappeared in all the fields. Welcome back, corn. This country really likes its corn.
• For lunch, we poked around on Google to find a park within a reasonable detour from the highway and headed off down some back roads. In typical US fashion, the area was full of giant RVs with the SUVs that they’d towed parked next to them. Still, there were tables on a little dock so we sat there and saw alligators and what I think were turtles hooning around. Lunch was leftover sandwich from the French quarter yesterday afternoon, which were still fresh and cool thanks to someone’s very clever decision to buy a cooler bag and combine it with water bottles left on the hotel fridge overnight. (FYI that was Erin, not me.)
• Further west, and now well in to Texas, we made a carefully planned decision to pull in to a Walmart and it definitely wasn’t a panicked last minute swing in to the last available driveway because someone took a wrong turn. Its fun wandering around and looking at all the crazy snacks, but I think we were in too fancy an area because there were minimal mobility scooters and most people were appropriately dressed.
• Carried on to the hotel just south of Houston and checked in to find we have a new champion – SEVEN pillows! Couldn’t believe it, had to count them twice over. In fact, I believe there were superfluous pillows in this case. I should have built a fort. Dammit… Why didn’t I build a fort??
• Left the hotel on a high to see what we could see, and found a boardwalk all decked out in Halloween spookiness. The place was deserted which actually added to the spook factor, but it would have been cool to see it all in action. Lots of rides and events by the looks when it’s open, but the whole place was still playing music what not and just…. No one around 
• Dinner involved gumbo, which I have decided I am a fan of. Also key lime pie but we are way too full to eat it now, so it’s in to the cooler bag for you Mr Pie!
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