Alabama - we stopped and had lunch outside of Mobile.  That has to count for "visiting" the state, right?

We stayed in Biloxi, MS for several nights to play at the casinos.  What we didn't realize was that the railroad tracks ran right through the center of town.  Our campsite was literally 20 feet to the tracks.  After 2 nights (and days) of no sleep, we moved our RV to a spit of land that jutted out into the Gulf of Mexico.  It was our first night of "boon-docking", which means no hook-ups - no sewer, no electricity, no water connections.  But, it was as far away from trains as we could get!  The land was owned by Treasure Bay Casino, so of course we gambled there that night.  The players and the workers at these casinos really seemed relaxed and just had a good time.

Unfortunately our pet parakeet, Nikki, passed away in Biloxi.  Nikki had been with us for 12 years and was a great little guy.  He'll be missed terribly.  We wanted a place to bury Nikki that would be more 'natural', so we altered our plans to include a stop at a state park in LA.

Fontainebleu SP in Mandeville, LA is beautiful.  It sits on Lake Ponchartrain, but on the northern side (opposite New Orleans).  It has lots of trees, wildlife, and water.  It was the perfect spot for Nikki's eternal resting place.  Just don't tell the Park Rangers - I don't think they'd approve.

In Lafayette, LA we had hoped to do some outdoorsy stuff, but it rained the whole time we were there.  We almost went kayaking anyway, but the Vermillion River was so polluted that Andy renamed it "Vermin River".  We did get to enjoy ourselves at an indoor rock-climbing facility, though.  You learn quickly how weak you are when you try this sport!

Just for the record:  Louisiana has the worst roads we have yet to drive on (and note that we are in California now).  They are concrete, so the segments cause that constant thumping, but they are also filled with potholes and patches to make them worse.

Eastern Texas is your expected oil rigs and natural gas pumps.  We were still experiencing cold, wet weather so it looked even more dreary.  Visited Beaumont, TX and spent our time in museums.  We enjoyed the Fire Museum, the Texas Energy Museum, and the McFadden House.  These were all well-done, so we were surprised to be very disappointed with the Art Museum.

In Central Texas we stopped in San Antonio and Austin.  We enjoyed both of these cities.  San Antonio has their beautiful little River Walk, and of course the Alamo.  Austin has a great public area surrounding the river there and the capitol is worth a visit.  What we didn't understand about Austin was that everyone used Highway 35, so it was congested and very slow moving, and there were all of these other roads they could use that were empty.  Go figure.  While in Austin we stayed at McKinney Falls SP and enjoyed biking and kayaking within the park and our closest neighbors were deers and birds.  Our campsite was huge, too.  They say everything is bigger in Texas, and so far we believe them.  This was the first area that we were able to use our road bikes.  We did a ride from Bastrop SP to Beuscher SP - hilly, curvy, and lots of trees - everything FL riding isn't.  It was great!

After leaving Austin, we stopped in Fredericksburg.  This town offers a great micro-brewery and a great war museum - the Nimitz Museum.  We also drove out to the Enchanted Rock for some hiking.  We've been really wanting to do some caving though since we've gotten into central Texas.  So we scheduled a guided adventure tour at Sonora Caverns.  It was fabulous - if you like crawling on your belly, through tight holes, rapelling into pitch-black pits, and just getting dirty.  We spent 5 hours on a personal tour.  Just Andy, myself and Bill the guide.  However, it just strengthened our understanding that our navigation is horrible!  We would never be able to find our way out if it was just us.  Now that we've been to several caves (FL, TX, NM, AZ), we still think Sonora was our favorite - it was small and intimate.  You could get close to the formations - but no touching allowed of course!  Just to note, in Sonora we had a hailstorm and snowstorm in the two nights we were there, but the caves were a wonderful, humid 72 degrees.