With two new hands on the metaphorical deck, the sheer quantities of wine being drunk have reached biblical proportions. A veritable red sea of the stuff has been quaffed, every cup of potential water miraculously replaced by something more grape-based. We are told by a wine merchant fellow that Burgundy wines contain no sugar so they give no hangovers. However, we have strived keenly to prove the fellow wrong.

L’Aigle is, in his own, friendly manner, a mad wee bastard. He somehow manages to spend a good portion of his first day or two in the arctic waters of the pool. He is kind enough to retrieve my ice-clad testicles from the floor of said pool, but then only agrees to return them to me if I play umpteen-million hours of boules with him (pun not necessarily intended).

[FUN FACT: The game boules is sometimes called ‘pétanque’, but only when played using early-twentieth century tanks. This variation requires a great deal more space and heavy ordinance, so is more regularly played in this part of the world by the Germans.]

We find old Mungo’s golf clubs and invent a new game where you take a beach towel and lay it somewhere in the house’s (large) garden, and then attempt to fire golf balls onto it from increasingly improbable angles. L’Aigle, bless him, has limited control over his motor functions and regularly belts the balls into adjoining fields/the swimming ball/Moan of Arc. I, on the other hand, remain undefeated over the whole week. It seems that without my pendulous bollocks weighing me down I am quite the natural sportsman. I therefore decide to lob them back into the pool and live as a eunuch, planning to join the PGA tour upon my return.

*

We are somewhat less slothful this week and visit a few of the nearby towns. At one point we get a little carried away and purchase some very fancy Côte-d’Or wines. The Old Man seals his up in a box, which I offer to stash at my flat while he is back in China. He makes me promise not to drink them and I agree to this. (And who says that lying never works, my friends? Lying is fantastic. As soon as his airplane takes to the skies they are dead bottles walking.)

On one particularly balmy jour français, we drive cross-country for the best part of an hour to reach a town the Mansfield clan had not visited in two decades. Only when we get there does The Old Man remember that the place he was thinking of is actually in the Dordogne.

[FUN FACT: The Dordogne is the best part of 500km from, that is to say ‘nowhere-bloody-near’, Burgundy.]

If I was not already firm in my resolution to drink all The Old Man’s fine wine, this exercise in senility would certainly have pushed me across the line.

Just before we pack the car and head back to Albion we manage to catch not one, but two additional gerbil-rat thingies. We have neither the time nor the inclination to drive off into the deep wild to release them as before, so content ourselves by freeing them on the other side of the garden. As soon as the trap opens the little buggers peg it out of the cage, back across the lawn and up into the eaves of the house, rendering our great, final hunt somewhat pointless. We reflect, however, that this is now someone else’s (i.e. Mungo’s) problem – for it is time to race up to Calais and catch us a ferry.

*

Fortunately for us, all the widely-reported trouble at Dover is coming from north to south, as it were. Driving away from the port we sail past thousands of poor souls trapped in their automobiles as the gridlock extends up the A2 from Dover deep into Kent. It is certainly understandable that the French wish to up the rigour of their border security in the light of recent, tragic events. What is less understandable is why they decided, in order to do this, they should only send one solitary fellow over to check the cars, trucks and passports of innumerable holidaymakers and long-haulers. One imagines that it has something to do with Brexit. Everything seems to be, these days.

So, overall, a very pleasant fortnight indeed. A gentle medley of cheese and wine and relaxation, of wine and sunshine and wine, of rodents and bread and wine and wine and writing and wine. There was the occasional beer as well for good measure. And there was also wine.

Many thanks to those of you who read and enjoyed these incidental fripperies. Why not try rereading them and attempting to go drink for drink with us, in the manner of the potentially fatal ‘Withnail and I Drinking Game’? I suggest that you might first pop to Oddbins, however, for you shall, almost certainly, need to buy some wine.

As the elegantly French title of this post suggests, there really is little to report since the last post. We’ve drunk lots of wine, mostly good. We’ve eaten many a meal, again, mostly good. On one occasion I jumped into the pool, but then leapt back out again. I have yet to summon up the courage to go back in to retrieve my testicles, which instantly froze clean off and clanged to the bottom like two wrought iron maracas.

The region is undoubtedly a beautiful one, with lush valleys and pretty little villages. I have looked at a medieval chapel on a hill. I have gazed upon a medieval hospice in a town. I have surveyed a local chateaux and guessed that it perhaps dated back to the medieval period, though I have no idea why. The sun has gotten progressively more bullish and all has been well.

There are a couple of uncommonly large rabbits which frequent our lawn. Every so often the male one will attempt to do what rabbits do, but I do not feel his heart is in it.

I have done quite a lot of writing. Sadly I am now at that stage many authors come to periodically, where I am quite convinced that my ‘stuff’ is utter bobbins. Fortunately there is still much wine.

We caught a large gerbil-type creature in our kitchen attempting to make off with our hard-earned foodstuffs. We gave him two-days without the option in a small metal cage then released him three miles away. He has not returned, proving the rehabilitative powers of a decent bit of ‘bird’.

L’Aigle and Moan of Arc will be arriving tomorrow, so perhaps they will attempt to interrupt the pleasant, lazy routine The Old Man and I have perfected this past week. Hopefully we might catch a rat tonight. I feel dear old Moan would appreciate that.

Oh, lastly we met Mungo, our landlord. He is, in fact, real, not a Wodehousian creation as some cretin once suggested. He and his wife had us around for drinks, and we were informed that his ancestor used to run India and that another of his forebears was a fellow called Oliver Cromwell. He was more keen to talk about the India chappie.

All in all they seemed good sorts and at one point Mungo attempted to flog The Old Man the whole estate. Perhaps he assumed that the Mansfields also used to govern sub-continental nations. We didn’t, for the record. Not even Sri Lanka.

With the pound plumbing new depths, Article 50 strolling around London kicking unsuspecting coves in the castanets, and the delightful Mrs May marching towards Downing Street, the Old Man and I think the best course of action is to flee the country for a spell in la belle France (trans: French campanology). We therefore steal my mother’s hideous Vauxhall, pack up our troubles in the proverbial kitbag and do one via Dover Port.

We get there at some ungodly hour yet still, of course, miss our ferry. This was mostly due to the Old Man picking the longest, slowest lanes at the dock with the practised hand of the true connoisseur (trans: to provide a gentleman with an informal cognac). Once on the ferry we are surprised to find no fewer than 530 Americans, all garbed in blue windbreakers. It turns out they are the state band/choir/assorted hangers-on for the great State of Minnesota. I go around saying a friendly ‘Go Vikings’ to the whole battalion, to mixed/negative responses. Perhaps it was still a little early for sports-based bonhomie (trans: ‘good boy, who’s a good boy then?’).

The drive south was long and mostly uneventful. Every so often the French government would stop us and shake us down for ‘toll money’. I guess that’s what happens when the socialists take over – be warned Corbynistas, la belle will toll for you as well.

[My word that was a combination of frightfully poor jokes…one can only apologise…moving swiftly on…]

One incident of note took place in a French service station, where one gentleman, clearly a long-standing fan of the European Union, decided it was high time to reverse into the side of our good, British car. Unfortunately for him, being a continental he had strapped two velos (trans: ‘velo, velo, velo, what’s all this then?’) to his boot, which proceeded to smash straight through his rear windscreen.

The Old Man, with remarkable patience and quite serviceable French, got out to do battle. He kept shaking his head and repeating “Vous ne regardez pas…vous ne regardez pas” and adopted the tone of a frustrated matron who had returned to the playroom to find her young charge had filled his kegs with shit, right up to the belt. We explained to the fellow that, try as he might, it is simply not possible for a gentleman to strike other gentleman with the side of his motor. As he had done the reversing and “nous sommes arreté”, he was, as we say outside the EU, bang to rights. The fact that he would not accept this clear reasoning was a credit to his proud nation.

Also at this particular aìre (trans: quintessential French affectedness) I purchased and quaffed my first Orangina of the trip. One has not truly arrived in France until one has skulled an Orangina. Were you to liquidize egalité, fraternité and the other one, put it in a small glass bottle and charge through the nose for it, it would surely taste like Orangina.

[Coincidentally, should anyone who works for Orangina be reading this, my blog is still currently without a sponsor.]

After an age and a day we make it to a very pleasant little village in Burgundy called Soussey-sur-Brionne. I am not sure who Soussey was or how they knew Brionne, but what goes without saying is that they got on splendidly. Here we are staying in an old converted farmhouse, seemingly untouched since we joined the EEC and Common Market (sighs… pours another glass of red).

We are renting said pad from a fellow called Mungo Lockhart. We have yet to meet Mr. Lockhart, and I am fully of the opinion that the reason for this is that he does not actually exist. Rather, he is a character from a P.G. Wodehouse novel who flogs fortnights in delightful, cluttered Burgundian farmhouses online as a way of paying off sizable gambling debts to Bertie Wooster following a ‘corking boat race night’. We shall have to, as they say, wait and see.

That evening we somehow manage to squeeze into position A1 at the nearest town’s one and only sports bar (imaginatively called ‘Le Sporting’) to watch France’s heroic one-nil loss to a bog-average Portuguese side. The whole of the Stade de France was seemingly covered in locusts – proof if proof were needed that Hollande’s nefarious plan to construct vast public works using enslaved Israelites was getting the bird from the Almighty. I am told later that these are moths, not locusts, and that I should not talk about Hollande’s nefarious plan to construct vast public works using enslaved Israelites.

The beers are very small and all the establishment offers a weary traveller in terms of nourishment is either a croque monsieur or “sausage” and chips. I opt for the former, the “sausages” looking quite sensationally ghastly. I don’t know who Mr Croque is, but you can tell him from me that he makes a damn good cheese-on-toast.

The whole village has turned up and the atmosphere is jovial. Everyone knows literally everyone, and plenty of Burgundian kisses are planted on plenty of Burgundian cheeks. No-one kisses my cheek, which is a shame I felt, and probably because 52% of us Brits voted to leave the EU. There were a couple of lasses there who I thought should really know that I was among the 48%, but in the end I held my tongue – mostly because, upon a second glance, they were seventeen at the very most.

France dominate the game and manage not to score. Payet at one point early doors kicks Ronaldo exceptionally hard – so hard, in fact, that after plenty of treatment and a few Portuguese tears, he has to be stretchered off. Payet wanders up to the stretcher, smoking a Gauloise cigarette and wearing a trilby. “Stay out of East London” he suggests, knocking ash onto Ronaldo’s beautiful, hideous face.

Later on a good goal is scored by a Portuguese substitute called Eder, which is French for ‘header’, somewhat ironic as he used his foot. The crowd in the bar are somewhat disquieted by this. We beat a hasty retreat before the topic of EU membership comes up again.

*

Once home I hit the sack and grab myself a good eleven hours of the dreamless. The following morning we return to town to find a supermarché (trans: a group exercise which Jeremy Corbyn feels is a fine substitute for a functioning political opposition). There are plenty of sad faces around. As Brits, who have been victorious in 100% of our major association football cup finals, we can sympathise but not empathise with their plight. They really might have considered scoring a goal or two.

The smell of a French supermarket is quite unmistakable and not nearly as bad as you think it is. As we wander the aisles it also strikes me that as one gets older the roles between parent and child become more and more reversed. It is now me, the son, who pushes the trolley and he, the Old Man, who runs around in an excited trance, grabbing item after item. Soon there is a preponderance of cheese and wine in the shopping cart. Hoping to keep us from catching scurvy I toss in a few speculative apples, but they are soon buried under rich strata of pate and various charcuterie (trans: final evolution of the Pokémon ‘Charmander’ in the French-language version of the famous computer game).

On the drive back home the Old Man pulls not one but two monumentally illegal manouevers: The first is a swift U-turn to go visit a previously missed boulangerie (trans: fancy bras, but for a gentleman’s testicles) , as he feels the two baguettes in the boot are simply not sufficient. [NB: there are only two of us on this trip until Moan of Arc and L’Aigle arrive later in the piece. The man simply loves his bread.]

The second is an emergency stop combined with fifty yard reverse down a country road after he believed, erroneously, the bird sitting in a nearby field is something more interesting than a buzzard smoking a Gauloise. It should be noted at this point that the Old Man is quite the ornithologist (trans: twitcher) and has always been quite happy to risk the neck of his firstborn in order to gaze upon something feathered.

Much to his delight when we return to the homestead there is an arrogant woodpecker bouncing around the lawn, ignoring the trees and sticking two fingers up to nominative determinism. He looks at us, suggests we casse-toi (trans:…um, go ask your mother) and flies off. The heavens then open and we dash inside. The weather was sensational yesterday and this is most dispiriting. I’m not sure how, but my guess is that it is something to do with us leaving the EU.

The inclement weather gives us ample time to get on with some work. I settle down to do a spot of writing, but then decide that actually the Mansfield belly is getting a little extensive and some exercise is in order. I take a handy ab-roller and give it a go, tearing every single one of my stomach muscles on the very first ‘roll’.

Now my old friend Andthesea would no doubt suggest that “that’s the fookin’ point you fookin’ pussy, get up and do ten more” but he is made of sterner stuff than I. Instead I crawl weeping to my keyboard and decide, on a whim, to write a pretty damn inconsequential blog post. There may be more coming in the next week or two. In any case, a bientôt (trans: good head) my friends, and may God save Archchancellor May!

This morning I am as refreshed as can be. My decent spot of sleep has hit the figurative F5 key on the keyboard of the Mansfield corpus, and I’m ready for anything the day might throw at me.

The same cannot be said for the others. It seems that without my sage and guiding hand at the tiller New Orleans night #3 got somewhat sordid and very, very boozy. I am, however, unable to wring any details out of them due to my previous journalistic endeavours. I guess we, my friends, will have to imagine it…

A little later I stroll downtown with Silver, Andthesea and The Big Man to do a bit of shopping. We are scheduled to be picked up from the hostel ‘between 12.45 and 1.15’ for a ‘swamp tour’, but we are confident we can get in, get the necessary kit and get out again in a prompt and manly fashion. I buy some last minute souvenirs, and Silver and The Big Man source some good value vestments. Andthesea purchases a handsome Cleveland Cavaliers jersey, and somewhere in Ohio LeBron James smiled broadly.

Inevitably we are now running a little late, and this is exacerbated by the swamp tours bus driver fellow – who I shall call ‘Billy-Bob’, despite this probably not being his name – turning up ten minutes early and being annoyed we made morning plans. The Eagle calms everything down and we hop aboard to go a-swamping with ‘Airboat Adventures’.

Now airboats are, in many ways, the most awesome things mankind has yet conceived, and Bobby (actual name) our pilot and guide really lets it rip as we leave the little port and head out to the bayou. It tops out at 45mph, which feels swift enough I can tell you, especially around tight bends in between tall banks of green reeds and old cypress trees, turned white with salt.

Eventually we slow down a touch and we do some successful ‘gator spotting. It really is a mesmeric, verdant, wonderful landscape, and the idle sun has finally deigned to get his arse into gear and make with some rays. All in all a top way to spend an afternoon – one which was ‘capped’, so to speak, when The Yankee’s new baseball cap flew off his dome and dived into the muddy waters some forty, fifty, sixty yards back. We turn around to get it and The Eagle, that true Briton, goes to fish it out. We all pray that he topples in, but on this occasion The Almighty is abstemious with the divinely ordained physical comedy. One cannot, as they say, have everything.

*

Back at base camp we pick up some BBQ and enjoy it with beers (quelle surprise) in the garden of the hostel. The Big Man and Silver sling a ball around and somehow manage to bring down a whole ten metre string of fairy lights onto my head. The Yankee comes downstairs wearing a full suit and tie. He rolls his eyes at the mess of broken lights, then leaves before we can press him on where he got the suit and why he was carrying a violin case.

We meet a few folks at the hostel and night #4 in NOLA looks like it is taking shape. But once again I will not be in attendance, for tonight I have to ‘go see about a girl’. I imagine that without my calming influence the lads will once again overstretch themselves and fall into sin and/or vice. But where better to do so than New Orleans, Louisiana?

***

Late, late on the morning of April 19th people are traipsing back to the dorm room. Bags are beginning to be packed and there’s only a few hours until our taxi to the airport. Then, finally, awfully, lamentably, it will be back to Heathrow via Miami then…and I type this with dread…work first thing on Wednesday morning…oh lawd..what a vile, ghastly thought…

But to strike a happier final note, what, WHAT a holiday! Quite sensational from pillar to post, and a tip of the hat to The Yankee, The Eagle, The Big Man, Andthesea and Silver for making it such a riot. And thanks to all who have come along with us through this here humble blog. It’s been a pleasure to write, and I hope it has been an enjoyable read.

Until next time my friends, adios! God bless you all, and God bless the United States of America.

We wake to find The Yankee has gone off for coffee. It seems he had difficulties in sourcing himself any as he is away for some seven hours… A mysterious fellow is The Yankee. He is becoming more and more enigmatic by the instant. Distant…unknowable… poor on the text-back. Perhaps he’s gone ‘native’. The swifter we get him back to the UK the better, in this man’s opinion.

The rest of us, simpler and more present men, travel way, way across town to attend a baseball game: the New Orleans Zephyrs verses the Omaha Stormchasers. We are quite taken with America’s Pastime, even if the quality of this windy match-up is not spectacularly high. We see one home-run (Omaha) and our beloved Zephyrs go down 3-2.

The highlight of the occasion is that The Big Man and Silver are picked to take part in a mid-innings race of no little hilarity. The Big Man, resplendent in a large, inflatable burger bun, lies supine next to his rival. Silver, swift as coursing lightning, has to run back and forth collecting outsize plastic condiments and fillings to place on The Big Man’s chest, before donning a bun-suit of his own and throwing himself atop the completed burger (and, of course, atop The Big Man).

Things are neck and neck between the two teams until the very last, when a burst of good, English pace sends an airborne Silver home by a yard. Our boys win a $50 voucher for a restaurant we shall never visit..but they also win glory. Sweet, creamy glory.

*

Some time later (damn the public transport in this country – or lack thereof) we return to the hostel laden with beers. We were promised that the hot tub would be nicely warmed for us, but it lies tepid and uninviting. Just as we ponder our next move The Yankee returns, sans coffee, and with no explanation as to his lengthy absence.

We decide to grab a streetcar deeper into the lovely Garden District and find some food, and this we do after a sizable wait for said streetcar. Have I already cursed the public transport in this country? I have? In this very blog post? Smashing.

A very fine meal is enjoyed by all, save for The Yankee who ordered the cheeseburger at a restaurant named (quite appropriately) ‘Superior Seafood’. Many of the lads have char-grilled oysters and all are well-pleased. The Eagle, hip young thing that he is, has raw oysters. He then has a comedically large allergic reaction, much to our gratification.

Back at the hostel the hot tub is still icy as a second-hand igloo, so we sink our beers in the communal area and listen to music of inconsistent quality. Andthesea has another crack at the guitar, with a little more success than his Friday set. Clapton, Hendrix, Andthesea – it’s only a matter of time. The Yankee disappears again, wearing a very smart purple shirt as yet unseen on this holiday. We ask him where he heads but he leaves without a word, a faraway look in his intelligent eye. Curiouser and curiouser.

Soon after this the other four head into town for more carousing and rambunctious high-jinks, but my tank, I am sad to say, has run dry. There is a flickering red light a-flashin’ on the Mansfield dashboard, and it is time for me to head to bed. It is our final full day in the States tomorrow, and I’ll need to be on tip-top form.

This Saturday morning sees the latest start yet for some of our number, with The Eagle and The Yankee knocking on the door of 3pm before they drag their sorry hides out of bed.

Silver and I, however, rouse ourselves somewhat promptly to go face the music regarding the car we abandoned yesterday eve. The ladies at the desk are undoubtedly unimpressed, but once again our smooth English tones pour oil on the choppy waters of potential opprobrium and all is well. So it is a final ‘bon voyage’ to the Suburban…goodbye old girl, you were a worthy foe.

Back to the hostel for a bit of downtime. Eventually Silver, Andthesea and The Big Man get up and decide to take a taxi out east to the parts of the city worst affected by Hurricane Katrina. The Eagle and The Yankee, once up and about, join me in exploring the Garden District around our hostel – a lovely, leafy part of town with ancient streetcars and huge overhanging trees draped with sparkly beads. Very nice indeed.

Early evening we three head to town and stand in line for the famous Acme Oyster House. Their specialty is char-grilled garlic oysters, and The Eagle is somewhat sceptical about this offering…until he eats the first one that is. They really are fantastic. I had a half dozen but really could have demolished a thousand more. Highly suggested fare.

All six of us are reunited at a nearby bar and we begin an epic tour down the vile Bourbon Street. Now I flatter myself to say that I’m a humble fellow, a man who remembers his roots and seldom gets above his station. However, I can say this categorically: I am better than Bourbon Street. We are all better than Bourbon Street. Even Silver and The Big Man are better than Bourbon Street, and they’re just the worst!

The sights and sounds and smells (oh the smells..) of that place will live long in the memory, but are not suitable for a PG-rated account such as this. I will, therefore, bring this post to a close with but one final comment: altogether another top night all round.

Coffee etc. is sourced in Natchez central then we sally forth across town to do a quick tour of Longwood House, one of the grander antebellum piles for which the place is so famed. It is certainly quite striking, a massive five-storey octagon with a central Byzantine dome balanced on top – and it would have been doubly impressive had the plantation-owning son-of-a-bitch who built the place not gone bust during the Civil War.

There is something rather satisfying about the thought of an impoverished slave-owner having to live in his own basement (the only portion of the house successfully finished). There he sits, cursing the ‘damn Yankees’ (but not our damn Yankee of course) for robbing him of his ill-gotten wealth, struggling to feed his eight racist little kiddies, contracting ‘the consumption’ etc. etc.

Gay, our elderly tour-guide, seems less pleased with the whole outcome, lamenting the lost prosperity of Mississippi rather than celebrating freedoms won and cruel injustice defeated. But she can, as we say in Essex, ‘go do one’.

*

The Big Man, Silver and I drive in rotation during our final journey in the beast, and I hand over the reins to Silver in Baton Rouge, LA. Whilst there we purchase ourselves some very tasty local cuisine at ‘Poor Boy Lloyd’s Seafood Restaurant’ – which, coincidentally, is a favourite of one Barry O’Bama. The 44th President of the United States favours fried oyster po’boys, just in case you were wondering. Andthesea and The Eagle try some alligator. It gets mixed reviews.

We take a bit of a detour post-Baton Rouge in order to cross the mammoth Pontchartrain Causeway into New Orleans – the longest continuous bridge on the planet at 25 miles plus.

…

It’s a big bridge.

..

There’s no denying it.

*

Finally, New Orleans. Our very final destination, reached at last. At some points during the trip I didn’t think we’d make it. I certainly expected The Yankee to meet his maker along the way…I guess I owe The Eagle five bucks..

We find our hostel ‘Atlas House’ in the Garden District just west of the city centre and drop off our kit. Silver and I then go to hand over the Suburban, but the car rental folks have seemingly knocked it on the head for the evening. Being well brought up young gentlemen, we choose to abandon the vehicle there and wash our hands of it until tomorrow at the earliest. We have more important matters to attend to..that is to say, drinking.

We therefore wolf down a quick pizza or three back at the hostel and get ready to hit the town. Andthesea insists on playing the guitar. We recognise very few of his tunes. Sarah, a hostel employee, is keen to come along too, and she shows us a few choice spots on Frenchmen Street with decent live music and readily available beverages.

I must confess, the rest is a bit of a blur..I think some of us made it to the infamous Bourbon Street..though, Your Honour, I am a most unreliable witness…I think various hard liquors may have been involved.

So a good and grand start then, let’s see what tomorrow will bring.

We potter around Bill’s House and The Shack Inn’s grounds in the morning, enjoying a final look at a singular and memorable place to lay one’s head. Then it is to the motor, for we have a long day’s drive ahead down some celebrated roads: Highway 61 – The Blues Highway; Route 1 along the great Mississippi; and finally the Natchez Trace, the most beautiful stretch of road in our whole trip.

The group stop for a mesmerically disappointing lunch at ‘Garfield’s’ in Greenville – one of a succession of somewhat impoverished towns in Western Mississippi. The service was achingly slow – while White Castle served undoubtedly more evil fare, at least its cruel punishment was swift and expeditious…

Our time well wasted we speed off towards Vicksburg, the ‘key to the South’ to quote big Abe Lincoln. And when I say ‘speed’, I do mean ‘speed’. One of the many annoying things about my crashing of the car back in Bowling Green is that it has stripped me of all critiquing privileges vis-a-vis the driving of m’colleagues. This is scarcely a problem in regards to The Big Man who is somewhat masterful behind the wheel (despite the fact that today, on a flat, empty, ridiculously straight bit of road, he coaxed the beast north of 120, the bastard). No…’tis Silver who would suffer my disdain, were circumstances different, for he drives like an eighteen year-old Essex boy with five WKD Blues in his belly and one in his hand.

Now you might say, ‘Tom, isn’t it equally churlish to criticize his driving on these blog posts, rather than face-to-face?’ And to that I would say, ‘Thank you so much for reading the blog, I do hope you are enjoying it!’

*

On the outskirts of Vicksburg we take a driving tour around the historic battleground – an extensive and highly impressive thirteen-mile monument to one of the Civil War’s defining clashes. The whole place is littered with obelisks, gravestones and statues of varying sizes, and red and blue plaques are placed hither and thither to show the Confederate and Union battle-lines.

The Yankee is in his element here. He demanded at least one battlefield at the start of the trip, and the trip (as is its wont) has delivered manfully. We then march into the town itself and have a drink by the wide and muddy Mississippi. It’s a big river, there’s no denying it.

We leave pretty promptly from Vicksburg (not a town, in my opinion, deserving a 47-day siege) and take the beauteous Natchez Trace to the lovely riverside town of Natchez, full of grand antebellum architecture and wide, pleasant streets.

NowThe Eagle has been hiding something in his feathery nest, and that something happens to be over 100,000 Holiday Inn reward points from his travels and travails at his work. So, being the very finest of birds, he sorts us out complimentary rooms, much to our delight.

However, we promptly squander those savings in Natchez’s only casino – which doesn’t even have the good grace to be a riverboat. However, we do enjoy a meal and a few beers there right on the surprisingly peaceful riverfront, and we all have a decent enough time, despite our periodic losses to one-armed bandits (fruit machines) and two-armed bandits (blackjack dealers). The casino puts on a shuttle-bus back to the town’s hotels and we use this to get an earlier night than usual. It is to be our last pre-New Orleans night, so a good eight hours of the dreamless is absolutely imperative!

We endure an early start this morning and, unused to such foul hours, a few of us make a real hash of the Baymont Inn’s breakfast offerings. Silver, for example, explodes an oatmeal in their microwave, and yours truly creates some very, very questionable waffles. The day can only get better from here and, true to form, it does indeed: for our first stop is Graceland!

The homeof The King is a surreal, gauche, enlightening, kitsch and fabulous place, and it’s an odd ol’ experience walking his halls with a throng of genuine Elvis aficionados, all following along to John Stamos (no idea) on the iPad-guided tours. As with Louisville’s Ali Museum, it’s all unsurprisingly hagiographical, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little touched by the place, especially when you exit the Jungle Room, wander through Graceland’s grounds and find the grave of The King in his ‘meditation garden’.

There are private planes (x2) to explore and countless automobiles of varying levels of taste and utility. Some exhibits fall a bit flat, and there are eleven (count them…ELEVEN) gift shops slinging unbelievable levels of tat. However, overall, highly rewarding.

Even more rewarding, though in a very different way, is the exceptionally powerful Civil Rights Museum, which is to be our next stop (after another swift Chick-Fil-A of course). However, as we drive towards downtown we spot the historic Sun Studios, so The Eagle and I hop out to take a quick tour around the birthplace of ‘rock & roll’:

Content-wise it is similar enough to the Sam Phillips exhibition at the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, but it is well worth it for the exuberance of the tour-guide, who has some strong gags and fine anecdotes. Standing where Elvis, Johnny Cash, B.B. King, Jerry Lee Lewis and countless others recorded huge hits is a bit of a thrill, no doubt about it.

There’s a complimentary shuttle bus downtown and it ferries the pair of us to the Civil Rights Museum, where we find the other four in quiet contemplation inside a fantastic, troubling, exceptional exhibition: Built around the Lorraine Motel where Dr. King was assassinated and the lodging house across the street where the fatal shot was fired, it is an emotive location for a thorough, no-holds barred examination of the struggle of African Americans for equality, especially here in the Deep South. Obviously we all went in with the highest levels of respect for the great man, but coming out we are all just knocked backwards by the majesty of Martin Luther King Jnr. The drive out of Memphis is a quiet, rainy one.

*

I drive us south to Clarksdale, MS, along some of the strangest, dullest roads man has yet laid. I don’t like the car, the car doesn’t like me, but we make it work. Our accommodation this evening is fantastic: We are all staying in the enormous Bill’s House at the Shack Up Inn, just outside of town. It’s a huge, two-level wooden cabin, filled to the rafters with odds and ends, stag heads and guns, huge wooden desks and cabinets. All genuinely bizarre.

We are heading first to Morgan Freeman’s own blues bar, Ground Zero, and they send a car to pick us up…I say ‘a car’, it’s a 1980s-era limousine chauffeured by the irrepressible Abraham, who is a hundred gallon barrel of laughs.

Ground Zero is a cool place, though sadly Morgan is nowhere to be seen. We have a bite to eat and school the locals at pool, but then head across to the town’s other main bar, ‘Red’s’, in search of higher quality blues. And find them we do, in that little neon dive, which serves us beer by the bottle and music by the crate.

MVP of the three-piece has to be ‘Hollywood’, a surly teen named with deliberate irony who could not possibly look any more bored. However, he’s a far better drummer with one hand than most are with two.

Wellpast midnight Abraham returns, sans limo (electrics died, hopefully nothing to do with us..) and he takes some of us back to the Shack Inn in his own car, legend that he is. The Big Man and Silver stay on in town to head to a curious after-party in some sort of art gallery fixture, but I forewent this attraction – so you’ll have to ask them for a full appreciation of the Clarksdale art scene.

The Eagle has (somehow) managed to source a full rack of smoked ribs, so we feast on these in our eclectically and eccentrically decorated cabin, feeling supremely southern.

I wake quite sublimely refreshed and demolish the meatloaf I had placed on death-row (score another late win for Tommy). We then spend the whole morning in glorious Mississippi sunshine mucking around Dark Blue’s family cabin, which is pristine and splendid, with two floors (or a ground floor and a ‘mezzanine’ as Silver put it, to much hilarity from Mississippi locals) with large bedrooms and a number of sunny, well-appointed porches.

There is a large lake and levee and a damp meadow within the grounds. We fish (unsuccessfully) in said lake, hit a few golf balls off said levee and play out an epic game of American football on said meadow. Dark Blue, Silver and I suffer a narrow defeat against The Yankee, who (with annoying regularity) picks off passes to the six-footers Andthesea and The Big Man, the latter of whom takes significant pleasure in taking me out off the ball. Happily I manage to deposit him in a large, swampy puddle at one point, covering him head to toe in stagnant ooze. Sadly, I’m sure The Big Man’s vengeance will be swift and severe, should there be a rematch.

*

We drive around in the sun for a short spell, discovering that Tuesday early afternoon is not the busiest time of the week in Northern Mississippi and much is closed. However, we are able to slip into Yalabusha Brewery in the small town of Water Valley where a fine fellow by the name of John shows us around an increasingly successful Southern craft brewery.

This gives us quite the taste, so we go purchase a good few of their offerings at a nearby BBQ joint called Lamar Lounge. The BBQ itself is tasty and plentiful, and I am able to chalk up a win by taking down a a big old pile of high quality local cuisine. The waitress today also doesn’t seem much of a fan, and I fear a pattern is emerging. I should really spend some time writing some better jokes. Come to think of it, I guess y’all feel pretty similarly as well…

*

We drop off Dark Blue, hit a liquor store to buy him and his family liquid thank-you gifts, then drive to a close-by gun range. It is time for us to fire powerful weaponry and finally become truly American. We get our hands on a 9mm semi-automatic, an old-school revolver and an M-series semi-automatic assault rifle (the single loudest thing I have ever come across in my life, even more than Silver after a few ales).

Comparing targets at the end, Andthesea seems the most preternaturally gifted, and The Big Man points out that such talents are wasted on a Quaker. The Yankee is less deadly, as is the Eagle, who was shooting with his wrong hand following an embarrassing football injury from that morning.

Personally I found two things quite concerning with the experience: Firstly, that the minimum age at the range was eight years old..EIGHT!! Secondly..was how much I enjoyed it…oh the power…oh the titillating, captivating, overwhelming, intoxicating power of it all. On the way out I sign a petition against gun control and attempt to join the GOP over the phone.

Putting aside our new-found Republicanism, we went back to bid farewell and give gifts to the notably Democratic Dark Blue and his family. A couple of their friends were visiting so we have a brief but sweet little gathering before heading up to Memphis for the night.

*

Back in Tennessee on the outskirts of Memphis we find a decent enough motel (The Baymont Inn, for those taking notes) then head downtown to Beale Street – the main strip for bars and live music. We go to B.B. King’s Blues Club and (unsurprisingly) the band is fabulous, with a peerless, top-quality guitarist and a singer with lungs the size of punching bags. It’s not a particularly late night, though a few beers may or may not have been enjoyed. However, the music will live long in the memory.