Mississippi.........Ever notice how many "S's" are in this state name?.......After this ride, I now think they stand for the types of roads Tim (Thumper) found for us to explore.
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Not only were the fire roads and trails great, when we did have to connect dirt to dirt, the asphalt was just as fun to ride on. We logged two 200mi days and a 150mi day.......and not to forget, a little "Blackjack" at the "Isle of Capri" on the mighty Miss river in Natchez.
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Tim had us set up all the way around.....great GPS routes, comfortable base camp, 4 wheel lodging that had an air conditioning unit that resembled a "Blue-Bell Ice cream delivery truck"......We had our steaks, chips, beer, and some comfortable bunks.
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We drove out Thursday afternoon, set up camp, cooked some grub, drank some hops, and just about got frost bite sleeping in the meat locker.......Thank goodness his wife supplied some comforters......We slept well.
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Friday AM we fire up the steeds and head north east to cross the mighty Miss river..............I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story........Enjoy
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"El Capitan".....our Tour Guide
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St Fancisville, LA ferry crossing
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The roads in this part of the state were lined with hard wood trees. The trees had branches that made a canopy over the road. We had mile after mile of trails that had a roof of tree limbs that filtered the sunlight. Made for some great, cool, visually beautiful riding.
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River bottom was hard packed and just begging to be explored....headed upstream about a 1/2 mile before heading back.....Joe caught some action shots of me conquering a river crossing......Piece of cake compared to the dreaded west Texas "Slimed River Crossings".....Could a sworn, that as my front tire hit the water, my collar bone sort of gave a little twitch.....
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During day 1, we paralleled the Miss River heading north. One of Tim's roads, which started out great, got just a little too close to the big river. We were blasting down this great twisting dirt road, to come to a screeching halt.............The river has over run it's banks and flooded the roads........Under that green is Miss water.
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We did tread where no street bike has ever been......Our GPS route said that the road turned and was just around the corner. So we sloshed full steam ahead for aways, veered up into the woods to see if we could connect the road. It got over grown real quick, we were pushing down swamp brush with our front wheels, which then opened up into a vast cypress stump lined swamp. We still had enough traction to plow forward, all the while dodging the 10-12 inch tall baby stumps. We trudged on for about a 1/2 mile in this swamp, all the while having that creepy feeling that we were being watched by "Big Foot", or some other swamp creature........We finally did find a dry road.......Dry for about a 100 yds.......To the left was green soup as well as to the right. We had to turn around and head back into the deep shadows of the "Swamp"
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If it weren't for GPS's, we'd still be sloshing around in that swamp....We made our way back to civilization, to a one horse town with a name that fit our previous 10 miles....."Pond, Miss".....Met an old timer that had some great stories and some cold "Soda-Pop"............
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Rested and cooled down, we headed down the road.........Tim had run across some local history while on the net. He set aside a waypoint and we headed towards it............An old church that still had a cannon ball embedded in it's wall.........The plaque will tell the story......
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After Tim got us lined out, we headed north for some more "Culture"........There was an old civil war cemetery and museum that he wanted to check out.........As we were heading through the country side, we noticed the vegetation changing, and changing in a big way.........
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The dreaded "Kudzu" was every where.......It reminded me of a "Steven King" SciFi movie........A little further down the road, we see the reason why it's gone wild and has overgrown everything, and the reason is not too far fetched from a Sci-Fi movie..........
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We make it to the war museum but realize we don't have enough time to do the tour. We take a few pictures and head down the road.......maybe next time
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Shadows are getting long, so we head to town, (Natchez, MS) to check in to the hotel Tim has picked for us. He swears he spoke with some one that assured him it was a nice hotel and the rates were what we were looking for......We said "Lead the way, El Capitan"..........We let our GPS direct us to this..............
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We get to a vantage point which gave us a grand view of the mighty river and the Natchez bridge.........while up there we spot the gambling river boat and some other hotels......We settle on the "Isle of Capri" hotel...........
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We get two nice rooms, shower, change and head downstairs to the shuttle bus. We are taken down to the river to try and part us from most of our money. We board the "Pirate Boat" named "Isle of Capri" for the buffet we had heard so much about. We grab a table and fill our bowls with some of the best tasting seafood gumbo. We followed it up with shrimp, oysters, Alaskan king crab legs, fresh fish and all the other fixins...........Tim and I head downstairs for some culture......I use that term lightly.........We've never seen so many poor looking locals sitting at the slot machines robot like feeding the machines their money. We saw one poor looking couple that just got off from work with what looked like the husbands paycheck. She stood behind him while he tried his hand at "Blackjack".............Tim pulled up a chair and after a bit of nail bitting close calls, walked away from the table with some extra gas money. We had a good seafood dinner, a few free Crown-n-Cokes and a good time.
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We figured that since our fearless leader (Tim) was doing such a fine job of finding us hotels......(Insert laughter here).........We'd pull a little prank.......Found an old quart of oil in the back of a fishing boat. There was just enough oil left in it to pour on Tim's primary sprocket and let pool under his bike......The next morning, while I was cleaning my bikes carb, Tim comes down with his coffee and bagel to see how I was coming along. He then looks at his bike and sees the puddle of oil.......This was a Kodak moment, his face went from all smiles to the "I got the Blues, I wanna go back to bed look"...........He then starts saying that he brought another seal and can fix
it. I let him stew for a few minutes, had a twinge of guilt and broke the good news to him.......This is where Tim says......"I owe you one Doc"
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Second Day
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Who said Adventure riders are uncultured and only interested in "Dirt"?...........We start the day with the typical Continental Breakfast,....Oh well, it was free........Head on down the road after renaming Tim's bike "The Exxon Valdez"........After some great dirt trails with some fun erosion berms that we jumped, we came to a locked gate.........backed tracked to a connecting road that directed us to the "Windsor Ruins"....(http://www.positivelymississippi.com/html/windsor_ruins.html) Took some pictures and a break under the old pecan trees.
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We head on into Port Gibson for some gas and lunch........It being a Saturday, we didn't think we'd have a problem.........Pulled in, found the gas, then tried to find a place to eat. There was a Sonic that was having some type of kids party out in the grassy parking lot. Way too many people to get any service. Spied a SubWay.....it was closed. Spied another country restaurant, it too was closed. Asked a local where we could get some "good" food....he pointed to a service station combo deli.........Went in to find greasy fired food behind a glass serving counter......So greasy, droplets of grease were running down the glass.........yummy.........Drove down the road and found this red building that didn't have a sign of any type. Was told by another local they thought it was a restaurant........Walked in to find one of the nicest, cleanest country restaurants. It was so nice and clean, we felt a bit over dressed to be in there, with white linen, real silverware, fresh flower arrangements.........Prices were very reasonable and the food was good.........
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DRZ had some electrical gremlins.........Enter the gremlin killer (Tim)
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Ran across a sign in a country store front door.........Don't know if it was truly a law in this town, but I wish it was......
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End of the day.......about 200 miles under our belt, starting to show
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Ride over, back at the truck........Another great dual-Sport ride
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Yeah it was a great ride, but we didn't finish the route partially because day 2 was too long and my faulty wiring job on my bike set us back a few hours to boot!
The only other re-route was at the green slime.
Hi Joe, you hang out with the strangest people 
I remember one section about 20 miles long...I tried to estimate the amount of flat or straight road. My guess was no more than 2 miles!
