Biloxi Blues

We traveled to Biloxi, Mississippi last year at about this same time, a scant two years after two major hurricanes ripped through the Gulf Coast, ripping it all to hell.

So this year we thought we would find a revitalized Biloxi. We did find this new RV park called "Majestic Oaks" that advertised itself as far from the freeway and close to the beaches.

***Biloxi still has a ways to go in terms of rebuilding. While the flattened buildings have been removed and the foundations cleanly scraped, the pace of new construction seems slow. The buildings in the best shape are, sad to say, the huge casinos.

Majestic Oaks is nice, clean comfortable park, no question about it.

But what the brochure should have added was "far from the freeway but close to the runway." It neighbors Keesler Air Force Base...

....with C-130s occasionally buzzing the park, flying directly overhead. We snapped this shot atop 4,000-foot Mount Biloxi--the C-130 strafing us at Majestic Oaks.

And just across the street from Majestic Oaks is this not so majestic liquor store with security bars. To say the least, this is not one of Biloxi's pristine neighborhoods.

But what does Daisy care? She says, "Give me a bowl full of Beneful and a pup to sniff and I'm in dog heaven."

But the park really does make the best of the negatives that surround it, providing poop-scoop stations for dogs (and people)...

...and quite honestly, operations at the air base (that water tower is on the base) cease overnight.

So the Lance, the Tundra and the all-new-for-2010 bling-bling Adventurer bike with tiny tires felt safe and secure for this one-night stay.

The park owners spent thousands of dollars planting these palm trees and what the hurricane didn't nail

a hard freeze this winter did.

A pool, surrounded by spears so you can't get in.

Except for 12,000-foot Mount Biloxi, the park was perfectly level and the roads paved. A great opportunity for Paul to mount the Adventurer bling-bling and drag the poor damn dog all around the park.

And here's another of the mysteries of the deep....south, that is.

How the right-wing politicians down here condemn undocumented workers. And yet most of the laborers and workers in the service industry in Biloxi, at least,

are Hispanic. They were encouraged to come in and help rebuild following the hurricanes. And here they stay, still hard at work. So while Arizona is having a hissy fit over the issue, Mississippi seems quite content to blend these folks into the economy.

And since this whole damn thing is about the dog, here we are leaving Biloxi. Daisy doing what she does best after a drag through the park: sleeping on Paul's lap. We're on our way to Loo-zee-anna.


I know all you are praying that we either hit or (if you like us) missed the big tornadoes that hit the south a few days ago. Like it or not, we missed 'em by three weeks. Yazoo City was just a few miles from the Natchez Trace where we traveled in late March.