Later gator

Years ago, Angelo and I had a conversation in which we were ranking animals.

They actually said that capybaras were trendy, over-rated trash animals.

How our friendship survived that moment, I will never know.

Then it got worse. Angelo said - I kid you not - alligators are better than horses.

Alligators.

Heresy!

I should have unfriended them right then and there, but somehow we got past it.

Mostly.

I lived in the South for seven years, but Mid-South, not Deep South. 

I've never seen an alligator in the wild.

On the drive from New Orleans to Ocean Springs, Carol told me there are occasional alligator sightings in her neighborhood. Of course, this led to us looking up the locations of the most recent reptile human encounters and going there. For posterity, I snapped a photo and sent it to Seth...

and Angelo.

Sadly - or maybe not - we were unsuccessful in our attempts to find free ranging alligators. Fortunately, Carol had a back-up plan. The day after we went to Wild Acres, we were back in the car heading to Gulf Coast Gator Ranch & Tours in Moss Point, Mississippi.

We paid our admission and bought a cup of alligator food.

I don't know what I was expecting, but this wasn't it. The food looked and felt like grittier, denser, mostly odorless charcoal.

We stepped outside and suddenly there were alligators everywhere.

Ugh. So many.

We went up to the fence and started throwing.

Weirdly, feeding gators turned out to be a lot more exciting than I'd expected.

I made and sent two videos, one for Seth...

and one for Angelo.

Eventually, we ran out of food, which was fine because it was time to climb onto an airboat and go on a swamp tour.

This was also surprisingly fun.

The swamp was beautiful and also, very peaceful.

I didn't see a single alligator.

We got back to the ranch, went back inside and bought another cup of food.

Alligators are absolutely, positively not better than horses - or capybaras - but there's no denying that I enjoyed my visit to the alligator farm.

Please do not tell Angelo, but I would be happy to go there again.

Tack reference Tuesday

I visited New Orleans several times in the mid-1990's, mostly without my camera. As a result, I have just one picture of the city's iconic carriage mules from that time frame. 

Last month, I flew into New Orleans to visit my friend, Carol. She picked me up and the airport, and we spent the day with my nephew, Tom, and his wife, Erin, before heading east to Carol's Ocean Springs, Mississippi home.

For the return trip, we decided to spend a little more time in New Orleans. We drove over the day before my flight, checked into a hotel and then walked to the French Quarter.

Eventually, we found a quieter place...

for dinner...

and drinks.

After that, we walked to Jackson Square...

and found the mules!

This time, I took all the pictures.

Old habits die hard. Even though I'm sure I'll never need them, I still took a slew of harness and carriage reference pictures. Just in case.

Of course, then we decided we needed to go for a ride.

This is "our" mule, Archie.

And we're off!

It wasn't the most exciting carriage ride we've been on together - those honors will forever belong to Robby in Bruges - but it was fine.

I enjoyed seeing New Orleans framed between Archie's big ears.

Thanks, friend!

And thank you to Carol, too. I'm so glad we got to do that!