Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow, Next Up Oak Alley Plantation - Thursday, May 25, 2017

Thursday morning came along and it was time to depart after our usual morning routine. We unhooked the utilities and hooked up the pickup. When we got outside the park gate, the RV GPS would not work. Thank Goodness for iPhones! We used my iPhone to get us routed out of New Orleans and headed to our next stop. I was able to call Rand McNally finally and found out that we have to take the GPS outside the rV and push the reset button so it can read the satellites again. So when we arrived at Oak Alley Plantation, that is what we did. We stepped outside the RV and hit the reset button and it found satellites again! Imagine that, what a deal. We are glad it worked though. This GPS has given us lots of problems -mainly with the cord, 1 & 2 were done in by the cord - so we are on the 3rd replacement. We continue to save our receipt, in case it has to be replaced again. The Oak Alley Plantation has a large parking lot so we were able to park the RV there and leave the generator on so the dogs could stay cool. I have always wanted to tour a plantation, since I read Gone With The Wind. Our guide gave us a very informative talk s she showed us the "Big House". It was very interesting and lasted about 45 minutes. We got a veterans's discount also. The grounds were immaculate and the Virginia Live Oaks are old - like 300 years old and they are registered and have names. This was a sugar plantation, so cane was grown and made into sugar, a difficult, hot, arduous process. A large exhibit of Slavery at Oak Alley shares the story of those who were enslaved on the plantation and covers this difficult topic with accuracy. The plantation went through many ownership changes. We toured the grounds and had a late lunch. By the time we finished lunch we were ready to get on down the road. We had decided to stop at Opelousas, LA at a City park. So we drove in and tried to figure out where the RV spots were - we went down an offshoot road and could not turn around, so we unhooked the pickup and drove to the turn around at the end of the park. Then a nice park employee rescued us and led us back to where to park. We backed in and hooked up the utilities- the cost was $11.00/night. So the park cost was a bargain, but it was a rough road and lots of activity until dark. The guy who showed us where to park was the security guard and said he was on duty until 11:30 if we needed anything. But we were asleep long before that. We watched the movie American Sniper, for a 2nd time and then went to sleep. In other technical difficulties we could not get the back TV in the RV to work. Some days, technology is great and some days it is not.