venturing4th: The Buccaneer and the Colonel

My heart goes out to Suzanne and her family and all those living in the Boston area who are having to endure the relentless snow. Over 70 inches in two weeks is a lot of snow and I would imagine that even those who like winter and enjoy playing in the snow have pretty much had their fill! Is Providence and Rhode Island receiving the same levels of snow?

Suz sent me some pictures that she took today -

Suzanne's comment on this picture was, "I've lost my deck."

Here's Scott shoveling a path across the deck to the stairs and wondering where he's going to put the snow. Hi, Scott!

Meanwhile, further south...

We said goodbye to Sal and Noreen, who are from New Jersey, and are the campground hosts at Mystic River Airstream Park.

We travelled some in Florida and entered Alabama passing by Mobile...

and entered Mississippi where we are staying right on the Gulf, about two miles from Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. After we arrived in the campground of Buccaneer State Park we took a walk along the beach.

An interesting fact about Bay St. Louis. In 2001, the year the Providence Public Library was awarded the National Award for Library Service for a metropolitan library, Bay St. Louis won the award for the best small public library.

There are some spectacular homes along this part of the Gulf.

And lovely live oak trees.

I think these folks are getting ready to celebrate Mardi Gras.

Buccaneer State Park is right on the beach and use of this land was first recorded in history in the late 1700's when Jean Lafitte and his followers were active in smuggling and pirating along the coast. The French Buccaneer, Lafitte, inhabited the old Pirate House located a short distance from what is now the park.

The park site, also known as Jackson's Ridge, was used as a base of military operations by Colonel Andrew Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans in 1814. Jackson later returned to this area and built a house on the land that is now Buccaneer State Park. Andrew Jackson, Jr., a nephew and the adopted son of President Jackson, and his wife Sarah, who named the plantation, Sea Song Plantation, lived here just before the Civil War. The Jacksons sold the property in 1861 and the house was later owned by the Gulfside Assembly and Robbert E. Jones, the first black Methodist Bishop who, in 1923 founded the Gulfside Chautauqua and Camp Meeting Ground. At the time, it was the only resort in the Gulf Region open to black Methodists. The house burned in 1935.