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When I looked in my guidebook for somewhere to visit in Mississippi nothing jumped out as obvious in the way that New Orleans, Miami and New York City do. But it made Natchez, the oldest permanent settlement on the Mississippi river, sound nice and one guy I spoke to in New Orleans said it was nice so that settled it. And the fact that it was only a five hour bus ride from New Orleans made it more attractive.
Being a small town there was zero chance of there being a hostel so I was 'forced' to take a hotel room. I settled on one that was as cheap as possible but central but when I turned up I was completely surprised, in a good way. It had only opened about six weeks before and it was a beautifully decorated business hotel. It was like a Holiday Inn, only nicer. When I got into my room I was amazed how nice it was for the price of only $69 for the night. The furniture was nice, the bedding was plush and the TV was a flat screen and even had some HD channels! The only problem was that the curtains were decorative only and didn't close but the material was of a high quality.
For dinner I explored the surrounding area because I had cleverly picked a hotel right on the riverside and at the top of Main St. As I walked down Main St, checking out each restaurant I saw, I loved the buildings. I even continued past the shops to check out the houses further down the street. It was the typical beautiful southern town I've grown to expect. One place I walked past seemed to be a community hall with large doors down three walls, all open to the outside, and inside people were gathering to hear the results of local elections and proposition votes. It was such a sweet small town moment.
I ate in Biscuits & Blues because I'd heard of one in San Francisco that was excellent. I wondered why there would be one out here in rural western Mississippi but I didn't stop to wonder for too long because I was hungry. I sat at the bar and ordered a beer and, to sample the regional cuisine, I ordered a southern fried seafood platter, which is very unlike me because I'm not keen on seafood. In the end it was good, as were the American biscuits to start with, but that's not important because a more incredible thing happened.
I was sat at the bar and got talking to the guy two bar stools down from me. I told my usual story and we discussed all kinds of topics including politics, work and travelling. And everything we talked about we had something in common - same political views, same religious views, we both quit a job to go travelling, we like the same TV shows, we do the same job - software developing in Java/J2EE, we both worked in Scrum methodology at work and both had the exact same issues with it. It was getting quite scary and then it got worse because we were both staying at the same hotel and then, to put the cherry on the cake, we were staying in adjacent rooms. I got a photo of Mark to remind me what I'll be like in a little over ten years time.
I also need to stop using sarcasm in public. Once I'd finished my first beer I wanted to inform the barmaid that I needed a refill, but I'm not crass enough to yell down to her at the other end of the bar so, once I saw I'd caught her eye, I raised my glass and tilted it from side to side in a please-refill-me kind of motion. She said "do you want a refill?" to which I replied "no, I just like waving it" and she said "okay" and turned away until I quickly followed up with "not really, I do want another one!". I got a beer and a valuable lesson at the same time.
The next day I had a few hours before my bus out of town so I went for a wander around. I walked down the riverside and down to the casino running inside an old steamboat, then back up the hill to town. By the time I got back to Main St. and went inside a souvenir shop the back of my shirt was soaked in sweat. That's when I chose to base myself inside a bar and out of the sun until lunch. Since the beers were cheap I went back to Biscuits & Blues and stayed there for lunch.
Although I was only in town for 24 hours I liked it. The people were lovely and the place was so pretty. One advantage/disadvantage I'm finding in smaller American towns is that the centre of towns doesn't have the chain stores - they're all out of town in shopping centres or strip malls. The advantage is that you get more independent stores and restaurants in the town centres so the town feels nicer; the disadvantage is that it means I can't get to the useful big shops because I'm on foot. And bizarrely it means there's hardly a McDonald, Pizza Hut, etc. in towns. The only fast food I came across regularly is Subway.
Next stop: Texas, where everything is bigger.
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