Not enough detail to be sure, but probably a great egret.

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Great_Egret/id

Great blue heron

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_blue_heron

Our daughter lived in Houma, LA for ten years. We toured several plantations while visiting. Your first photo of the cottages reminds me of the slave cabins at the plantations.

Good sleuthing job on lodging. I'm always happy with myself when I make a good find.

OK wife, I'll quit whining. But I'd sure like to get past this cold/allergies/whatever real soon. Whatever it is, it ain't your fault!

I love a good routing challenge. It sounds as if we are quite similar in our stubborn streak to find a way where we want to go!

Good routing job!

Husband, enough about the "cold" and blaming it on your wife! You've got allergies just like the rest of the people in Oklahoma! You'll be fine!

I don't like starting a tour on used tires - I'm only doing so because I couldn't get new ones - they kept telling me that the tires should arrive any day from overseas, but they didn't make it in time. I usually get 6,000 to 7,000 miles on a set of tires, but only about half of that is from loaded touring and the rest is from unloaded commuting and my regular training rides. These tires will need to survive about 6,300 miles of loaded touring to get me through to the end - so here's hoping!

Some folks ride up the Mississippi River trail, and some do the ACA route - I think the 2 routes get confused at times as they both start in New Orleans and proceed north. I know there's a lot of poverty along and near the Mississippi River itself. Including the bigger cities like Memphis and St Louis. I don't expect to see as much on the ACA route itself, although this certainly isn't a wealthy section of the country.

You must be related to Jacinto, who favors Marathon Plus tires. He rides them until the black exterior is completely gone and the blue flat protection is showing through like a stripe!

We did carry one of my preferred tires, a Marathon Racer, as a back up tire this summer. We used it, and were never able to find a 559 tire that wasn't a mountain bike tire to replace it. Luckily, we didn't need a second replacement.

For Jacinto's 50th birthday, he wanted a momentous tour. We looked at this route. I had two friends (who had traveled together), say that the poverty along almost the entire route was overwhelming, and depressing. They were so opinionated that we gave up the plan and rode the Sierra Cascades Route instead. I will be following with interest, to hear your thoughts.

Tailwinds!

Scott, thanks for pointing that out! As weird as the winters are becoming with global warming, going north for the winter may become a thing. It would have made for a good journal title too, I'll probably find a way to work it into a title somewhere. Best of luck,

Thanks Greg! When I checked I didn't find any cheap rooms in Baton Rouge. It worked out better for me anyway as far as the riding distance goes by going on through the city and staying a bit further north. I'll check out your journal for tidbits that may be helpful to me, thanks for pointing it out.

Dave - I looked at your journal, looks like a great trip! You were on the opposite side of the river from my route through LA, but we would have some overlap with Natchez, Port Gibson, and Cape Girardeau. Thanks for sharing your journal, I will read it more closely in upcoming days for tidbits that may be helpful. Best of luck,

Hi George, we rode S to N in 2012. https://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/riverride
We followed the river very closely.

Looks like a fun tour to me. I did a similar trip from NOLA to Muscatine on my "Going Up" journal and I enjoyed it a lot. I'm not sure my journal would be much help to you though, because I mostly stayed close to the Mississippi River. I do have one suggestion regarding lodging in Baton Rouge. There is a hotel/casino in the downtown area which had very reasonable rates and nice rooms. At least that was true seven years ago.