Of course, as soon as I got through Beaumont I got off the interstate. 

Except, wait…  my journal mentions that I crossed the median to stop at the Goodyear refinery for some water, which is on I-10. So, just like in Mississippi, even though there was a parallel road with less traffic a quarter of a mile away, I continued on the interstate.

I pulled over at a truck stop where I downed a baked potato. Aha! You’re not gonna find a truck stop on a parallel road! And that means no baked potatoes! 

It was time to start looking for a campsite, but nothing in the area looked very promising. This part of the country has a lot of swampy areas, and it’s sometimes difficult to find a spot that’s dry enough for a tent.

Glancing across a swamp and thinking about camping, there was a whisper from the deepest recesses of my subconscious.

When I asked the whisper to speak up, it changed from a misty… 

“Something’s not right about camping here,” to… 

“Don’t alligators live in swamps?” to…

“The GatorFest is somewhere in Texas, isn’t it?” to… 

“Why, yes, it’s in Anahuac” to… 

“Anahuac? That’s, uh, sort of close to here, right?” to… 

“It is indeed. About twenty miles down the road from where I’m standing right now.”

…and finally…

“So, if there’s a festival just down this road that celebrates alligators there’s a good chance there are alligators in the swampy area I’m looking to find a place to camp in?”

Where did I put that stick I was using for rattlesnakes?