After leaving Memphis,

we drove southeast towards Tupelo, intending to complete the Elvis experience by visiting his birthplace. As soon as we turned off I55 we were in stereotypical Bible Belt country: almost many churches as homes, and as many trailers as permanent houses. Abandoned cars and trucks lay rusting in driveways and ditches every half mile or so beside dilapidated wooden shacks discoloured by age. Every now and again a pristine plantation-style house on a bowling green lawn would appear, bordered by less fortunate properties.

Driving along one particular stretch of road with with dense green foliage on the left and rolling fields on the right, some movement caught my eye among the trees: a big bird of prey (we weren't sure what kind, but it looked like an eagle of some sort) took off low and wheeled across the road, only to fly directly into the path of an semi truck coming the other way. There was an audible thump as the truck passed us, a few feathers flew up and I spun round to see the truck carry on down the road. We'd seen plenty of roadkill already but this was a bit of a shock...!

We carried on to Tupelo and found the Presley house more through luck than judgment and stopped to take a few pictures. We ambled through the Elvis Aaron Presley Memorial Chapel (what was that I was saying about a pilgrimage last time?) and hit the road again, this time along the Natchez Trace Parkway to Hazelhurst, where we stopped for the night.

Hazelhurst was a perfect example of most of the towns we stopped in on the way to New Orleans: we'd hit an identical strip of chain motels and fast food joints, fill up with gas and coffee and set out to find "downtown", or whatever constituted the original part of the town. Once off the neon-lit main drag we'd crawl through street after street of bungalows in various states of repair, but more often than not we'd be completely unable to find anything resembling a town centre. The sprawl seems to take over so rapidly and spread so wide that I can only assume that downtown is maybe three solitary streets hidden somewhere within a huge expanse of homogeneous suburbs.

The next day, though, we found an honourable exception: Laurel, midway between Hazelhurst and New Orleans, looked at first to be exactly the same as every other strip-mall town so far - if even a little scrappier around the edges - but then after half an hour of fruitless to-ing and fro-ing around the 'hood we discovered the original town centre in all its antebellum glory. Granted, it was only about three by three blocks in size, but it boasted a good few imposing gothic edifices and made for a pleasant ambling stroll before we drove the final stretch to New Orleans. Pity the one café in town didn't have any tomato sauce...