My wife and I are from the UK and we flew from Manchester to Austin, Texas to begin our 14 day road trip. We drove across Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and Arkansas - almost 2,000 miles. Naturally we only got a 'snapshot' of the towns we visited - but they were pretty good snapshots! Our hotels/motels varied quite a bit. From bargain $70 suites (using hotel coupons for places situated on the outskirts of towns), to an antebellum home stuffed with beautiful antiques. It was a great trip and we took plenty of lovely memories home with us.

After picking up our rental car (a Ford Escape SUV) we stayed our first night in a Super 8 motel near Austin airport, guessing that the short drive might be preferential for our first night after a long flight. It wasn't really a good idea. Although the motel was "cheap and cheerful" and not bad at all, it was a good half hour's drive into the city. As regards the city itself though, we enjoyed the 'feel' of Austin very much. Among the highlights for us were the tour of the State Capitol, the South Congress Avenue area and the Umlauf Sculpture Garden. We voted Austin a Big Hit.

Moving on from Austin, we were en route to San Antonio but took a detour to Fredericksberg in the 'Hill Country'. It's a nice enough town but, to be honest, not really worth our while visiting considering our time was quite tight.

In San Antonio we stayed at the Best Western Sunset Suites. The staff were very nice but we didn't appreciate the two guys chatting loudly to each other for half an hour at 6am while they soaked up the water from a burst pipe nar our room. The hotel is about a 10 minute walk from the Riverwalk and another 10 to the Alamo, so it isn't badly situated considering it's not expensive. We loved the Riverwalk area both during the day and at night. Very nice indeed. Outside the Alamo the next day was a re-enactment of the siege, which we enjoyed too. The line (or queue as we say in England) was very long. I got there 30 mins before they opened and there were still 80 people in front of me. You can't take pics inside the Alamo, which was disappointing, but to be honest there's not a lot to photograph anyway. Worth a visit, and you can't go to San Antonio without seeing it, can you? We also went up the Tower Of The Americas (a bit like Seattle's Space Needle) from which you get a good view of the whole city.

Looking forward to the rest.

Can't wait to hear about your impressions on the rest of your trip.

Day 5 saw us driving from San Antonio to Lafayette. It's over 400 miles via Houston but avoiding the city centre and rush hour traffic (got good advice from 'Forumites' with that). We took a break in a shopping mall just to the west of Houston to give my wife a bit of retail therapy. She deserved that for putting up with such a long drive I think! In Lafayette we stayed at the Homewood Suites (Hilton). A good quality room in a nice hotel and we were very pleased we chose it. The following day was the only rainy one we had in the whole of the two week holiday. Every other day was bathed in sunshine and in the low 70s. Just perfect for us. But in Lafayette we had a thunderstorm which began just at the end of our swamp boat trip. We chose Bryan Champagne's Swamp Tour and enjoyed it very much. It's in a nature reserve and we found drifting through the swamp to be very atmospheric (particularly as it was a misty day). A photographer on the trip, who had been on it several times, told us to expect our photo's of the swamp to appear almost black and white. He was right. Bryan told us which Cajun restaurant to go to that night, so we could experience Cajun music and dancing. It was midweek so there wasn't a lot going on, but we quite enjoyed it. I was surprised that we couldn't find any local Cajun or Zydeco music stations on the car radio - I expected to find plenty of them. We thoroughly enjoyed listening to the car radio throughout our trip, alternating the stations mainly between Country and Classic Rock. American TV is at the other end of the entertainment spectrum. Simply awful. Thank God for the BBC (no adverts)!

On Day 6 we drove to New Orleans, stopping to see Laura Plantation near Baton Rouge on the way. It was a Creole sugar cane plantation and we really enjoyed our tour around the house. The guide was very knowledgeable and we learned a lot about the family that owned it and the way they lived their lives - including the slaves. Just along the road is Oak Alley Plantation with it's beautiful tree covered driveway to the house. We just had time to take a few pictures of Oak Alley from the roadway. Of course, on the other side of the levee is the mighty Mississippi. In New Orleans we stayed in the French Quarter, in the Hotel Le Marais. It's a nice hotel, the room was very comfortable and we felt our 2 night stay was very good value. It's on Conti Street and a stone's throw from Bourbon Street. As we arrived in the city my wife nearly had a fit when she saw a large mausoleum and I suggested our hotel was across the road from it. No way would she have stayed there if it had been! We spent an hour or two that evening wandering around Bourbon Street.

During our second day in New Orleans we had a relaxing walk around the city including by the river, a steamboat ride on the "Natchez", a streetcar ride up to the Garden District and dinner in the evening at Galatoire's restaurant on Bourbon. The latter was on a recommendation but to be honest although the waiter was very good we had to send the food back because it was only warm. A bit disappointing. The streetcar ride was very nice and we found it a pleasant experience. The steamboat trip along the river was great and it was nice to have a jazz band to listen to. In the evening we strolled along Bourbon again and spent an hour listening to a good rock band in a bar. We enjoyed the whole day very much.

Our second week in the Southern states began with a drive eastward out of New Orleans towards Alabama - without really knowing where we'd end up that night. We stopped off at Mobile Bay and looked around the Battleship Memorial Park. The highlights are the USS Alabama, a submarine, fighter and bomber planes, and memorials to the Alabama dead from the Vietnam and Korean wars. Well worth a visit.

In the 'tourist shop' at Battleship Memorial Park we picked up a free magazine of hotel coupons and found a good deal in a town called Daphne, Alabama. A nice room in a decent hotel (Best Western) at a bargain price (about $75). I should mention that all these hotels we stayed in had free breakfasts, but after a while we did get a bit bored with having an almost identical buffet every day. Maybe we're too fussy, but scrambled eggs get boring after a while!

From Daphne that afternoon we drove the 6 miles down to Fairhope on the Gulf Coast. A very nice town, and even though this was before the tourist season had started and so it was quiet, we felt it must be a very nice town to live in or maybe stay for a few days. Sadly we didn't have the time, but we did manage to see a few shops, then we called into a wine shop called "Red or White". It was also a Bistro and seemed popular with the locals. We liked it very much.

I'm guessing you ate at Prejeans in Lafayette?

No Spiro, for some reason I forgot about the advice to go there. I believe it's very nice.

Day 9 was not our favourite part of the holiday...or at least the first half of the day wasn't. But that all changed in the late afternoon. Just to explain, we drove for almost 5 hrs from Daphne/Fairhope in Alabama to Natchez, Mississippi. The landscape was very much the same throughout and we just had the car radio and a shopping mall break on the outskirts of Hattiesburg to keep us amused. We expected it of course, so we didn't moan about it. After all, if you want to see plenty of the USA in 2 weeks you have to drive plenty.
When we arrived at Natchez we drove straight to our B&B, an antebellum home called The Burn (named after the Scottish name for a stream because the first owner was a Scot). There were four couples staying the night and when all were duly assembled the lady who looks after the house (I'll call her the caretaker) poured us all a glass of wine and took us on a tour of the 3 storey house and garden. The current owners live on the top floor so of course we didn't see that, but it was a joy to look around the house and see all the lovely antiques. The lady caretaker was very knowledgeable too. The very large garden was full of camellias and nearly all of them were in bloom.
That night we had dinner by the Mississippi in a restaurant called The Magnolia Grill. It was nice and we'd recommend it. We decided not to have dessert, but thought we might buy some ice cream on the way back and enjoy it in our bedroom. We soon realised that we'd have to do without. The whole town seemed to be closed for the night (it was about 9pm). Actually, the lady caretaker had warned us that the town closes down early. Boy, was she right!
We spoke to her on our return and asked if there were any cookies we could have. She said certainly, went away for 15 minutes and returned with her freshly baked cookies - just for us. How nice was that?!

Day 10 started with a lovely breakfast in The Burn (the best breakfast of our whole holiday). That was partly because of the lovely, freshly baked food and also because we enjoyed the company of our fellow travellers. People from Texas, Louisiana and Michigan. In fact one couple tried to persuade us to stay another night and we were sorely tempted. But it would have left us with an awfully long drive the next day and also there didn't seem to be a lot to do in Natchez at that time of the year (first week in March). We looked around the Natchez Visitors Centre which was really good. One of the exhibits reminded us that the cotton picked in the Plantations of the South often ended up in the Lancashire Cotton Mills of England - the area where we were born and raised. Also in Natchez we saw the "Forks In The Road" historical site where slaves were bought and sold.
Before lunch we drove north on Highway 61 towards Vicksburg. We were aiming for the battlefield memorial/national cemetery and bought a CD in the visitor centre that we listened to in the car as we drove around the battlefield. It was very useful doing it that way, we learned a lot about the siege of Vicksburg and of course it's always poignant to look at all those graves. We used a hotel coupon to stay at the Marriott Fairfield Inn & Suites near highway 55 north of Jackson. It was only a stop-over, so the low cost (about £75) was the main factor in our choice, but we had a very nice suite. My wife left her dressing gown in the room and we drove off without it. We phoned the hotel the following day and they posted it to our home in England. Very kind of them. That night we had dinner at a nearby Outback Steakhouse. It was the weekend and the restaurant was packed out. We thought the food was pretty good.

Looks like you saw a good area of Alabama. Daphne and Fairhope are delightful. I've done Natchez and Vicksburg, too. The CD for Vicksburg does really help get a sense of what the battle was like.

Sounds like a great trip. I'm looking forward to the rest of your report.

Great report. I am glad you were able to see so much of the south. I am awaiting your report on Tennessee!

On Day 11 we headed for Memphis. We wanted to travel at least for a short while on the Natchez Trace so for maybe 2 hours or so that's what we did before we had to come off and head towards Memphis. I was conscious that we'd miss some of the places I would have liked to visit, like Clarksdale and Greenville, but time was tight. The stretch of the Natchez Trace we were on had the Ross Barnett reservoir on the right hand side. It'a a lovely area to drive by - and the road itself is immaculate. Very well maintained. Just after the reservoir there's a mini Cypress Swamp that was interesting to see too. I think we got to Koskiusko before we left the Trace and headed for Memphis on 55. We got there just before 4pm - just in time to do the last tour of the day at Graceland. So that was good timing! We enjoyed the tour of the mansion, Elvis's private plane, his cars and movie/music memorabilia very much. We booked into the Springhill Suites (Marriott) for 2 nights. It's downtown, so it's in a good location and the room was very nice and not too pricey. I did consult Trip Advisor for most of our hotels on this trip and found the reviews to be accurate. That evening we went to a pub not far from the hotel and enjoyed the meal and the relaxed atmosphere in there.

The penultimate day of our holiday was a busy, but very enjoyable one. We took the trolley tour around the downtown area and noted that "Mud Island" was closed because it was out of season (early March). A bit disappointing. We drove the car to Stax Studios but discovered that it was closed that day! Not a good start then, but we went back to Stax the following morning. However, Sun Studios was open and we thought it was very good. The guide was particularly enthusiastic and helped to make it an enjoyable visit. We took lots of pictures. Next we went to the National Civil Rights Museum. It's a good museum and the only slight disappointment was that some minor renovations being made to the Lorraine Motel meant we couldn't enter the infamous room No 306. But at least we could peer through the window into the room in which Dr King spent his last night on earth. In the late afternoon we walked along Beale Street and listened to some Blues Music. We returned in the evening to have a fish supper at Silky O'Sullivan's Irish bar and restaurant. Very good. Even the goat they have in the pen in the outside drinking area seems happy!

I have enjoyed reading your trip report. Sounds as if you had a great trip. Glad you stopped in Kosciusko on the Natchez Trace. I grew up there in the 60s.