With the excitement of Nascar over, and a high pitched residual ringing now a constant companion to everything we did, we set about planning the next few days. We had one more stop-off before we left Dallas - Mike had hooked up another meeting with one of his concept design contacts, leaving Tom once again wondering whether he was just a passenger on an elaborate networking trip!
Jeremy works for the industry-leading game production studio ' iD ', and had mentored Mike via email for many years as he learnt his craft. We rolled up to Jeremy's impressive out-of-town office and after signing Non-Disclosure Acts, we were led into the secretive inner sanctum of the studio. We (well,Tom was trying his best to keep up) spent hours talking normal map applications and art style choices, while playing their new top secret 'in-production' game: ***************. We continued on a full tour of the studio where we saw *************** being developed for ***************. The designs for the *************** looked stunning, especially the *************** and ***************.
Having been blown away by seeing some amazing stuff at iD, Jeremy treated us to a fine meal at Cheesecake Factory (despite the name, this is a really plush restaurant) where we talked about his history at the best studios in the industry such as ILM and Blur.
We were indulged with a fine range of stories from his time at George Lucas’s ranch working on the Star Wars prequels and his ILM time modelling Transformers for Michael Bay – it was inspiring stuff! We ended the evening with a slice of the infamous Original Factory Cheesecake, bid our farewells and returned to our Hotel!
After Dallas the trip was unplanned (as always) so we needed to work out where to go, and tellingly at this part of the trip, where we still had time to go. A swift glance at the map left us with only one real option: New Orleans. We'd heard as much good about the city as bad, with Tom's enthusiasm for a bustling hub for soulful artists and jazz musicians cancelled out by Mike's abject fear of being raped by hillbillies in the deep South. On hearing about the thriving strip club scene in the city however, Mike cast aside his doubts and jumped on board. Our destination was set.
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| Wild Bill, wild style |
Two days after meeting CG maestro Jeremy, we awoke in a truckers stop in Louisiana, having embarked on a mammoth all night drive to escape Texas and make some headway into Louisiana. The climate was changing rapidly as we headed south, and as the cooking heat of the day began to kick in, we pulled ourselves out of our sleeping bags emerging into the world along with a host of bleary eyed truckers.
Having abused the nearby McDonald's toilet facilities, naturally we could only think of one thing to do: blow Southerners' minds with our freestyle football skills! Our mid-carpark tricks session attracted the attention of 'Wild Bill' - an old lone traveler and hostel owner from Leadville, who from our skills could tell we weren’t from around these parts! He told us about life in Leadville, which is the highest town in the USA (at over 10,000 ft) and home of the Leadville 100 mile ultra marathon. He gave us a thorough breakdown of all the local attractions, sights and history – the man was a human sponge, absorbing knowledge from his vast experience travelling all over the world, and his enthusiastic advice was a welcome change of pace from non-stop driving.
We hit the road again, driving in shifts until our arrival in New Orleans, along the way soaking up Southern hospitality on our frequent fuel breaks. A sleeping Mike unfortunately missed out on the dramatic entrance to the city as we approached on a raised highway, skimming across the surface of the huge Lake Pontatrain. We headed immediately for the old French Quarter, New Orleans' beautiful historical district, which was dripping with atmosphere and soul. This was unlike anything we'd seen in the States, and we were spellbound by the classical Spanish architecture as we wandered the oil lantern-lit streets.
We managed to stumble across an incredible hotel deep within the quarter, complete with wrought-iron gallery. As always with life on the road though, we didn't have long to stop and enjoy our new balcony's views - we had run out of clothes to wear, so hit the laundry. What was already shaping up to be the finest laundry we'd experienced (and we've seen a lot) turned out to be a registered landmark of New Orleans history: an old R&B recording studio and 'the home' of Rock N Roll music!
Exhausted by two days of non-stop traveling (and some intense laundry), we headed through the quarter's bustling streets in search of a quiet spot to grab some food. As if by fate, the best Spaghetti Bolognese of all time presented itself to us in our hour of need. After demolishing what was our first really nourishing meal for days, and sampling a few bottles of the local Louisianna-brewed Abita beer, we headed back to the hotel. In a part-comatose state of contentment we took a seat on our balcony and drank in the moody dusty street scene below, before sloping off to bed, pondering how many days we could afford to stay in this amazing city.
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| Socks, Suds and Rock n Roll |
The answer turned out to be three. With no rooms available in the building, we would have to move in down the road at their sister building 'Creole House'. As we left what had been our best hotel of the trip, we shared a coffee with the receptionist who told us all about her experiences when the infamous Hurricane Katrina caused havoc in the city. It was a fascinating and moving insight to hear about the hurricane's devastating effects on families from someone who had gone through it.
Once installed in our quirky new attic room, we set out in the blistering heat in search of a bar from which to update the blog. Our quest led us to 'Turtle Bay' a typically buzzing bar which happened to be right opposite our new favourite spagetti-providing cafe. We had a lot to catch up on and fuelled as usual by a constant torrent of local beers we launched into a flurry of writing activity. As always, the adventure found us somehow - Tom overheard a shady looking character at the bar talking about cheap basketball tickets. A swift google revealed there was a game the following night and before Mike could intervene Tom had leapfrogged the table, $40 flapping in the air. We suddenly had tickets to New Orleans Hornets vs Portland Trailblazers.
It was getting late and the streets were starting to fill up with eager revelers. After a quick hop across the road for a bowl of spaghetti, we finished off the blogging for the day and shifted our focus to hitting the New Orleans night life. The night was a blur of hipster bars and street performing hip-hop brass bands. The bohemian tone was complimented by a row of poets hunched over typewriters on the sidewalk. Sensing fellow word-smiths, (but doubting they could achieve the kind of literary highs you've been treated to courtesy of us) we cornered one of the poets, threw some key words about the trip at him, and disappeared into a bar while he worked his magic. A couple of beers and another brass band later, we returned, collected our poem and vowed not to open it up until the right moment. What ever that meant. We had obviously been infiltrated by the pretentious nature of the area!
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| The final verse of our Poet's masterpiece |
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| Stranger does uncanny Mike impersonation |
On our short stagger back to the hotel, we stumbled into the entrance of a late-night sandwich place 'Quarter Master'. Unbelievably, the friendly broad (we're also being influenced by American language at this point) from the rock n roll laundry was behind the counter! With her recommendation, we sampled another southern delicacy: The po-boy - the pinnacle of human advancement in drunken food technology.
Drunk, full of greasy junk and feeling a tad tired, we returned to our semi gothic hotel room and slumbered.
We hit the road again, with Spot restored to his former self. After a couple of hours sitting in the co-pilot's seat, watching Mike struggle to the end of his shift, eye-lids practically welded shut, Tom took over. Lit by the eerie half light of the newly rising sun, Tom peeled the unconscious deadweight of a completely spent Mike off the drivers seat, rolled him into the back and took over the controls. 
