I didn't want to repeat the route, so I chanced the signs saying tht US 11 was closed. The bridge gets hit all the time or something breaks and then this great span is out of commision. I have never been across it. It is much wider than the Rigolets Bridge. Not a new one by any means, but much better. US 11 crosses I-10 headed for the bridge. I got a glimpse of the hated roadway. It gives me the shudders, bad. It is so nice to know the alternatives.
   It was getting late as I passed through Slidell. I checked out a part of "Old Slidell", but did not find a picture. Maybe more exploration will shed a better light on it. Slidel is a great old and new town. It was my first time there and I was getting tired, so the call to adventure was fading.
    Heading up 41, which runs on the La. side of the Pearl River, the border between La.and Miss., I spied a sign I can't resist, fading energy or not. It was a Corp of Engineers site sign. Can't resist them. I wanted to see the Pearl at this point. I've pictured it before in the Mississippi articles, but that was far to the north. I wanted to see what she had become.
Bigger Pretty
  This is the Corp's stuff. Locks. It ain't the Panama Canal, but they do afford shipping  northward .
Looking downstream.
Looking upstream.
  Lots of water in Louisiana.  It's good we all have webbed feet.
    Let's quack on Home before those guys from Delacroix catch up to us.
  Or, a better idea, check out more of the Northshore (north shore of L.Pontchartrain). There is some stuff there I think will add to your trip to New Orleans or Baton Rouge.    
     And as Bob would say,"We'll meet again someday on the avenue," no doubt,
"Tangled up in blue."
As promissed, Fort Pike and other's links, go there and see these neat historical places.
Fort Pike
More Pike
Pike and McComb
More pics, more fort
And Fort St. John, where I played as a kid. No, it wasn't operational at that time.
Take a look at the Northshore
New Ride (5/24/06) to the area and a look inside Fort McComb below.
    The end of May found me headed for New Orleans. Jason had told me that there was construction down at the old US 90 bridge on the Rigolets. I went by there and sure enough a high rise bridge was being built right next to the old beauty, disfunctional as she is. I did a lot of picture taking there and had to retrace my route back to Slidel and pick up US 11 to cross the lake. I thought about not looking for McComb as I wasn't real sure where it was and New Orleans was calling me. I saw that the pass was only 3 miles down from where US 11 hits US 90 and I'd kick myself if I passed up something good. So, of course I took off toward the pass.
Good is what I found. The fort had beeen hidden by a business, but that business was gone thanks to Katrina.
   I walked around taking every angle I could and was about to write it off as just a repeat of of her sister Fort Pike. Fort McComb would be the stepsister being given no care and left to rot. Compared to Pike now, she looked the better.
Pike has a moat that surrounds it. McComb has a land crossing.
What could be more dangerous than riding motorcycles?
    Going into an old fort? Not. The entrance had hurricane (wire mesh) fencing covering the entrance. It was torn. I went through it.
I looked straight ahead and saw the courtyard. I figured that.
    Looking to the right I could see where the fort turned. It was much darker. The camera compensated beautifully.
  I shifted angles to see more. I was standing in the main entrance hall, frozen.
This place was not frequented, I thought. That is dried mud on the floor from the hurricane. It had been underwater for a while.
I walked out into the courtyard and panned it taking the next two pictures.
Nature is destroying the fort. This is a sin.
I walked back into the entrance hall and went to my right feeling a bit brave.
It was darker.
A little littered.
More littered.
I quickly left.
  I was headed back up the "Chef", US 90, to New Orleans. That full ride is coming.
Shrimp boats don't normally park here, although now a common sight.
  You can click the Next Button to start this ride from the beginning and see the area before Katrina.
  Click the button below to see Fort Pike and the old Rigolets Bridge before it's gone.
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