Jumped for V-Day in Natchez

From Vicksburg, we hoped onto the Natchez Trace. The Natchez Trace Parkway is a 444-mile drive through exceptional scenery and 10,000 years of North American history.  Used by American Indians, "Kaintucks", settlers, and future presidents, the Old Trace played an important role in American history. It was the only thing listed to do in Mississippi in '1,000 Places to See Before You Die'. It wasn't as scenic as we thought it would be, after driving through the forests and landscapes of Upstate New York. There were little stops along they way, historic markers and places on the National Register. We were excited to see the remnants of a once thriving 1,600 population cotton town, now a ghost town, but all it consisted of was a path through the woods with one little well and a random rusted out safe. We did stop to see the country's second largest Native American sacrificial mound. It was large.

At the end of the Trace was Natchez, which, before the civil war, was second only to New York City for the number of millionaires living there. The town is filled with huge antebellum houses hidden behind Live Oak lined drives. The most impressive of them all was Longwood. Longwood is the largest octagonal house in the United States. The mansion is known for its octagonal plan, byzantine onion-shaped dome, and the contrast between its ornately finished first floor and the unfinished upper floors.
Samuel Sloan, a Philadelphia architect, designed the home in 1859 for cotton planter Dr. Haller Nutt. Work was halted in 1861 at the start of the American Civil War. Dr. Nutt died of pneumonia in 1864, leaving the work incomplete. Of the thirty-two rooms planned for the house, only nine rooms on the basement floor were completed.
The house was spectacular in that you could really see and feel the contrast between the finished basement level, where the family ended up living, and the unfinished framework of the upper floors. Your imagination could run free with the potential of what the house could have been, if not for the devastating economical impacts of the Civil War.

Also, Longwood was used in the HBO series True Blood for the external shots of the Jackson, Mississippi mansion of Russell Edgington, the Vampire King of Mississippi and Louisiana.

Chatting with the locals, we were told that Natchez is once again staging a comeback, due to the relocation of people from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast and the fact that you can purchase huge estate homes for ridiculously cheap.
Mary Lou's keen eye spotted some Tiffany windows in the Trinity Episcopal Church. The three dimensional effects of the angels' garments in the windows, were achieved by the glass having been folded by Louis Tiffany when molten.

In the morning, after a quick relocation drive, Mary Lou left the lights on in the RV and drained the battery. So, she got jumped on Valentine's Day. Nicole didn't.


Click here for photos of the Natchez Trace.