STL2NOLA 14 – New Roads, LA to Natchez, MS – The Long Flat Surprisingly Interesting Ride

The ride from New Roads, LA to Natchez, MS was supposed to be long, flat, and boring. Everybody I talked to or emailed with told me to expect nothing but a lot of empty fields and no services. With that in mind, I started with low expectations but was ultimately surprised to find that the ride was actually quite interesting. It was still long. It was still flat (thank goodness!). There were no services for many, many miles. But it was fun.

I ended up making my longest ride in my career, 85.55 miles at an average speed of 12.5 MPH, according to Garmin. I am still loving the tailwinds. It is ever so much easier to ride for hours when I can stand up on the pedals and stretch or occasionally coast down a hill. With the headwinds, I had had to pedal 100% of the time or the bike would come to a full stop.

Leaving the hotel and turning left onto Louisiana route 1 brought me to this giggle. I think the doctor missed his calling.

Riding on, I did indeed find a lot of open space.

Pretty much everywhere I looked, it was open space.

Riding across the Morganza Spillway, I and was very glad that they had numbered the bays so that I did not have to count to 125. That linked Wikipedia page is pretty interesting. The Great Mississippi River flood of 1927 was the most destructive that the US has ever seen. The Mississippi swelled to 80 miles wide. This spillway, and the control structures that you will see below, are part of efforts to prevent that from happening again. They also help prevent the Mississippi from changing its course through Baton Rouge and New Orleans to a new course down the Atchafalaya River to the Gulf of Mexico. Were the river to change course, it would mean the end of the ports in Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

I had tailwinds and it was a pleasant temperature. I streamed some music; lately I have listening to whole albums instead of playlists and it is kind of nice to return to hearing sets of songs curated by the artists. I turned on some podcasts (RadioLab and The Moth on this day). I stopped hourly to eat a bit. I just relaxed into the day. I relaxed so well that, out of almost seven hours of riding, I only exceeded heart rate zone two for less than three minutes.

There are not very many of us bicycle tourists so I was pretty excited to see a guy on the other side of the road with a pannier and a bed roll on his bike. I went over and met Damon. Bicycling is his life now. He was headed for Florida, the up the east coast, and probably to California for the winter. We were both amazed to discover that we both hail from Saint Charles, MO. Damon even whipped out his driver’s license to show me.

Take a look at the two of us. We belie any myth that you have to be either young or in good shape to ride a bicycle and see the world.

Nineteen miles into the day, I turned off of route 1 onto a prettier backroad. Some of the pavement was torn up because of the repaving project but the newly paved parts and the lack of traffic were wonderful.

In Williamsport, LA, I stopped to admire St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church. It was consecrated in 1859. The bricks are handmade. The stained glass came from England.

There was so little traffic, it was like having my own private well-maintained road.

I stopped for a bit under an oak tree. I had found some RXBAR protein bars at Walmart. Made from just egg whites, dates, almonds, cashews, chocolate bits, and sea salt, they are delicious and filling.

While I was staring at my bike, it occurred to me that you might be wondering how I carried enough water to ride 85 miles. It was definitely something that I spent a bunch of time planning. I carry three water bottles, each 24 ounces. I use just the plain uninsulated ones, nothing fancy. (One of the bottles that I have now is insulated and annoyingly extra tall because I forgot one bottle at my lunch stop on the previous day and had to replace it with the only thing available at Walmart.) I have a bladder which holds three liters. I also bought a three quart bottle of water and strapped that to a cargo bracket on my front fork. That gave me over eight quarts to get through the day. I ended up needing only five so I dumped the large bottle on the front fork before the climb across the river at Natchez.

I do not know what qualifications you need need to get a job painting white lines on roads in Louisiana but this person must have lied on his resume or cheated on the exam or something.

My 21 mile scenic diversion ended with a turn back onto Louisiana route 15 at 30 miles. I would follow route 15 all the way to Vidalia, LA where I would turn right and cross the Mississippi River.

As soon as I turned onto route 15, I came to the lock over the Lower Old River, complete with a draw bridge and a sign reading (believe it or not) NO BICYCLES. This is particularly ironic since it is part of the Mississippi River Trail, laid out specifically for bicycling. It was kind of cool to see a barge in the lock as I pedaled over the bridge.

Nine more miles brought me to the Low Sill Control Structure. It was actually two structures over two waterways.

Two more miles and I was at the Sidney A. Murray Jr. Hydroelectric Station. A lot of political angst is being wasted on renewable energy these days. The US has actually been heavily invested in renewable energy such as this for a long, long time. It is so ubiquitous that we do not even think about it; we just use it. That is, truly, how utility scale generation is supposed to work.

Each of these dams and control structures had its own rail-mounted crane. I suppose they are needed to maintain the gates or lift one if the primary drive mechanism ever fails. This one is rated at 380 tons. The one back at the lock with the barge was rated at 700 tons.

Next up on this ride was… 42 miles of empty road. It looked pretty much like the pictures at the top of this post so scroll back up and enjoy them again. Or look at this photo which really was taken later in the day.

As expected, the middle 60 miles of the day had no services. The closest to “service,” and one of the high points of the day, was the guy who stopped his truck to offer me a Gatorade while I was standing next to the road eating a snack. I politely declined because I carry Liquid IV packets and add them to my water bottles as needed.

The weirdest part of the day happened when a semi-truck was following me and wanted to pass. I waved him on by. There was a little white car coming in the other direction. I figured that the truck would pass me after the car passed the two of us. But the woman driving the car, for reasons that I cannot begin to imagine, slowed down and slowed down and ultimately came to a complete stop next to me. There was nothing there, no reason to stop. Maybe her car died? The poor truck driver had to slow down to my speed and then crank it back up when we were past the stopped car.

Here is a mystery for me. Maybe you know the answer and can put it in a comment. Why are gas meters in Louisiana in the front yard like this? I am used to seeing them attached to the sides of houses instead of free-standing.

I got to the Mississippi River shortly before sunset. The Natchez Vidalia Bridge is another one with nice wide shoulders, perfect for bicycling. There are only two traffic lanes on this bridge; the entire right side is shoulder.

I had a picture perfect crossing of the Mississippi River. It was my final crossing for this tour.

From the bridge, it was a short climb to the top of the hill and then a nice coast down to the Grand Hotel Natchez where I had a riverview room waiting for me. This was the 14th day of the trip. Day 15 will be a rest/laundry day. About 2/3 of the miles are behind me.

You can find all of the posts in this series, and a map of the entire tour, at St. Louis to New Orleans.