Some more on Vicksburg and we head down the Mississippi to Natchez

We got to tour a lovely old house filled with original furnishings





from the time of the civil war.






It had been hit several times during the siege of Vicksburg and one of the cannon balls is still in the wall.



It came through the door here









and finished up here.





We also took the National Park Service tour of the battlefield which was a waste of time, just lots of monuments. The only interesting stop was a museum dedicated to the ironclad gunboat Cairo

which was sunk by an early mine





and recently recovered and restored.

This is the damage that the mine did.



It was built like a catamaran at the back to protect the paddle wheel.




The North built 7 of these in 6 months. This is the only one to survive and as it went down in a few minutes it was a time capsule as the Mississippi mud preserved most of it.

The Park is also the site of a big military cemetery



used from the civil war until the 1960s.






DOWN THE NATCHEZ TRACE

Getting off the main road we followed part of the 444-mile Natchez Trace Parkway which commemorates an ancient trail used by animals and people that connected southern portions of the Mississippi River, through Alabama, to salt licks in today's central Tennessee.

It was also used briefly by riverboatmen who, having floated down the Mississippi would walk or ride on horseback North back up the trace.





This is one of the old stops on the way. They used to sell the travellers a meal for 25 cents and space to sleep on the porch.



We will look in on one of the mound building peoples sites today and then head on down to Baton Rouge in Cajun Country for some Zydeco!