The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1935-07-18
High|ights Of An
Auto Tour
BY THE EDITOR
SIXTH INSTALLMENT
On to Tampa.

On to Tampa.
With the wanderlust urging us on,
we pulled out of New Orleans bright
and early one morning and turned the
nose Of the auto into the rising sun.
1t was a delightful morning and the
drive as we sped eastward out past
Lake Pontchartrain was enjoyed by
all of US Within few miles we found
ourselves skirting the Gulf of Mexico.
Just few steps to our right there was
a concrete sea wall and, of course,
tapping the foot of the wall was the
waters of the gulf. To our left, there
was one Of the finest arrays of attrac-
tive homes we saw on the entire 1000
mile journey. These were large, hand
some houses set in spacious yards,
lovely with magnificent trees, shrubs
and flowers, beautified with all that a
tropical foliage could impart
few OF such outstanding homes
would not have attracted much at
tention. We had passed through many
cities by that time and had remarked
on the sattractiveness and beauty of
many of the residential districts But
the feature that made this array Of
homes so noticeable was the fact that
they extended apparently for endless
miles. The old car purred along over
winding highway that followed che
gulf line, with us expecting momen-
tarily to run out of this assortment of
lovely homes. But still the same en-
vironment continued, the concrete sea
wall on one side, the lovely homes on
the other. Later we learned that the
sea wall extended distance of 40 miles
and we presume the fine homes also
covered that distance.
A Fine Beach.
Jutting out into the gulf before
nearly every one of these houses was
small dock, evidently for use in
yachting and other forms of boating
The docks extended some distance into
the water. We also noticed that the
beach must be fine one judging from
the fact that we saw fisherman
standing in the water out from shore
about hundred yards and the water
came only to his waist
Traffic was heavy through this dis
trict and with the road winding in and
out along the gulf line, distance could
not be covered very rapidly Every Jew
miles this line of homes along The
waterfront would spread into a small
city We passed through Pass Christian
and Gulfport, two pleasing little cities
Pass Christian was at one time The
winter home of President Wilson Biloxi
was also on our route that morning and
we sped through it heading for Mobile
This thriving port of 10000 people we
found to have very attractive resi-
Dental district, with handsome homes
set on streets that were avenues of tall.
magnificent shade trees. The business
district, however. was not so attractive
The buildings there showed age and
were grimy and unkempt.
Here we stopped for lunch and to
have little work done on our car
and here we also met with one Of The
pleasant little experiences of the trip.
We happen to be member of that
fine organization, Lions International,
and we carry a Lions insignia on our
windshield. When we drove into a
garage for the work on the car, a fine,
nice looking, outstanding young man
came forward. In the course of his
work he remarked, Il see you are a
Lion" Yes, | am" I replied Are
you?" NO" was his answer, Il am
not a Lion but the father of the girl
60 with is and | hear lot about it. "
He was very cordial, wanted to take
me out to meet some of the Mobile
Lions and refused to take any pay for
the work he had done on the car, quite
little work and real service. Evil
IDENTIFY that young man has a warm
spot in his heart for the Lions organiza-
| ton and we counted our meeting with
him one of the pleasant little expert
ences that go to make travel over the
country so enjoyable touch of that
hospitality and cordially that we
found everywhere on our journey re-
gardless of whether it was in the far
corners of Alabama or Florida, or in
the rocky and beautiful mountain
country of Vermont
Toll Bridges Galore.
A traveller in the. South wifi run onto
many toll bridges. There are numerous
bridges down there and the powers that
be evidently intend to make the travel
| ing public pay for them-not bad
! practice. We paid toll charges of from
IS to SO cents. Running east from Mo-
bile we found ourselves crossing The
Mobile bay district, a lowlying section
Pulling up to bridge we stopped al
| the gate and asked what the tax was
The reply was "a dollar and 10 cents
AS reached into my pocket for tht
money I remarked, "That's rather steep
isn't it," and the gatekeeper re-