State of America The Travel Show

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This is the mighty Mississippi, the economic backbone of early America

running north to south more than 2000 miles, carrying the people and

cargo that helped to turn this country from a fledgeling upstart

into a powerhouse. For much of the 19th-century steamboats like this

ruled the river. But in 1879 construction began on a

transcontinental train line that would link the new-found prosperity

with the isolated far west, connecting the Gulf of Mexico with

the Pacific Ocean. On this January I will follow the railroad that pushed

the American dream along the Mexican border all the way to California. It

is a unique city. And I will meet people who helped to define this

unique, diverse and fascinating part of the country -- journey. New

Orleans, my first port of call. Right now in the middle of one of

its annual street parties, the French Water Festival -- Quarter. It

gets its name from when the French founded the city in 1718 as a

strategic port on the Mississippi and golf of Mexico. The Spanish also

ran the city before it was bought by the US in 1803 -- Gulf of Mexico.

And you can see all these influences in New Orleans' world-famous

architecture, food and music. That is New Orleans exactly how I

imagined it, a bra spent going down the street and a whole crowd

following them are getting into the vibe. Fantastic. Now, the city might

be best known for jazz, but you can also find a type of music you that

I've never encountered before. Chubby carrier is a Grammy award

winner and the third generation music family. People get it mixed up

with this music but you hear blues, R, Seoul mixed into one. -- soul.

This, Chubby says, is that the expression of Louisiana's black real

community, a bit of African, French and Caribbean mixed up and apart

from the accordion, Chubby says the essential instrument is the one that

evolved from his grandmothers watch bought. This is my grandmother's

washing machine. This was her washing machine back in the day. The

buttons on your shirt would make a little sound like this and the

grandmother would wash" at the time and of course we were going, hey,

that sounds good. It might fit with the accordion, bring it over here.

She said, you must be out of your mind. This is how I do my laundry.

Can I...? You should try, it is percussion in zydeco. You have the

rhythm going like this in your head. That is it. When you hit the board

you lose it. Why? I don't know. The streets are packed and there is a

jubilant atmosphere here. But it has been hard won. It has taken more

than a decade for tourist numbers to recover from the devastation of

Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Music has helped the city get its mojo back

and festivals like this are better than ever. I feel lucky to have a

ringside view. -- bigger than ever. When you point a camera to you I

want you to shake your booty like your mum gave it to you. We want to

show them how we do it in New Orleans. And then after my friendly

disastrous ten minute lesson, this happens...

BBC Travel here, y'all! And the party goes on long into the night,

but I have got an early start and a very long trip ahead of me. So, that

was New Orleans in all its flamboyant glory. It is eight in the

morning and today I am heading west. 21. Thank you so much. And the

service I am taking is the Sunset Limited train line, the route dates

back to 1894. And stretches some 2000 miles Coast to coast from New

Orleans to Los Angeles, passing through five different US states, an

Odyssey really. So this is a route steeped in history but I am hoping

it is also going to tell me something about contemporary

American too. Right up the stairs. Thank you. Back in the day, several

railroad franchisers joined-up to create this pan American rail

network and all along the route significant, historical and natural,

reveal themselves to passengers. So this is the view of the Mississippi

river on this bridge and we are right in the middle of two lanes of

traffic which is a read feeling. -- weird feeling. God, it gets rocky,

doesn't it? Keep your feet shoulderwidth apart and keep one

hand free so you can touch things when you are going through. But the

bars we have a great iron which you can use. Have you fallen on a

customer? Yes. LAUGHTER. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

We will be in New Iberia in 30 minutes. Train supervisor Bruce is a

veteran of the Sunset Limited line. The railroad is what created the

United States, opening transportation from east to west and

that was the big thing, transportation of both goods and

people. The train might have been instrumental in the creation of

modern-day America but today rail use is way below that of air and

road travel, which are often cheaper and quicker. So why would anyone

take the train? You basically don't have planes flying into, and you

don't have Greyhound buses going into, so these isolated areas in

taxes especially, New Mexico, this is the lifeblood to get

transportation through -- in Texas are specially. Every trip is unique.

It is a unique city. You had people giving birth... That has happened?

Oh, yeah, on the train. Sometimes we are one hour away from civilisation

and babies don't wait. LAUGHTER. We just crossed the line, so go,

guys, we're in Texas. On the role as we cross into Texas and are joined

by a group of train buffs on a day trip. So, are you mostly here

because of them, because of these two? Yes, he saw Thomas the Train

one time when he was two years old and since then he has been all about

trains. Join the club. LAUGHTER. I actually have a couple of Amtrack

cars and since I got them I thought they looked so good that I was

waiting for a long time to ride on Amtrack and I was thinking that it

was like, time to get the tracks. Some people don't get to get into

the smaller areas, the smaller towns, so by going through the back

areas you have an opportunity to expand the mind, because once the

mind expands it can never return to its original dimension. My next stop

is the city of San Antonio, but not before the Sunset Limited lives up

to its name. San Antonio is a modern, prosperous city. In fact now

it is America's seventh-largest. It is very cosmopolitan and in many

ways not their stereotype of Texas, but it does have one historical

attraction which gets to the very heart of what it means to be

American, and more spec -- especially Texan. This is the Alimo,

a legendary site in US history where in 1836 a small group of troops

fighting for Texan independence were laid siege by a much larger Mexican

army -- Alamo. Texan forces held out for 13 days before they were

overwhelmed and killed. Doctor, Winters, Bruce. But this historian,

Bruce, says it would be simplistic to call it that guys Mexicans versus

good guys Americans. This is a story about people, to make nations, a

story about the idea of what should government be like --2 nation. It is

really the convergence of Mexican history and US history. # any man

that will fight to the death rolls over but if you want to leave the

butterfly. The battle became a symbol of resistance and the

struggle for independence the Texan won that year. # will remember the

Alamo... Prepare for 12 times. Dot Reddy, load. Today, the Alamo is one

of the top tourist attractions in the state and these re-enactors help

tourists make sense of the complex past. Fire! APPLAUSE. That was

scary! # we will remember the Alamo... So, I've been talked into

having the full Alamo experience here. But Brian, tell me, there is a

point to this, isn't there, it is living history. Absolutely. As

people come in here they see how we or coffee, how we cook meat in the

fire, the kind of food we would have, parched corn and beef is what

they would have during battle. So what we try to do is just let people

in on that side of history, give them a kind of taste, that emotional

experience. What was the mood of the people in this situation and waiting

in a sense for the Mexicans to come? This was home for them, this was

their chance for a new life, and so in that they were willing to fight

for something greater than themselves, which is kind of that,

in my view, the amazing feeling you get at any battlefield site. This

epic fight for freedom from Mexico might be part of the folklore of San

Antonio, but Hispanic influence is also a huge part of the city's

current identity. We are only two Hours Drive from the

border, and contemporary Mexicana is celebrated here. When you win, what

do we say? Watch don't we say? Bingo! If you say bingo, we don't

use that word. We say lotteria. You put the T-shirt on, join a team and

you realise this is about family, community and winning. You've got

the double? -- devil? The next part, the deer. -- card. Somebody has won

already. We all know the lotteria, it's important to us because my

grandma didn't know English and I didn't know growing up. --I didn't

know Spanish. It gave us quality time with each other. We had a

connection during the game. Hello everyone, I'm from London and I'm

going to bring you luck. Are you ready for this? How's my team doing?

The barrel. Anyone close to winning? Lotteria! Your first time playing!

Maybe we should let him win. What's it like being Mexican - American? I

wouldn't change it, I love it. I have assured that says, I'm just

lucky. It is true. Just because we are darker, it is hot in Texas. Our

ancestors are from them, but we were born in the United States. Don't try

to send us back to somewhere we are not even from. The next day and

deeper into southern Texas, you find yourself even closer to the Mexican

order. Some call it the last frontier. Alpine Station is the

jumping off point to one of America's most rural vote in

national parks. We drive through a Vista that feels straight out of a

Western. They call it, big band, after a twist in the legendary

movie. But today it separates the USA from Mexico -- big bend. This is

the Rio Grande. Welcome to the border! This year marks the

Centenary of the foundation of the National Parks service in the USA,

and what a spectacular asset they are. Just to get out geography

sorted, where is the USA? So we have Mexico over here, Texas over here.

The actual border is the deepest current in the river. This would be

the spot where some politicians in the US want to build a water wall.

I'm not sure how they would manage that. It is not just the spectacular

border with Mexico that makes the park unique. The desert extends

north into New Mexico, but this part definitely contains the biggest

chunk of the desert. Then there are the mountains, you get up in the

high mountains and you get different species of animals, like tears in

line, and trees. So there is big diversity in the flora and fauna.

710, this is the Ranger out on foot patrol. Varies more to wild corner

of the earth than the incredible diversity of living species. Big

Bend has more dinosaur fossils than any other national park. Over 90

species have been found here, dating back over 80 million years. This is

fossilised dinosaur faecal material. Dinosaur Prue? That would be correct

to. That is fossilised? Wow. -- dinosaur poo. That's the first time

I've held dinosaur poo. A new exhibit dedicated to the dinosaurs

is opening in September. It will incorporate these giant bonds cost

of fossils. This is a crocodile dinosaur. You can see from its size

that it is a well named species. I've seen crocodiles from today and

they are pretty scary, but this is huge! This would have had around 40

feet of length through the entire animal. Sometimes we find scarring

in other animal bones from his teeth, so he literally ate the

dinosaurs -- other dinosaurs. It contains 180 miles of Borders line

is more relevant today than ever. 100 years ago, the people in this

region, the border wasn't a significant part of daily life. The

river was. So we had people who would live on the United States

side, and they had cousins in Mexico. There would be a

multinational community here because the boundary wasn't considered to be

a significant part of daily life -- border zone. Now, we have made it a

significant part of our politics. We head off to get a high vantage point

of the Rio Grande River. We have a community in Mexico over here which

has just over a couple of 100 people, but beyond that, that is

protected land in Mexico. People can legally move between the two

countries at a crossing point in the river. There are schemes where the

sides were together to protect the environment. Sometimes they help us

out with protecting our resources from wildfire, sometimes we partner

together to remove invasive species to make the entire Rio Grande a

better place. So the first half of my trek across the Southern stretch

of the USA and is literally a stone's throw from Mexico. It is

wonderfully tranquil, so it seems odd that this place has found itself

at the front of politics. I am going to relish my last moments of

serenity, because next week I continue my journey west where

things start getting strange. You and I have just started something

that we can't stop. There is only one problem. We are on this thing

and there is no want to turn it off. Does that mean we are on it forever?

In theory, that could happen.