GIANTS SUPER BOWL ROAD TRIP

Visiting Giants-Patriots landmarks between New Jersey and Arizona

NEW ORLEANS -- From his office here on the 35th floor at 1100 Poydras Street, a brass and marble building that greets visitors with oak-paneled foyers when they step off the elevators, Cooper Manning can see the French Quarter, which is tempting the tourists, and the rest of downtown, which is slowly regaining its strength as it prepares for another Mardi Gras.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerCooper Manning, eldest brother of Giants QB Eli, talks about his family from his office in the families hometown of New Orleans, LA.

He can point out his favorite restaurants -- Galatoire's, a white-tablecloth dining room with terrific shrimp etouffee, and Mother's, a landmark lunch joint that serves the best Po'Boys this side of Lake Pontchartrain.

TIPTONVILLE, Tenn. -- Cara Jones, the 74-year-old owner of the Lake County Banner, hoots when she hears about The Star-Ledger's Super Bowl Road Trip, which has stopped in her town on the way to Arizona.

"You're going where after this?" she says, her eyebrows raised as she looks up from her cluttered desk in the dusty newsroom, plaques and photos covering the walls. "People don't come here on the way to somewhere else. The road doesn't lead anywhere else."

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerGreg and Bonnie Ross sit in Vell's Diner in Tiptonville talking about Bonnie's brother Jerry Reese. Greg looked up to Jerry when he was growing up in Tiptonville before he married Bonnie. Giants GM Jerry Reese grew up in Tiptonville, TN and attended Lake County H. S. in his home town.

KELLYTON, Ala. - Jimmy Tuck, 53 and still as skinny as 6 o'clock, stands at the bottom of the concrete front steps of the four-bedroom home he built on a scratchy lot on County Road 71 in 1973, and he proudly describes each phase: how, in exchange for meals and favors, he sweet-talked friends into helping him pound nails, lay bricks and spread shingles long into the moonlight after his exhausting warehouse shifts for a local homebuilder.

Here in this town of 2,365, where a neighbor is probably family - and if he isn't, you treat him as if he was - you can barter for hard labor with cornbread.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerSunday dinner is served at the Tuck home as (left to right) Justin Tuck's grandfather Sam, uncle Spencer, brother Jamison, sister Tiffany and father Jimmy dig in. The Giants Justin Tuck lives in Kellyton, AL., surrounded by a large, close knit family.

GREENVILLE, Ala. -- They were best friends growing up, two Scottish brothers, born 14 months apart, who used to sit on picnic tables in local parks, their feet and their futures dangling in the Florida sun. They would dream aloud about the years ahead, trusting each other with their innermost thoughts: The younger one longed to be a kicker in the NFL. The older one yearned to return to Europe to be a soccer star.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerNew York Giants PK Lawrence Tynes celebrates his game winning field goal in OT at the NFC Championship game at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, WI.

BLUEFIELD, Va. -- A snow plow is snaking around two vehicles as it scrapes 6 inches of powdery snow, blindingly white in the bright sunlight, from the parking lot in front of Graham High School.

The sky is blue from horizon to horizon, but there is no school today, because of the storm the previous night. Trapped between the mountains, it just kept dumping snow until it finally could escape to the east. In his office in the back of the library, the halls silent, football coach and athletic director Doug Marrs is multi-tasking.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerAhmad Bradshaw's high school coach Doug Marrs (left) and principal John O'Neal tell stories about Bradshaw's high school days. In the foreground is a photo of long time football coach Glen Carlock, who also coached Bradshaw. Giants running back Ahmad Bradshaw went to High School at Graham H.S. in Bluefield, VA.

FORT BELVOIR, Va. -- Greg Gadson believes this story begins with a fate-changing interception in overtime in the NFC championship game.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerLt. Col. Greg Gadson, who lost both of his legs in Iraq, has become an inspirational symbol for the Giants. He lives in Fort Belvoir, VA.

But maybe it starts minutes earlier, with two faith-testing missed field goals that made the interception possible. Or possibly, two weeks before that, in a lobby of a Tampa hotel. Or 15 weeks before that, on a Saturday night, in a meeting room of another hotel, a few miles from FedEx Field in the Washington suburbs.

Tim Farrell/The Star-LedgerMarie Spagnuolo, wife of Giants defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, gives Star-Ledger reporter Kevin Manahan a "haircut" at the salon where she works in Springfield, PA.

SPRINGFIELD, Pa. -- The receptionist at the front counter at the Nirvana Hair Gallery and Day Spa isn't sure she heard me correctly, so she raises one carefully waxed and painstakingly plucked eyebrow and asks incredulously, "You're here for a haircut? A haircut?"

She has a smirk on her face -- you know, like the one on Mike McCarthy's face when those two field goals sailed wide in Green Bay last Sunday night.