"Camps"

We have enjoyed the various "camps" that are floating and on the levee ground. The floating ones are pretty cool - note the air conditioner and camping trailer! With aligators and water moccasins - who would ever swim - not me!

Cypress Forest

The cypress trees with the Spanish moss creat an eerie beauty. Calm and quiet - the exact oposite of the overtime of the Olympic hockey game on our TV! The water is 3 - 4 feet above normal. Canada scores - the stadium goes wild and the USA has to settle for silver - bummer!

Cruising Under I-10

The second longest bridge in our country is this I-10 bridge that took six years to build (1967 - 1973) . The Lake Ponchertrain Bridge is longer and took 7 years to build. This was most impressive!

McGee's Landing Shots

Technology of my lifetime! When we were children in Verona, Mom's new washing machine looked like this - I loved the wringers as the clothes left the washer and went into the rinse tub - and then through the wringer into another rinse tub. Then through the wringer again and into the basket to be taken out to our clothes line. I was not allowed to feed the clothes into the wringer, Mom did that, but I could pull the clothes out the other side!
Now the technology of my senior years - the satellite dish. Kinda cool!

Atchafalaya Swamp

21 States and 2 Canadian Providences drain water into what area? The Red River and Mississippi River also drain into this area. Have any of you heard about the Atchafalaya Swamp? Have any of you heard of the famous 1927 flood? Today we lunched along its banks and enjoyed learning about the history of the area and its people, enjoyed lunch along the water, and then had a boat tour of the swamp.

How do you like this house - note the wring washing machine on the right side of the porch. To the left of it are the washer tubs with the Marti Gras beads hanging from it. Very colorful!

McGee Landing is where we had lunch and the tour boat is to the left.

The music is fun and lively and the lunch crowd was up and dancing as soon as the music started. Such fun. Jack Ehlenberg told us all the restaurants have cajun music on Sunday afternoons. He gave us the names of a number of places to visit - sounds like we could use several weeks here!

The Way Home

We had been warned by the staff at the State Park to not arrive via the levy road from the south as it is quite an adventure and not paved. Those using GPSs for navagation are in for surprises. Of course with a Land Rover that spelled adventure and fun so... From Jeanette we headed south and then finally crossed a bayou or canal and then continued along on the other side with lovely homes and then a few more turns and a crossing across a bridge that was narrow and I don't know how much weight it can handle and then onto the levy road! For 12 miles we followed the bayou, Lake Fausse, "camps" of all sorts along the water, a number number of bee hive boxes (groups of about 30 hives), pickup trucks and a number of people driving their ATV's along the top of the levy. We drove through semi dry areas and lots of mud ruts and some were pretty deep and we knew not to stop. Today we just might need to find a car wash or wait for tomorrow's rain!
Saw this bicycle contraption in Jeanette - not sure what it was or is but suspect he was collecting cans.

Rice Factory

Next we headed back to New Iberia and checked out the Conrad or Konriko Rice Mill. We missed the noon tour so they sent us to the local favorite cajun restaurant (if you can call it that). This was a most colorful place with a huge volumn of locals and take-outs. We had seafood gumbo and shrimp po-boys followed by bread pudding. Fortunately the lady at the rice factory had told us the servings were huge so we shared everything and still had extra shrimp that fell out of the roll! Was the best po-boy I have ever had.
We then headed back to see how the rice is processed. The plant was not running since it was a Saturday but it was still interesting.

Avery Island

This morning after hearing cajun music in the campground, we headed to Avery Island which is a large salt mound that was uplifted in this flat area ages ago. This is the location of our country's first salt mine and it will be mined for many more years. The salt starts 12 feet below the surface. The reason for the trip was to visit the home of Tabasco and tour the plant. All the Tabasco (and it is sold in 160 countries around the world) is bottled here. In the general store they even had two ice creams made with Tabasco and many other products I had never seen before. Had a great time sampling!

Camping in a swamp!

Praying the water doesn't rise too far! The park staff said not to worry the water level marks on the trees is where the water was last week...

Traveling through Southern Louisiana

The sightseeing today sure was different with many miles of elevated roadway over the swamps, many bridges over waterways and even a refinery or two.

Who chose this route?

Holy s**t! A rusted high under construction with temporary sides and we are in motorcoach crossing the Mississippi!!! Original sides are in top picture which are replaced by the temporary ones! Fortunately the navagator did not choose this route (US 90) over the Huey P. Long bridge so the driver could only blame himself! A railroad bridge section is above and two the left. A long freight train had just crossed as we approached the bridge. And yes, we did go see the sight on the collapsed I-35 bridge in Minneapolis and that one wass not only much shorter but much lower.

New Orleans Elks's Club #30

Last night we parked in the Elks #30 Lodge parking lot with the Marti Gras floats! This is one of the oldest lodges in the country.

Off to New Orleans

Beautiful sunny but cool day as we traveled to New Orleans where we have set up camp at the Elks Club in Metarie. Dinner tonight was wonderful and at the suggestion from the Elks Club we headed to a family seafood restaurant called Jaegers on Clearview Parkway in Jefferson. I had crayfish and chicken gumbo with jumbalaya while Bill had seafood gumbo and shrimp and catfish plate. Wow! We then shared some bread pudding and then waddled out to the car! Now we need to run a half marathon tomorrow!!!!

Grayton Beach - Great as usual!

Our return to Grayton Beach was exciting since this was our first return since the new area was completed. The day was beautiful when we arrived and unfortunately I did not take any pictures. Wednesday was a cold windy and wet day. We drove past the Selden cottages, Contentment and Sistah, and it was odd to see no one at home! Guess Smokey had the best idea - take over the couch! We spent most of the afternoon reading The Blind Side and staying warm and dry!

Falling Waters State Park

Bill as usual is enjoying a water fall. Vivian and Bill drove down the 35 minutes to join us for lunch at Bailey's Surf and Turf. It was good. On Monday we drove over to Marianna ad went to Florida Caverns.

Falling Waters State Park is a small park at Chipley, Florida. It has floridas highest waterfall and about 24 campsites. Close by are Walmart and other stores and easy access to I-10.