what a wonderful world

Sitting in Fremin's that night so very, very long ago, ages and ages now it seems, it was hard to disagree. It was the last night of our spectacular trip to Louisiana and we had dinner in this elegant place in the historical district of Thibodaux. The 1878 three story building once housed a drug store, but on this night, this serene and wonderful night that seemed to stretch forever like the warm enveloping arms of a lover, every sensual nuance of Louisiana was on display. We had martinis and wine, chargrilled oysters, redfish and crawfish in one last expansive meal. We lingered over more martinis and a very talented jazz ensemble playing on this Wednesday night kept us enthralled. We did not want to leave. But, because we had listened to an informative and harrowing dissertation on the loss of Louisiana land and the damage done by Rita and Katrina by a park ranger in Thibodaux that day our appreciation of life’s preciousness was heightened. Despite the travails of this world though, the medicinal elixir being stirred here in Fremin’s kept us safe and sated. We truly felt happy that night in Fremin's and the very idea of returning home seemed baffling. Life goes on, even when it goes badly is a phrase I often use, but the approach to life here in Louisiana, given the history of the Cajun people, changes that sentiment from a survival course to a way of enjoying life no matter what is tossed in their path.

I have learned a lot while here in Louisiana, but the dearest lesson gained is this approach to life. Listening to that jazz ensemble play Louis Armstrong's standard “What A Wonderful World,” that delights in the simplicity of life, it all made sense and I hope I remember it for the rest of my days.

Laissez le bon temps roule.

Sigh….

This is the last entry for our trip to Louisiana. I apologize for the break in time, but it was my birthday last week and well... laissez le bon temps roule... come'on...!

Thanks so very much for reading and for all your emails. I hope you all find happiness in this world as well.

love,

greg

make levees not war…

Make levees not war. That’s a popular t-shirt these days in New Orleans. Vying for the tourist’s attention among other classic shirts that say “pinch the tail and suck the head,” usually with an affectionate looking crawfish smiling lasciviously from the shirt, and “I’m not an alcoholic… Alcoholics go to meetings,” we are reminded that a serious, serious catastrophe hit this state and specifically this city less than 3 years ago. Sadly, despite the nice phrase, people are making money off this calamity. I was particularly mortified when I saw signs offering tours of the devastated Ninth Ward. I did not inquire if any of the proceeds from the tours went to the displaced citizens of that part of the city; it just seemed so viscerally wrong.

As it was explained to me by a U.S. Park Ranger several things happened to broker the New Orleans disaster. Not to go into incredible detail here, but the levees that were created to control the river, or to circumvent the Mississippi River by ships, and building far too dangerously close to Lake Ponchatrain all led to the disaster. The eye of Katrina hit Mississippi. It was the storm surge that shot up the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet Canal or MRGO that raised the waters of the Lake and then eroded the levees in the Ninth Ward. Look at a map. Trace MRGO from the Gulf straight into the heart of the Ninth Ward. It’s eerie to see how the disaster can be easily explained and how man unwittingly disrespected nature and created all the conditions for this to happen. If the wetlands and marshes south of New Orleans were not being eroded, by oil, by the controlling of the Mississippi’s course via levees and were able to absorb the brunt of hurricane force storm surges, this may have been averted. If homes were not built on what really is marshland, reclaimed from the lake, the disaster that horrified America in 2005 might not have happened.

Water always finds the easiest route to take. Water will go where it “wants” to go, was a lesson my Father taught me. The Mississippi is kind of headstrong on this subject. Sure, we control it with levees, but that is until it finds a better way to go. As it was explained to me by the Park Ranger in Thibodaux the Mississippi River is like a huge garden hose, flopping about if unchecked. Of course the flips and flops take hundreds and hundreds of years to complete. Bayou Lafourche and the Atchafalaya water basin were once the main routes of the Mississippi River. This river that flows at such incredible volume taking sediment with it from as far north as Minnesota builds lands, thrusts up natural levees as it rushes to the gulf. It floods too. That’s what it normally does. But, since monstrous, towering levees were built along its banks, the Mississippi complies, at least for now.

Our plan this day was to see a plantation. Sugarcane made the area west of New Orleans prosperous and a couple of the old places are open for tours. We settled on the aristocratic Oak Alley Plantation. We listened politely to the tour, marveled at the opulence and gaped in awe at the three hundred year old oaks gnarled and wise, stretching over the main entrance and giving this place its name. But from the second floor balcony where we were afforded a spectacular view of the oaks lining the alley, barely a sun splash making it through the thick canopy, I kept looking at the large hill across Route 18. It was the levee. I figured I have been reading about this river, I have to go see it. When we left Oak Alley Plantation we drove directly across the small road and parked in a gravel area. We took pictures of the plantation and then we walked to the top of the levee.

It was alarming because it was so unexpected. The Mississippi River, completely hidden by the levees that create a country lane-feel to this sleepy road, is so wide and is moving so swiftly that it is hard to consider that the two are side-by-side. Yet here it is and suddenly the power of this great river is before us, whisking the air from our lungs. Afterwards we drove with reverence along the many twists and bends of this great river all the way to Donaldsonville. We did not mind that this piled on the miles; it was fascinating to follow upstream every whim of the Mississippi.

Bayou Lafourche, once joined at the hip with the Mississippi, starts in Donaldsonville. Now separated from the might river by less than 1,000 feet, the bayou is a nothing like the water it sprung from, yet Lafourche will take you all the way to Grand Isle. We drove along the appropriately named Mississippi Street that separated the two water courses and marveled at this comparatively withered street of water before heading north to drive past the Nottoway Plantation in While Castle. No sliders here.

But, hunger was getting the best of us. We headed in, away from the river to take a typically circuitous route back to Thibodaux. We used route 69 and eventually 70 to get us to Morgan City and route 90, but we got on some roads that drove as deep into the Atchafalaya water basin as possible. Any more into it and we would have needed a boat. There was once a small colony of people living here in the 1920’s, called Bayou Chene. The trappers, fishermen and lumberjacks and their families that once comprised this community eventually disappeared and according to a film we saw at the U.S. Historical Park, the exact site of Bayou Chene is unknown today.

I think we found them….

Well, we did drive by some very poor homes. We drove past trailers, ramshackle, clapboard listing homes, some sitting in water and hoped these were just camps, where people would come to hunt and fish. But, then we saw kids playing amongst eviscerated cars and Spanish moss looking particularly ghost-like and figured that a large part of this poverty was called home.

Thibodaux seemed especially cosmopolitan when we returned. We had a ho-hum dinner at Flanagan’s and then went to her sister restaurant in the historical section of town, Fremin’s, for a much needed martini; anything to affirm our place in the fortunate social order of things.

Thibodaux

There is no “th” sound in the French language, so this is why a lot of Cajuns say “dis” instead of “this,” “dat” instead of well… you get the picture. Sprinkled with French the whole act of conversing with a Cajun is quite an adventure. Just trying to get through the pronunciations for cities like Iowa or today’s destination, Thibodaux has led to hours long discussions between us. T-be-dough? It certainly passed the time for us as we drove along the relatively rural route 90 and avoiding the madness of interstate 10. We paused briefly in Iowa to take pictures of the Dirty Rice Saloon and drove slowly through sleepy towns like Jennings and Crowley to admire some nice homes. Crowley is known as the Rice Capital of America, and we meandered down the main avenue, snapped pictures of the Rice Theatre and peered at a couple of elegant homes, but sadly we were not in time for the International Rice Festival, so we continued on to the half way point to Thibodaux… Prejean’s.

The lunch we had at Prejean’s was perhaps the finest meal we’ve gotten so far in Louisiana. We were served two expansive meals that reduced us to giggling schoolchildren by the end! The nuance of the flavors spread across our taste buds was remarkable. Janet later would say I get that faraway look in my eyes as my senses are caressed by the wonderful food. I consider myself very fortunate to eat such meals and I am amazed consistently at the flavors. At Prejean’s we had another order of the Sassafras Shrimp and we tackled the waitress when she tried to remove our plate… Janet was still trying to lick the plate clean. Then we shared two meals. I had Catfish Pontchartrain that was lightly fried and topped their “gold medal crawfish sauce Pontchartrain”. Now, I’ve been eating a lot of catfish while in Louisiana, mainly because the oysters unless pasteurized are not in season, and the crawfish run was finished in late May and so there’s no boil available. But, this catfish at Prejean’s restaurant in Lafayette was light and tender and the brown catfish Pontchartrain sauce had a deep taste with a slow smoldering spice. Topped with several little crawfish, I almost did not want to give up my second half to Janet. I was glad I did though. She got Oysters Saxophone! Fired oysters and shitake mushrooms are piled into a hollowed loaf of bread and covered with a lemon parsley beurre blanc. Normally we try to avoid carbs… but you’ll want to use this bread to sop up every drop of the sauce.

All told we were in Prejean’s for two hours! They begged us to leave. Janet bought a t-shirt, but they made me give back the stuffed alligator. (I wouldn’t have fit it on the airplane anyway.)

After leaving Prejean’s for the last time (3 meals in all) we barreled down route 90 toward Thibodaux. The destination was more a matter of convenience than an interesting place to hang our hat for a couple of days. We picked out the town as a close enough point to reach plantations along the Mississippi River and to New Orleans.

We were somewhat disappointed in Thibodaux when we first arrived. It seemed dreary and the historic district at first looked to be a row of empty storefronts. We checked into a hotel on the other side of Bayou Lafourche. We had traveled along the latter length of this particular bayou on our way to Grand Isle so many days ago. It is called by some down here to world’s longest street and for good reason. Many of the homes would face the bayou and not the streets behind the homes and would use the bayou as the main means of transporation. Lafourche is from the French word, “fork,” and at one time this slow moving water was actually a part of the Mississippi River itself. A French priest in the early 1700’s stood near where the Mississippi and the Bayou Lafourche once split off and wrote that he could not tell which leg was the main branch of the river. But, in 1905 the fork was damned and then reduced to a slow moving, almost stagnant bayou.

Well, despite all the history, we almost did not venture out of our hotel that night. The town seemed shuttered and without promise. But, beer, that strong elixir given to us by the gods beckoned and we drove out into the night searching for a barstool. After plying the empty streets of Thibodaux for a bit we decided to park in the historic district. We had seen some neon lights and thought to investigate. Every place we looked into was open, but empty. It was not until we gulped and headed into Rene’s Bar. It’s windows were nearly boarded up and there was only a faint light filtering beneath the door. It seemed dead, or dangerous. But at Rene's we found solace. Perhaps another time we would not have been so adventurous, but we had learned that such fearful steps only lead to disappointments and throughout our time in Louisiana we have encountered nothing but good times behind such similar clapboard facades.

Rene’s did not disappoint, though it was far from the charm of other places we’ve visited. We were more in civilization than in the rural backwaters. We were not the life of the party. Thankfully we were just another couple that bellied up to the bar (a metaphor that was quite appropriate given our sated guts). It was a bar! Janet had her beer wrapped in a napkin… I did not. People played pool. Others at the bar in voices that were not tinged with Cajun accents joked with the bartender, but ignored us. We smiled, happy to have found this place.

Thanks for reading….

If you’re keeping track you’ll notice that this entry is quite late. Our last few days in Louisiana were a flurry of activity with not a lot of downtime. Plus the added inconvenience of having to endure weather related plane delays kept us in New Orleans for an extra day…af the airport, unfortunately. After finally returning home and finding my house needed to get put back in order, I have had little time to write, but I will finish the next couple of entries in the coming days. I hope you’re enjoying reading about this great state as much as we had exploring it!

finding my way

The way I like to travel is when I see a road that is interesting I take it, even if it's not in the intended direction. Like a latter day Yogi Berra coming to a fork in the road, over the years I have done this, a lot. But, I have had my greatest successes while traveling alone without having to answer to anyone. When traveling with others there is always an agenda and wailing voices that plea, “are we THERE yet?” Janet though is different. When I get to that proverbial fork in the road that just begs me to make a left, although making a right is really the correct way, Janet smiles coyly, whips out her array of maps and says, ‘Okay.’ Dang, she has even suggested side-trips while out here in Louisiana. She calls them “Greg’s way.”

Sigh.

Throughout our travels in Louisiana, traversing the southern half of the state, we have deviated from the agenda and have gone out exploring on plenty of these roads that don’t even SHOW UP on the official Louisiana state map. It has led us to a myriad of delightful experiences. From the tumult of New Orleans we’ve traveled through the high water serenity of bayous in the Atchafalaya basin and found isolated windswept vistas of the Gulf. We’ve been enchanted by songbirds and hypnotized by the clang of penny slots on a riverboat casino. Without our brave forays into the much smaller roads we would have missed out on a cool refreshing beer at Red’s Levee Saloon. The act of traveling is often more rewarding than the destination and this wonderfully diverse state affirmed in me the joy of traveling along a road just to see what was around the next bend.

Yesterday, a trip that was supposed to be a quick jaunt into the Lacassine Wildlife Refuge, the last leg of our trip along the Creole Nature Trail, turned out to be an all-day affair. We intended to take a swing out to the refuge and hurtle back down the country roads to our hotel in the Charpentier district of Lake Charles to swim in the pool and eat an early dinner before our long drive today. We went out into the fierce, bright sunlight of Southwest Louisiana and drove along the prairies outside of Lake Charles. We passed field after field of rice. Each time we paused to ogle an interesting sight, like a dilapidated barn or listing home, the heat and humidity pressed against us like a drunkard. We drive without the air conditioning on with an eye to the gas mileage and because it’s not quite as big a shock when we exit the car to snap a picture or peer out onto some vista. This may sound ludicrous and we do sweat, but we are used to it, and the beers afterward taste especially refreshing.

Our first stop in the Lacassine Refuge was the pool, but it is certainly not for swimming. It is 16,000 acres of freshwater marsh at the convergence of the Central and Mississippi flyways of migratory birds and a major landing spot for all these tired and hungry birds on their own instinctive travel agendas. Created by a series of low levees by the government, the pool is also home to a large variety of birds. Despite the brutal midday heat we took our time, slowly driving down the chalky dust road to birdwatch. (Ricky would have been SO proud of us.)

Our greatest sighting was a Roseate Spoonbill. We gasped at the beautiful pink feather of this oddly beaked bird as it gracefully flew away. Evidently the Lacassine pool is home to a rare nesting rookery for the Roseate Spoonbill.
We also saw a Common Moorhen prance across lily-pads the side of plates at a country buffet. Each time the colorfully-faced Moorhen hopped to another pad it squawked. Refusing to fly it would hop and leap and step gingerly pad to pad, squawking merrily as it hunted for morsels of food.

Because the Lacassine Refuge is a freshwater pool the plant life is different than in the salt marshes. There are water lilies sprouting hearty flowers that turn the landscape in every direction white or yellow. The yellow lilies have a seed pod that appears when the flower blooms looking like a shower head, which then dries and holds the seeds in a little cup waiting to be tipped into the water. I’m bringing home one of the seed pods. I crept down to the water’s edge and plucked one that was growing near to the shore.

I would not have been so brave though had I known what was in the water aside from gators. Later on when we got out of the car near some fishermen to walk along the road which was being repaired and was closed to car traffic, we shuddered at the sight of a massive fish that broke the surface of the water. A passing fisherman explained the roiling water was from an Alligator Gar. There was a stuffed Gar hanging on a wall at Prejean’s and it was big and ugly! It is particularly vicious looking; its body is like a gator with fins, but its snout is narrow and well…ugly. The fisherman, wearing a tight fitting baseball cap and a tight fitting t-shirt seemed unconcerned about this ugly critter’s proximity. He was catching perch. We thanked him, but he just mumbled something about Gar not being good eating, unless you made some kind of Gar ball, and then without another word turned and cast in the water.

The refuge trail was eventually blocked for construction, so we had to backtrack in the high heat and humidity around to the other side to exit. We had noticed that there was a “do not enter” sign on the way in; this was the end of the refuge trail; but this exit was not blocked. Janet, usually the rule follower in such matters, urged me on. I was more than a willing follower. We drove down the gravel road until we came to a levee that had a small road on it. We followed this low lying divider in the pool for a long while until we came to a covered platform that stood 20 feet above the water. We have been in this state for nearly two weeks and we are still amazed at the beauty and vastness of it. As swarms of blue dragonflies hovered in the air near us, apparently approving our sense of adventure we looked out onto the Lacassine wildlife refuge, at its enormity and solitude. Somehow the heat seemed less oppressive from this beautiful and breezy vantage point.

Most people just kind of flit through these places in their air conditioned cars. We are a couple of knuckleheads though and laden with day old biscuits from Prejean’s we came to a wooden bridge as we drove the opposite way. Afraid that this was still under construction, we thought the bridge would not support the weight of the car. So, we got out to feed the gators. But, the gators here are not used to humans like the ones we’ve seen at Avery Island, and our offerings were ignored by the two that happened to be in the water when we stopped. Janet hit one in the head with a biscuit and the gator quickly disappeared under the surface as if Janet killed it! From then on Janet has been calling her biscuits “Gator Bullets.”

We eventually tested the bridge after seeing construction workers driving to their work site go over it in their pick up trucks. They ignored us as we stood on the side of the road sheepishly holding our weapons.

One thing about gators… if there aren’t any birds in the water, it’s a sure bet the gators are close. All the time we traveled into this closed off section of the trail we did not see one bird. But, we saw A LOT of gators. A quick count was pegged at nearly a dozen in the half mile drive to the actual construction site where we had to turn around. The gators were everywhere we looked in the water, although we looked from the safety of the car only! At one point three were gliding down the water together. Another one snapped and thrashed at something on the far bank. I launched a bullet in their direction but the gators were on some sort of mission. Perhaps they were trying to head us off at the bridge and then drag us from our car to beat us up? Janet did conk that one gator on the head! Even though I’m fooling around here, it did seem like the gators were traveling together in a similar direction. We fled the pool, happy that we did not have to use the gator bullets on ourselves.

We drove out of the pool and down to the main part of the Lacassine Refuge where we took a chilling 200 yard hike. We parked on the side of the road near a trail marker. Just a few steps away from the road we entered a roughhewn trail that had a swamp on either side. He had doused ourselves with bug spray, so mosquitoes were not a concern, but everything else gave us the willies. The road quickly disappeared and we were alone. Our voices echoed off the still water. Cypress knees broke out above the surface of the water in places looking like the hands of drowned men. Using binoculars we watched a snake slither into a man made bird house. We felt like we were being watched, or sized up. Were we worth the aggravation? The swamp looked like it harbored all sorts of dangerous critters just beneath its surface and behind every cypress there was certainly a bear lurking or a snake was ready to drop onto our heads. We noticed that the spider webs that were everywhere along the trail were the homes of very, VERY large brown spiders and when we finally saw a dragonfly in its death throes being sucked dry by one of the spiders even our willies had the willies. Spooked, we headed for the car again.

This time we rolled up the windows and turned on the air conditioning… all the way back to Lake Charles.

Our favorite restaurant in Lake Charles, Chastain’s, was closed, this being a Sunday, so we settled for a chain Mexican restaurant for our dinner. Later that evening after a swim in the cement pond Janet and I walked through the Charpentier historic homes district of Lake Charles where our hotel is located. Charpentier is French for carpenter and some of the homes in this small area date from the late 1800’s. Evidently there were no real architects in the area when some of these homes were built and according to the official website for Lake Charles, the homes took on the individual characteristics from the carpenters who built them.
Assured we would not get tackled by a gator seeking revenge we took a leisurely stroll through the area to peer at the lighted facades and interiors of these beautiful homes.

coon-ass tidal waves

Now you may think that the term “coon-ass” is an indelicate, derogatory name for the Cajun people, but they quickly describe themselves and everything they do using this word. The short woman ladling out the shrimp gumbo at the Cajun French Music Festival told us she had lived in Virginia for ten years before she demanded her husband get her “coon-ass” back to Louisiana. A jury-rigged piece of equipment might be called “coon-ass” engineering. Some people may consider it an ethic slur, but I use it with as much endearment and appreciation as the people who live here. I may not yet be an honorary Cajun “Coon-ass”, but I think I’ll get the hang of being one pretty soon. Maybe I have to eat some more gumbo...

From our perch in the upper rung of the Burton Coliseum in Lake Charles, Louisiana it looked like a tidal wave. We were at the Cajun French Music Association’s 21st Annual Food and Music Festival. People, young and old, would enter the large dance area whenever the band started playing and depending on the song the crowd would flow into the waltz, the many and varied couples moving nearly in unison counter clockwise around the floor, or into a lively two-step. When the song ended the crowd would quickly empty off the dance floor and into the general seating area as if the tide was going out. Each time a new song would begin, the crowd would file back in. This went on all day. Young men and old women danced together. Old men and young women danced together. Kids danced with other kids or adults. Teenaged boys in wranglers and cowboy hats danced with teenaged girls wearing dresses and sparkly tiaras. Parents two-stepped around the dance floor with their infants cradled in their arms. For hours this went on, through Joe Simon & the Louisiana Cajuns, to Lesa Cormier & The Sundown Playboys all the way through the “Swamp Pop” of Don Fontenot & les amis de la Louisiana. Except for the changing of the bands the music continued until 11:00 p.m. and the crowd ebbed and flowed throughout.

Janet and I were the only ones who seemingly did not dance. People would work the crowd looking for a new dance partner for each new song and we saw some unlikely pairings. There was a skinny guy who danced with a very tall and large woman dressed in pink and then the next song he twirled with a tall skinny woman. There was one short, stout fellow wearing an orange shirt and baseball cap who jerked and twittered throughout the day and night with a myriad of women, young and old. From eye level the dancing was an unusual sight. The dance floor was sectioned off from the rest of the arena by a fence covered by red, white and blue bunting. Because of this obstruction we could only see the top half of the couples and their bodies seemed to flow past us as if adrift on a river as we could not see their shuffling footsteps.

There was evidently a Queen of the Festival contest and a dance contest. There were several young women wearing spirited tiaras, and some wearing far too much makeup for their innocent ages, who danced throughout the festival. They danced with anyone who asked and also posed for pictures at the mere sight of a camera. We watched a man and woman who danced beautifully take home a huge trophy for their fluid movements. We watched young men of 18 or 20 teach girlfriends how to dance. We watched young men ask the frailest of older women to dance, though we did not believe they would survive the dance floor, but then gaped in amazement as they moved with such grace we were embarrassed to even try to get out there ourselves.

What we did do a lot of was eat…

We had one of everything. Boudin balls, sausage on a stick, crawfish etoufee, jambalaya, shrimp gumbo, red beans and rice, smoked cracklings… and homemade sweets. This event was a slice of Americana that few people would know of outside of this wonderful world. We had gotten a “taste” of it while going to the Crawfish Festival back home with the music and dancing and food, but this was by far a greater experience. Though we stuck out like sore thumbs; people eyed me up and down and commented often on my Aloha shirt; we were only met with gracious, friendly people proud of their world and very happy to share it with us. These people of Louisiana are good people.

Iway

The bearded old man wearing the coveralls and tattered baseball cap leaned into me at the bar and whispered, “Be careful.” We were at the Dirty Rice Saloon just outside of Iowa, Louisiana along Route 90. Janet and I had spent the day driving the western half of the Cajun Nature Trail that ran along the extreme southern coast of southwestern part of the state and we were hot and miserable and very much in need of a beer. We had tried to get a place in Sulphur but we quickly found out that place was too edgy for us. It was filled with transients and we drove down the frenetic traffic of Route 10 to Iowa and found us a place that was much cleaner and quieter. We then went out for our beer.

Actually we were looking for a margarita, but the woman tending bar in the smoky joint sort of winced when I mentioned that drink. We settled for Buds and Janet had her bottle wrapped demurely with a napkin. We munched on roasted peanuts and read the graffiti scrawled on the walls and ceilings and read the electronic message board behind that bar that flashed missives about regulars that were ribald and included many invectives. We listened to the old man singing before his electronic keyboard that kept a beat and the heavy-set bass player with his face nearly hidden by his baseball cap and thought that this was all right. But, then the old man picked up his accordion and started playing Cajun music and suddenly people were up dancing; skinny as a snake old men in cowboy shirts dancing with young women. A big woman tittered in a barber chair near the band. The bartender asked us where we were from and why we were in Iway; I guess we didn’t look like regulars. When I told them she hooted and announced to everyone in the bar that we were here and then tried to get us to drink shots. Everyone in the place cheered and we waved. The bartender took our pictures for her MySpace page. The band began to play more passionately and then the old man came over to me.

“Be careful,” he whispered. “I came here three years ago….and never left.”

A long while later Janet and I were back in our hotel room after dodging the many Sheriff’s vehicles lining the short route from the Dirty Rice Saloon and our hotel and we were trying to figure out how to pronounce the name of the town we settled in for the night. Iowa? Iawo? Iway? It looked like Iowa, but with the mix of accents it was hard to determine. We settled on Iway.

We had left Lafayette that morning after a hearty breakfast at Dwyer’s Diner on Jefferson and headed off for the Cajun Nature Trail. The day was hot and the sun was unrelenting. We passed through small towns like Abbeville, Esther and Pecan Island. We passed vivid green salt marshes that stretched forever and interrupted only by random stands of trees in the far distance. The blue sky was decorated with clouds and whenever we stopped on the side of the road to look at a bird or an oak or a ship far out in the Gulf of Mexico, the silence was absolute. We were very alone.

We entered ground zero for Hurricane Rita in 2005, Holly Beach. She hit this desolate area a month before the catastrophic Katrina and Holly Beach took the full brunt of the storm. Everything was wiped out. There were 6 people living in Holly Beach one year after the storm, that’s how devastating the storm was to the area. There were a few houses rebuilt in Holly Beach, but many of the structures were just mobile homes with canopies covering them. It was eerie to drive through the footprint of the little town. Street after street was laid out, streets crisscrossing each other, but whole blocks were just empty, grass growing where houses once stood. We drove onto the wide beach and watched a lone fisherman standing hip deep in the Gulf haul in fish after fish. I collected some sand to add to my collection of sand from around the world.

It was frightening to consider what it must have been to see a hurricane bearing down on your location and there was nothing you could do but flee. House after house we passed on the remote LA82 was either brand new, rebuilt since Rita, or was scarred and abandoned. We were told hundreds of oak trees, some hundreds of years old, were lost in the area of the Lacassine Refuge, miles inland from the coast, torn from the ground by Rita.

One place that had survived not just Rita but Audrey in 1957 was Sha Sha’s in Creole. The restaurant is not that hard to find. There still are not a lot of buildings in Creole, like Holly Beach, and it’s right on the corner where there’s a traffic light, the only one for a good long way. We ate lunch in this squat, neat restaurant and had some damn good bread pudding with rum sauce for a dessert.

We traveled all the way along the coast clear through to Port Arthur in Texas and then turned right around again and drove back to drive through the Sabine Refuge area. Despite the strong, fierce sun we walked the 1.5 mile wetland trail with its boardwalk that weaved through the marshes just recently reopened a few months ago and looked at all sorts of birds through the binoculars that I had brought. (Ricky would have been proud.) We saw an alligator in one of the waterways and dodged fire ant mounds along the trail. We got on the road again, passing prairies and cattle with great herons, their white feathers ablaze in the sun, looking for bugs kicked up by the beasts. We passed through Hackberry, home to the first oil drills sunk in Louisiana. There were signs of the oil industry all through here, including several oil drills rising into the sun. By the time we reached Sulphur we were hot and miserable and the sight of a monstrous petrochemical plant was not very appealing. Thankfully Iway was in our future. By days end we logged around 250 miles.

happy trails

In a thickly accented voice the deeply tanned man, except for his grey hair invisible in the dark recesses of Red’s Levee Bar in Catahoula, asked us if we had ever seen an asshole wrapped in plastic. Already giggling from the whole situation we obviously answered no and then he immediately turned to the old fellow next to him and asked for his driver’s license. We laughed aloud and then, in keeping with the way people talk around here, he repeated the joke and then explained it. He bought us beers. I fetched cigars from the car and gave one out to our friend who lapsed between French and English like it was all one big language and another younger fellow nearer to us who spoke so slowly that we were thankful that the bartender was able to translate for us. Her deeply lined face with its kind eyes would remark caustically to something the man would say, repeat his utterance, though not really for our benefit, and we’d finally understand. The younger man was aglow over the cigar and looked at the label and thanked me more than twice.

The bartender wore a sleeveless house dress that boasted a bold red flower motif and after we ordered our first beer she looked at us and said to us, “I don’t know you. I haven’t met you,” in a voice that sounded slightly disappointed. It felt as if she were able to remember every single person that would grace her teetering bar that was set on a corner of a country road, the levee on one side and a field of sugarcane on the other. We told her our names and explained where we were from and were then forever committed to her internal guest register and that was it! Suddenly we were the highlight of the day for the five people in Red’s, although throughout the fun Janet and I were poking each other in the ribs and giggling because this was the highlight of our day as well. We were having so much fun on this trip. This is what we wanted, this is why we came to Louisiana after all; to immerse ourselves in the culture and food and music, to hear the voices and smell the food and tap our feet in time to the “French Music” and Zydeco. But, I knew this soiree would quickly evolve into more carousing than we were prepared for, especially when a younger woman, wearing hospital scrubs entered Red’s and immediately wanted to buy us beers. She playfully cussed up a storm at the old guys at the bar and called them pedophiles as they pawed at her when she came and then pointed her finger at us and asked what we wanted. The old man who was the butt of the other man’s jokes also tried to buy us beers. But, I begged off them all, apologized profusely, produced a twenty and whispered to the bartender that she was to buy everyone who wanted one a beer and then keep the rest for herself, before bidding all an adieu.
Outside we laughed at Janet’s joyful find. It was after all her choice to stop at Red’s Levee Bar. We turned off the road that skirted the levee and saw Red's with it's door wide open and Janet said that we HAVE to go in for one beer. We could have stayed a lot longer.

We were in the middle of an unplanned day today that was the most delightful of our days so far in Louisiana. We ate at Prejean’s for breakfast, got on that day’s evening local newscast when a cameraman shot some B-roll inside the Lafayette visitor center while we were there (luckily we ducked out of Red’s Levee Bar before that story came on the television or else they would have drugged out the moonshine in our honor…). We went to the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and saw a couple of films; one was about the history of the Cajun people. We drove to Breaux Bridge to walk around, take some pictures and a cup of coffee and to pick up an “I Love Jake Delhomme” sign at the Breaux Bridge visitor’s center. Delhomme, quarterback of the Carolina Panthers, lives down on LA94, a mile past Mulate’s. Janet posed for a picture with our wonderful poster outside of Red’s. We had a quick lunch at Pat’s Fisherman’s wharf Restaurant along a bayou in Henderson and ended our drive by tooling through St. Martinsville, the place where Longfellow set his epic poem Evangeline. As we stopped at the famed Evangeline Oak, Janet insisted on reciting the prelude of the poem and wished Mr. O’Connor, her 7th Grade English teacher, was on hand to witness this recitation.

We did not eat an official dinner that night. Instead we went to hear some Janet music. I say “Janet Music,” but I’m quickly adopting it as well. The Thrift Store Cowboys, a group out of Lubbock, Texas, were playing at the Blue Moon Guest House on Convent Street in Lafayette. The stage was set on the back porch of this house and the group, now down to just two members for this particular trip because one had a conflict with work and the other had a cyst on their leg that needed attention, played their country music with guitars and accordions. We got “dinner” by fetching some red beans and rice from a crock pot on the side of the stage and swilled Abita beers beneath walls decorated with road signs and graffiti. We marveled at our luck yet again at this find and Janet murmured that she wished her daughter, Charlotte, and Casey, her friend, were here to soak this all up.

After the Thrift Store Cowboys were done they mingled in the very small crowd at the Blue Moon and we clapped them on the back and bought their CD. We did not want this day to end so we drove around the streets of Lafayette smoking and listening to the Thrift Store Cowboys. Several times we drove down the “new Bourbon Street” as the lady at the visitor center called Rue Jefferson, to pass the many vibrant bars that are set side by side here before steering the car to our home for the night….

Hey.. if you like (or hate) what you’re reading, leave a comment. We’d love to hear about it.
You can always drop us an email too….
Greg’s email is: greg.dunaj@yahoo.com

Janet’s email is: jalemarsh@gmail.com


Happy trails
-greg

smoked tasso and sweet potato pies

The culinary highlight of the trip so far has been Prejean’s Restaurant in Lafayette. It was after all the main reason why we have gone on this trip. We have been going to the Crawfish Festival for years and we met Terryl Jackson this year as he ladled out Pheasant, Duck and Andouille Sausage gumbo. He is the executive chef at Prejean’s and this affable man had his picture and his awards all on display at the entrance to this expansive restaurant. Every taste of every dish we had last night was better than the last. Janet started out with an appetizer that was called Sassafras Shrimp. Grilled, stuffed with Jack Cheese covered by apple smoked bacon, fried and then smothered in a crawfish creole sauce, this was a meal by itself. My lightly fried alligator bits, though tasty were absolutely pedestrian in comparison.

We asked our waiter if Mr. Jackson was in and eventually the man himself came to our table. Though he did not recognize us at first we showed him the business card he had given us at the Crawfish Festival and we talked for a long time about how he was so very impressed with so many people eating Crawfish Boil. He was delighted that we had traveled so far to eat in his restaurant and then he proceeded to tell us where else to eat, although his first bit of advice was to have us return to Prejean’s for breakfast.

So, we did.

Janet and I got up relatively early for ourselves and made Prejean’s for breakfast this morning. The vast hall of the restaurant was empty save for a small number of tables near the stuffed alligator on display near the front door. The idea was to split one dish, the Napoleon. It is a sweet potato cake and lump crab cake topped by a poached egg, shrimp, Hollandaise Sauce, smoked Tasso and dusted with cayenne pepper. I got some oat meal too, but we giggled as we ate this gourmet breakfast that Janet labeled as the best she had ever eaten and we waved at the web cam at all you poor folks at home who are unable to enjoy meals like these.

tee wally on the menu

Like slowing down on the highway to watch with morbid fascination a car accident, we stood as silent as the grave on the platform at bird city to witness a deadly confrontation. While snowy egrets, once endangered, squawked through a showy mating spectacle on the platforms far behind us, we watched as Tee Wally was being sized up for his own personal extinction by a huge biggun' gator. Perhaps the big fellow was just protecting his morsels of bread still waiting for his frightening array of teeth, or perhaps Tee Wally (Tee is the French/Cajun word for petit or junior) was a welcome addition of protein, but whatever the reason, Tee Wally was in danger.

It was very obvious. The big fellow, estimated to be around 7 feet long, had stopped being interested in floating near the platform set up by the McIlhenny Family of Tabasco hot sauce fame at Avery Island’s Bird City and took notice of the nearly imperceptible movements of an algae covered piece of wood that crept nearer to us. Janet and I after all, while safely ensconced behind the railings of the platform, were foolishly tossing bread into the water and felt our hair bristle with fear each time the big guy moved to snap up our offerings. Near the edge of the water was one crumb and he fully displayed his unnerving length in retrieving it before slipping back into the water to become another innocuous bump on a log bedecked with algae, albeit one who’s nostrils flared and who’s sinister looking eyes seemed unaware of anything.

But then Tee Wally invaded the big fellow’s realm and slowly, slowly, slowly the monstrous alligator moved. First he rinsed off the algae covering him by dipping into the water and then nosed his way toward Tee Wally (our pet name for the critter). The little guy had now completely stopped, his entire puny length outlined by the green growth of the lagoon. Tee Wally seemed to know the gig was up and he began to move one of his hind legs in the opposite direction of the behemoth just before all hell broke loose. In a flash and a cascade of water the huge alligator moved twice its length in a frightening display of speed and malevolence, but Tee thankfully was gone. With his little corner of the lagoon now freed of any distractions the beast settled once again beneath our little perch on the platform, perhaps praying that we’d be adventurous enough to want to get a bit closer.

Lured by the scents of Tabasco sauce wafting through the air we fearfully ventured down route 90 to Avery Island for a great excursion. It was our second day in the Lafayette area and we witnessed no less than 2 car accidents on the overburdened main route on the way down and resolved to avoid it on our return. After the Tabasco tour where we watched them bottle Tabasco for the Japanese market we settled in at the tasting bar in the country store. It wasn’t until security was called in and removed me and the straw that I employed to taste EVERYTHING that we ventured into the Jungle Island and Bird City part of The McIlhenny homestead. While others raced through the 200+ acreage of the cultivated property, home to several types of bamboo, an 800 year old Buddha, azaleas that sadly had turned green months ago, obviously frisky snowy egrets and, of course, gators. It was our first up close exposure to these critters and we soon discovered they liked day old LeJeune Bakery French bread.

More later...thanks for reading!
-greg

the rule of red and green gold

Every plant pointed out by Captain Tony had either a medicinal purpose, was edible or could be used in the capture of something edible, or was poisonous. One item was a knob on the side of some tree used by the Indians for alleviating toothaches. Another was a leaf, when crushed and rubbed against the skin, repelled mosquitoes. He pointed out a tiny vine that was used as a string and when fastened with some sort of leaf and some thorns it would be used to lure shrimp and fish for a meal, “if ya’ll stuck out here.” He pointed out bay leaves and the “knees” of bald cypress. He told the history of the logging industry in the swamps and how it took men earning 6 cents an hour over an hour to cut down the monstrous giants that he called “green gold.”

Captain Tony pointed out places on natural levees that he had camped over the years and proudly said he had every one of his children camping at this one idyllic spot beneath a “grow-back” cypress festooned with flowing Spanish Moss. Grow-back’s are bald cypress that the logging industry in the area either left behind because they were too small at the time or have begun to grow in the 80 years since the logging company took their massive profits and moved away.

Captain Tony is a “100% coon ass” or Cajun who has lived along the Bayou Black all his years and his Atchafalaya Basin Backwater Adventure Tour in Gibson, Louisiana was speckled with antidotes of his life on these waters. He warned us against bumping our heads on a wasp’s nest that hung from a tree just over the water and told us how one night while gigging frogs with a buddy he did whack one and they came after him. He said he was just wearing coveralls and no shirt, “on accounta the heat,” and the wasps got in under the bib of his coverall and in his panic slapped at them with a frog he had caught. He spoke about his son who had gone out one night to catch frogs himself and came home with a 3 foot alligator in a sack. He pointed out the Rule of Red for plants and said anything with this color was poisonous … with exceptions. He warned us not to touch bulrushes with their razor sharp leaves he offered us a taste of edible hyacinths, their delicate lemony taste and soft purple and yellow hues belying their ability to choke off the waterways if left unchecked. He pointed out the alligator off in the distance that was as afraid of us as we were of them, but he did not offer to feed them…as other tours do. Nor did he try to sing! Thankfully. No, Captain Tony was real and knowledgeable. This was not a “show” but a learning experience. Part of his excursion was through the Tiger Bayou which was pristine and primordial and labeled the most beautiful in Louisiana by the National Geographic. As we slipped through the water on our 3 hour tour… we were very much alone and we were in very good hands if the tiny ship was lost. Captain Tony had everything covered.

You can reach him at 985-575-2371.

Smelling of laurel and hyacinths Janet and I said good-bye to the Captain and then meandered our way along the coast. After a wonderful diversion down LA317 that ended at a windswept camping area right on the edge of the Gulf, and stopping at a riverboat casino to lose big; $3.00 in penny slots; we took the scenic byway LA182 that meandered through towns like Morgan City and Franklin (where the first Tarzan film was shot) and Jeanerette before ending our day’s journey in Lafayette. We did not eat that evening; instead we had filled up on a loaf of doughy and sweet bread at LeJeune’s Bakery in Jeanerette (www.lejeunesbakery.com). After we unpacked we drove a short distance to Breaux Bridge to listen to “French Music” at Mulate’s. The Cajun restaurant was decorated floor to ceiling with business cards and had winded old men draped over banisters because their wives wouldn’t stop dancing!

Thanks for reading…
-greg

a little slice of heaven

When I first started uttering that line, “A little slice of heaven,” to describe our new digs in Grand Isle, Louisiana, it was a sarcastic quip. Janet would laugh sharply and we’d giggle at the spartan accommodations at Ricky’s Motel and RV camp at 1899 Route 1 on Grand Isle, Louisiana. The entire place is set up on stilts and cars are parked beneath the rooms. There is a large open area set just off the highway and the rooms are arranged in a horseshoe shape. The Gulf of Mexico lies out of sight, across the highway and beyond sand dunes.

The main “sit-down” area is the RV camp and fishing pier that pushes out into Caminada Bay behind Ricky's establishment. Here, people gather in a communal boiling hut to make expansive meals of fish and shrimp and crawfish and chicken wings and trade stories about the fishing they’d done that day as little kids toss nets off the pier and repeatedly spit in the water, perhaps mimicking their dad’s (or mom’s) ploy for bringing good luck to the cast.

Further on down the pier is a cutting hut where people gather as fisherman fillet their fish and boast of the weight of their catch. Yesterday a man presided over a King Mackerel that he had caught earlier that day. It evidently was the largest landed that season in two states! And, he would happily repeat to anyone who asked the weight of his monstrous fish that now sagged over the sides of his wheelbarrel. (39.93 lbs...)

At the end of this hotbed of activity one can sit in halved blue barrels where even more fishermen idly cast into the water even as an incredible sunset bathes the sky. Last night as Janet and I settled in on these chairs to watch heat lightning from a thunderstorm far away north in the direction of the town of Golden Meadow, I felt like we did not belong here. We were after all occupying chairs meant for a fisherperson or crabber. We don’t fish. We don’t “birdwatch.” So why were we coming down here to Grand Isle, if not for either of these activities? We were asked that very question by the weathered men wearing baseball caps in Ricky’s main office. They eyed us suspiciously as we got our room key, their faces as lined as the aerial photograph of Grand Isle and the surrounding bayou country they had taped to the top of the office’s front desk. Crisscrossed by canals cut by the oil companies for their pipelines, the waterways looked like roads and the men looked as if they’d seen it all, but they had yet to see the likes of Janet and me. We’d come a long, long way to get to Grand Isle and we didn’t much do what the rest of the people do here. We were definitely not locals, our accents gave us away and given our lack of interest in things-that-are-important-in-Grand-Isle we just didn’t feel like we belonged here.

Perhaps this trip to Grand Isle, this little slice of heaven, was a big mistake.

But, after a day of quiet exploration we have a love of this beautiful island. If not for the fishing we would not have had conversations with some of the people here who were as curious of us as we were of how to gingerly handle Hardhead Catfish. New Jersey is a quite a very long way from here and every time I said that I’ve traveled here from my home it is met with astonishment… and awe.

If not for the fishing Janet and I would not been so lucky to see the fishing rodeo that was being held at a nearby pier (and scored some great Jambalaya and free beer) as the men in their team shirts stood around and listened with great pride over the prizes awarded for entry’s like Bull Redfish and Speckled Trout.

If not for the plentiful food the area readily gives up, Janet and I would not have had a meal of boiled crabs featuring the meatiest Blue Claws I have ever struggled with. At one point, as we got elbows deep in our meal of crabs and gumbo the man himself, Ricky, ambled over and remarked favorably on our meal. He asked if we had caught them ourselves and then named the place when we shyly said we didn’t have the tools to pluck these critters from the water. As we sat there in the boiling hut at one of the picnic tables, other families came in with their own pots and started boiling or frying their own meals. Soon every table was filled and we finally felt like we belonged at Ricky’s Motel and RV camp.

After a stroll on the beach we headed back to the pier once again and sat amongst the fishermen and their reels, though we were only armed with cigars and cigs. Soon we were enchanted by the tale of one fellow who worked on an offshore oil rig. We listened to the rigors of his job of working "on top of a bomb" and the loss of his French culture. He only spoke a word or two, his father, a police officer on the waterways a bit more, and his grandfather just a few words of English. We watched as he caught Hardhead Catfish and gingerly unhooked them so he wouldn’t get “stuck.” At one point a stranger walking by asked him what he was catching. “Hardhead," he drawled. “They’ll stick ya,” said the stranger.

Today we made for the beach at Oak Lane. There are public access points all along Route 1, but the woman at the welcome center said she liked this one the best because of the “nice walkway” over the dunes. So we went and plopped ourselves down in the fine brown sand and watched as a man walked in the water waist deep, his hand trailing along a string set up between two sticks in the water a dozen feet off shore. As he came to a knot in the string he slowly lifted it, placed a net beneath what was bait and caught a crab. He did this a number of times along the length of string before he reached the other stick, snaring half dozen crabs in the process. Janet and I applauded him when he turned for shore. He smiled at us.

Yeah, Grand Isle was a great place to visit.

This is my first post in a few days. Turns out Ricky's Motel and RV Camp had a wireless connection, but our computer is too old for their system and despite the repeated attempts by the man who set up the wireless we were unable to get on the internet. We are now in Houma, Louisiana after driving around quite a bit. We left Grand Isle this morning and drove north through what is left of Leeville, then Gold Meadow, Galliano, Cut Off and Larose before heading west and then south again to have a drink at the Co Co Marina in Cocodrie. We turned north again... for there was no more land south of Cocodrie.... and skirted Bayou Grand Calliou and passed through some remarklable salt marshes. The land is literally sinking into the ocean here. It's a combination of levees on the Mississippi preventing it's flooding and thereby supplying the area with new sendiment, and erosion caused by oil companies cutting canals for the pipelines through the grasses and allowing salt water into this delicate ecosystem. As we drove north along LA57 the skeletal remains of oak trees reached up out of the water, killed by the salt water. Even one of the fellows at Ricky's remarked that the land had changed drastically in just the fifteen years he had been coming to Grand Isle. There is a large bridge being built in Leeville. I guess they are preparing for when the land there, barely just two lanes of blacktop now, will finally disappear into the water.

thanks for reading...

-greg

bubbles

Between songs the cacophony of Bourbon Street invaded the serenity of dixieland jazz at the little club on the corner of Toulouse Street. The clean notes would fade, a smattering of clapping would announce the small crowd's pleasure at hearing these incredibly accomplished musicians fill the air with understated frivolity and playful notes, the faces of the artists impossibly stoic compared with the complexity of their craft, and then the muddied, overmodulated noise of the rest of Bourbon Street would press in like an unwanted neighbor coming to look in your refrigerator for a cold one.

As we sat in the Maison Bourbon Jazz Club we were made painfully aware of the difference between the raging torrent outside on the street and the serene eddy that slowly swirled here each time the band paused or ended a set. Across the street we could see people contorting in a Hip Hop Bar, behind us across Bourbon a steady raucous off beat noise from a karaoke bar threatened to melt the brass instruments in our club and force the drummer to open his eyes as he sat at his small drum kit. Unflinching in their craft though, the band murmured through their announcements of songs and played on in their quiet, smooth way.

On Bourbon there are many such bubbles or eddies to hide from the noise and enjoy a respite that soothes the senses rather than assault them. Step into the Inn on Bourbon, our hotel, and suddenly the prattle of Bourbon disappears. Our room overlooks the serene pool area, thankfully, though people pay twice the amount for a room on the street.

It is better to throw beads into the crowd that way...

Galatoire's is the same. It is next to a stripper's outfitters where a girl can get that much needed outfit after the last one was stolen by that creepy guy in the corner. But, step into the stately environs of this older restaurant on Bourbon is like entering an antebellum plantation. It is quiet and inviting and charming. Upon entering one is asked who their favorite waiter is, provided a suit jacket if one was not packed (ahem...) and caressed and eased through a wonderful experience that is much more than a meal, but an event. It is hard to believe Janet could easily purchase a foot long set of stilletto heels just next door. No, Galatoire's, with it's extensive menu and wine list and impeccable service.... ask for Rushell to be your waitress ... is perhaps the finest dining experience on Bourbon.

Try the Lamb Chops with Bernaise sauce....
Be kind to your waiters....
Drive safely... we're off to Grand Isle today....

love,
-greg

serendipity and chance

I love to write, for all the obvious reasons. With writing I can be very creative and the process of writing leaves with a sense of accomplishment. But, here in the Big Easy my writing is a helpful way of keeping me sober! I'm here in my room on Bourbon Street writing this blog and that means I am not out there imbibing and carousing. It means I'm not eating something. It means I'm not dodging the hawkers of bars, or girls on Bourbon flashing their wares from such fine establishments as Little Darlings (of which I have three free passes) or Hustlers Barely Legal. It means I am in my quiet room taking a deep breath and relaxing before heading out again into that vibrating, throbbing, electric city.
Thankfully during the day Boubon Street is fairly calm. Sure the strip joints are all open, but the bars have yet to spring to full frenetic pace. The street won't be blocked off and there won't be two or three policemen at every intersection or pairs of Public Safety Officers in their white shirt uniforms plying the streets. After I write today's entry I'll be able to walk out there and marvel at the beauty of the French Quarter without having to weave my way around a drunkard, or a pack of drunkards, who are all wonderfully inebriated, but smiling and in great happiness. In fact the entire day from the beginning to the end I had experienced nothing but happy, smiling people. Even the woman/girl who handed Janet the free passes to Little Darlings late last night was aglow with thanks and brimming with smiles! Perhaps serendipity and chance, which should be the modus operandi for any travel excursion, will lead us through another day of charming discovery.
It always does.

It took us a long time to get our rental car. We arrived at the airport around 10 a.m. and questions about New Jersey weather led to a lengthy, joke-filled conversation between Janet and the women behind the counter about traveling to Spain and France. But that is what serendipity and chance are all about; allowing the day to unfold and not commandeer it in any direction. Despite the early hour of departure we were happy as oysters.
Speaking of oysters, that was our first "taste" of New Orleans. After we drove along St. Charles and through Uptown and the Garden District to marvel at the homes and their expansive and well maintained gardens, we dropped off our bags and headed to the Acme Oyster Bar. We waved at the Oyster cam (which is a web cam for the joint) and informed the shuckers that they will go straight to heaven no matter what else they do in this life and then sat down at the bar with a half dozen of raw and a half dozen of chargrilled oysters! Janet took pictures of our meal. We giggled through our fortunate lunch and then headed out into the French Quarter.
We stopped in several boutique hotels to gape at their opulance and to take advantage of their air conditioning. We walked along the Mississippi and ogled the paddleboat waiting for passengers. We stepped into a free concert at the New Orleans Jazz National Historical Park (www.nps.gov/jazz). We didn't know about it until a chance turn led us to a quartet of four young people (they are all young when compared to me) playing great music. I kept sneaking looks at Janet throughout the hour long show and she looked so happy.
The music didn't end there though. People were playing music on the streets, two or three member ensembles curbside, or bands in restaurants along Decater Street.
We had coffee and beignets at Cafe Du Monde, gleefully wiping powdered sugar off our faces for hours, a telltale sign of one's temptation.
Later that evening we took the rattling, open-air St. Charles trolley to Oak Street to eat at Jacques-Imo's. I told Jack that because he closed his place down in New York I had to take Janet here to eat. After posing for pictures with us and our meals (Janet had blackened redfish and I had sesame-crusted tuna), Jack thanked us for support of New Orleans. He said that he'd rather be here in New Orleans than New York and we could not argue with him. We had drinks afterwards at the wonderful dive, the Maple Leaf Tavern, two doors from Jacques-Imo's and watched as Jack came in to have a drink and share some laughs with familiar faces at the bar. Next time I go to his place I will seriously consider taking my meal in the back of the truck that's parked out front.

Now, I am not a big drinker. I am a "cheap date". We took the trolley back to Canal and entered a Bourbon Street that seemed to breathe and tremble and vibrate. Music blasted from every bar and people danced in the streets, not a frown in sight. This mind you was a Tuesday night. Perhaps everyone we saw on Bourbon were tourists, but even the people working the bars were smiles and pleasant and happy. The woman who poured us expansive (and expensive) beers talked to us at length about our pending trip after New Orleans offered us advice about destinations.
We weaved down Bourbon, my cigar trailing smoke and our hearts swelling with happiness at our day. But, by the time I helped a girl tie a necktie around her neck, and we admonished playfully the male of a couple that did not notice his girlfriend had powdered sugar on the nose and cheek, I was rightfully drunk... I eyed curiously the Old Absinthe House, but quickly figured out that I would not survive that recently legalized liquor and allowed Janet to deposit me into bed as dreams of where to eat today swirled in my dreams.

okay... perhaps the day can now begin.

cheers (literally)
-greg

windblown

Despite the frivolity of this impending excursion there will be the constant reminder of the catastrophic effects of Hurricane Katrina while we're there. Recently the New York Times ran an article about the homeless who are living beneath a highway on the way into the city. Guidebooks constantly warn of being aware of your surroundings while walking in New Orleans as well as remarking that certain places in Louisiana have yet to recover from the storm. Also, yesterday I picked up a book at the local store ... "Bayou Farewell" by Mike Tidwell, 2003 Pantheon. The subtitle of the book reads... "The rich life and tragic death of Louisiana's cajun coast," and it introduces us to the people of the area and talks about how land is sinking into the Gulf of Mexico because of human hands.



Sobering indeed.

le bon temps roule

Turtles and Turduckens

Critters indeed!
It must have been a brave man to be the first to eat a Crawfish... or for that matter a shrimp...
or to pluck a succulent, meaty leg from a frog...
or to fend off vicious attacks by the snapping claws of a crab to get at it's tender meat...
or to figure out how to make alligator sausage without offending the beast...
or to make boudin or andouille without waking up the pig...
or catfish...can't forget catfish...how they "grabble" for them (catch them by hand) is beyond me... but I certainly like them grilled and perhaps smothered with a crawfish etoufee...
oysters too! How the hell did they figure out they could put them on a grill and chargrill them? I have a hard enough time trying to shuck them myself!

And what kind of beast is a Turducken?
How did they get all those critters to mate to begat this new life form that is evidently part turkey, duck and chicken, stuffed with sausage...

Turtle soup? Why not?

I'm sure I've missed a critter or two in my listing here and I don't pretend to know everything about cajun foods; I am definitely not a professional here. But I do know you don't go to Louisiana and order hamburgers and hot dogs.... If you have any advice or guidance or have an antidote to share please feel free to drop me a line...

Hope you all are enjoying your holiday weekend... Be careful out there and check in again...
-greg

where have you been eating?

The first time I visited New Orleans it was with Frank Sinatra. I was in the city for less than a day while we did a show at the Superdome and afterwards I had to fly out for another gig in Washington D.C. late that evening. Still, I managed to run over to the Acme Oyster Bar in the French Quarter for a dozen and a po boy. Since that quick visit I've been to New Orleans another five times for work and play, including a pass through in the middle of the night when I was driving back home from Texas where I was researching my second book. I stopped at Cafe Du Monde for a much needed coffee and a cache of beignets.

A familiar question asked by the people of New Orleans is, "where have you been eating?" No matter the repeated ledger, it's met with an approving nod. New Orleans brims with restaurants and all are worth a visit. Armed with our Zagat guide, Janet and I already have a good idea how our 3 day eating soiree will go, but we're open to suggestions.

For the past four years I've gone to Michael Arnone's crawfish festival in Augusta, NJ. It is usually held the end of May. There's enough crawfish boil there, don't worry. If you're not able to make a trip like the one Janet and I are going to make, you should look into this yearly event.

There used to be a place in Chelsea called Cajuns. It is gone now, but that place was a lot of fun. A live dixieland jazz band played for entertainment.
Twenty years ago when I traveled to Hilo, Hawaii there was a restaurant in the hills called Roussel's and it was started by the original chef from that New York City restaurant. It was quite a find.

Just outside of Houston, in Seabrook, right past the Johnson Space Center is Sonny's Crazy Cajun Food Factory. Over the years as work has taken me to Houston, I've made my way to Sonny's and each time there I do hurt myself. But, it's more than the Frog Legs and Gumbo, it's Sonny's own cache of moonshine... ask nicely he'll give you a taste.

That's it for now... I'm hungry!
-greg

Cajun Country Travels

Emboldened by a love for tasty critters not readily found in the Super Markets of New Jersey and a complete and utter refusal to give in to the soaring price of gasoline, my friend Janet and I are going on a road trip into the bayous of Louisiana. Fresh off our yearly excursion to the Crawfish Festival in Augusta, New Jersey, our bellies filled with Crawfish boil, Alligator Sausage, Gumbo and Etoufee, our ears still ringing from the Zydeco music in the dance hall, we decided to fly down to New Orleans. After we explore that city for three days and eat in as many places as humanly possible, our intent is to rent a car and drive in whatever direction possesses us. We have only one planned stop after the Crescent City and that is Grand Isle, Lousiana. It is a barrier island in the Gulf of Mexico and was once used by the pirate Jean Lafitte as a base. Afterwards, we're not quite sure what direction we will go, but we'll have another week of driving ahead of us. Chances are we'll head to Lafayette to a particular restaurant there. We met the Chef of Prejeans at the Crawfish Festival and were told to visit. Another place on the wish list is New Iberia and the Tabasco Plant. There's also a Creole Nature Trail that skirts the Gulf and explores the bayous. Janet has also mentioned a swamp tour and a visit to a plantation. I'm considering wrestling an alligator.
In any event the fun begins next week.... Check in from time to time and follow our progress.
-greg