FTJ, Entry 66: In Cajun Country

Before I get into our days in Louisiana's Cajun country, I must include these very special photos of an establishment that I have never before frequented: Hooter's. I shall say nothing more except that 1.their food was quite good, and 2. I have never seen either of our fellas quite this happy.

Moving on...

Our next stop after New Orleans was Poché Plantation in Convent, LA, in Cajun country. It it right along the Mississippi River, which is pretty cool, in that the levee is across the road and ships are loading and unloading all day (and night) long. It is, as its name implies, also the site of a plantation established by Felix Pierre Poché, a Civil War diarist, prominent jurist, and one of the founders of the American Bar Association. The house on the grounds is a Victorian Renaissance Revival style plantation house built around 1870.

Our sites at the plantation.

The plantation house.

This entire tree is full of sculpted animals.

View from atop the levee, looking down at the church next to our RV park.

Views from/on the levee.

For dinner, we went to Hymel's (eh-Mel's), a joint where Thursday night is open mic and we were entertained by a jam band of locals. As you can see below, the beers were huge. And we ate crawfish! When in Rome....

Crawfish aplenty. The food was very good, and the people were just wonderful.

The next day we visited the magnificent plantation known as Oak Alley. Here are some photos:

The Oak Alley tradition is to sip mint juleps while you stroll the grounds! Deee-lish.

 These trees were planted here from Virginia about 300 years ago. We thought they were native, but, NOT! This whole trip has been a real education in parts of America we didn't really know anything about. It's great!

I included this because I had never seen a single row soldier sugar cane harvester. It gets its name from
the military-like, single file way the cane "marches" into the harvester.
It replaced the cane knife, and preceded the combine. Yet more education!

It is late so I am quitting -- tomorrow I will try to catch up on this blog. Need to write about our time in Carencro, LA, and today's thrilling visit to New Iberia, the setting of crime novelist James Lee Burke's Dave Robicheaux novels! Burke is one of my favorite writers -- perhaps not quite up there with Steinbeck, Pat Conroy, or Larry McMurtry (a few of my other favorites), but darn close. I was SO excited to see the place he writes of so often.

Till then.

Tanks, Panky