Louisiana in a Few Days

While Tony and I didn't see any damage sustained from Katrina (that we knew of) in New Orleans, we did see plenty of crappy little towns all throughout Louisiana that could have been damaged from that famous hurricane, or a more recent one, or the general ebbs and flows of the Mighty Mississippi or any one of its tributaries that flow through just about every single speck of habitation down there.

So many boarded up places, places that look like they should be boarded up but aren't, old worn down homes that look condemned but have little kids playing in the yard, and almost all are stilted up on piles of bricks a foot high. Under each corner, and also under each of the load-bearing beams, most houses have been built on piers of bricks. This is one way that the folks living there can stave off the ravages of flood.

It didn't look like enough to me, but I'm not part of a generational string of denizens with plenty knowledge of how the river(s) behave, about how the basically endless swamp flows to-and-fro, from Florida's panhandle to Houston, blocked by the Ozarks to the north and the Gulf to the south.

Beaches? With lots of coast line one might expect beaches, but not really in Louisiana. There, pavement gives way to swamp, and swamp eventually gives way to the Gulf. Where the Gulf begins and the "land" ends is generally up for debate. It seems to peter out, and I guess once you get to a low frequency of loamy swamp "islands", you could probably say that the Gulf has "begun."

Here's a picture of one of those "islands."

This picture was taken on the way to Port Fourchon (pronounced "foo-shaw(n)" with the 'n' almost silent), which, if you'd like to spend a few minutes playing with Google Maps, look it up and see how desolate and isolated it is. That'll give you a good idea how the "coastline" works.

Try the catfish and crawfish. Boudin I hear is great. The food is pretty good. Tony's meat store has crazy great deals.

One thing I never really heard was that gambling is perfectly legal all over Louisiana...if not, then nobody seems to do anything about it. Every single truck-stop also had a casino attached, and in most of the cities we drove through were loaded with casinos.

Have you ever heard of anyplace in Louisiana known as a gambler's paradise? I mean, New Orleans is a tourists destination, but isn't known for the same things that Las Vegas or Atlantic City is known. I was surprised to say the least. Gambling and casinos were everywhere. Maybe it's a sign of the run-down socio-economic spectrum...lots of casinos, dollar stores, fast-food, and check-advance loan proprietors.