After a good night's sleep it is time for the real journey to begin. We pile into the Dodge in the hotel parking lot. Photo by Glenn.
We are parked along the shoulder of FM1960 somewhere in eastern Texas while we take the barn picture at the top of this page. It is a mildly humid Saturday morning and the fields and forest are alive with crickets and cicadas. There is a pungent odor like damp hay in the air. We're loving it. Photo by Glenn.
We stop at a rest area along I-10 just outside Louisiana. Roni has thoughtfully packed a large can of Off that comes in handy as we begin to encounter mosquitoes. This is bayou country, after all. Photo by Glenn.
Just having some fun with the camera. Ben and Dad are reflected in the window of the Dodge at the rest area. Photo by Glenn.
It is an ancient custom in Louisiana to remove one's shoes before entering the state... Seriously, we have no idea why Roni has her shoes off while we are in the rest area. Photo by Glenn.
The shave is looking a bit better after a day. You can now see the second chin. Photo by Glenn.
It's official, we're in Louisiana now. Photo by Roni.
In Lake Charles you find this sign which either welcomes you to Westlake or beckons you to return, depending on which way you are traveling. We were looking for a way down to the river and its riverboat casinos (which we never did find) and only found Westlake by accident. There was little reason to go there again. Photo by Roni.
The backroads between Lake Charles and Baton Rouge take travelers through some excellent wildlife areas. This field was full of egrets and herons. There are six in this shot alone. Photo by Roni.
Louisiana just might be the sugar cane capital of the world. The farther south we drove on Highway 90 the more fields we found. The harvest is still a couple of weeks away. Photo by Roni.
Back on I-10 and heading into Baton Rouge, we drive on a long causeway that takes us across Henderson Swamp. This is supposed to be one of the largest swamps in the United States. Dig those trees in the middle of the water. Photo by Roni.
Another look at Henderson Swamp. We wanted to go back and check out this area but never did. Photo by Roni.
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Calling Baton Rouge
Saturday, September 18 (Day 2) — Today felt like the real beginning to our vacation. Yesterday was the start, technically, but when you spend the whole day getting yourself to the airport, finding your bags, finding your rental car, finding your hotel, sitting on a plane for three-plus hours, it doesn't feel like much of a vacation. This day would be devoted to sightseeing, and lots of it.
We got what for us is a fairly early start, waking after 8 a.m. and taking care of showers, etc., by just after 9. Unfortunately, that was just slightly later than the end of the continental breakfast at our Econo Lodge. They still had some muffins and juice out on the counter, so we were able to grab something to eat and take it back to the room. We finished our meal and tossed our luggage in the car, eager to begin our journey east. Another shortcoming of the Dodge, I have discovered, is that it comes with a CD player rather than a cassette deck. That means I can't play the MP3 disks I slaved over for several days, carefully orchestrating the selections to coincide with the various stages of our journey. That left us with the car's radio, which dutifully captured every FM country music station in southeast Texas. And Texas being the epitome of country, there were a lot of country stations to choose from, but little else. Not that listening to Alan Jackson or Toby Keith while making our way through the backroads from Houston was out of place. I'm just bummed that my effort apparently was for naught.
We set off from Humble on FM1960, which in these parts means "Farm Road." There are hundreds of farm roads, some more major than others. Some on the map and many not. At least not on our map. The pizza guy last night had told me that taking this route to I-10 would save 90 minutes on our trip, but I have my doubts. What I will say is that this route allowed us to see a lot of the "real" Texas you'd never see from the interstate. We passed through the small towns of Dayton and Liberty with their collections of ranchettes and roadside businesses. Most I can't remember now and probably would have no interest in unless I lived there. We saw at least a dozen Sonic hamburger stands, which was about the only chain anything we saw until we hit Beaumont. It is a different world in this part of the country. We found it strangely refreshing.
Much more refreshing than the weather, which was an oppressive 97 degrees before noon. We have the luxury of air conditioning in the Dodge, so for most of the drive we kept the windows up and the heat out. But I feel that you miss part of the experience this way. You can't truly visit a place without sampling its weather, and here we were, Californians 1,600 miles away from home, traveling in our little air-cooled cocoon, putting up walls of glass and red metal against the very thing we had come to see. So when we passed this funky ivy-covered barn somewhere outside of Liberty, it was my pleasure to turn the car around and check it out for some photos. We pulled off to the shoulder that was lined with thick woods on one side, across the street from the barn. When we got out of the car, Texas reached out and grabbed us. There was the heat, the unmistakable scent of damp straw, the tall grasses specked with blue and pink flowers, and the incessant buzz of field insects. There were crickets, for sure. Perhaps a few cicadas mixed in. It was impossible to pick out individual sounds because they all blended together in one prolonged hum, like the chatter of birds atop a tree. I wanted that moment to last all day. It was like an appetizer, a taste of the "real South" we had come for.
We continued on FM1960 to where it became Highway 90, then followed that road into Beaumont. There are 113,000 people living in Beaumont, which puts it slightly larger than Antioch back home. But this city felt much larger, perhaps because its business district is more substantial. Soon we found Interstate 10, on which we stayed until we had crossed the Louisiana state line. The interstate is as tediously boring as it is quicker to drive. The drivers we had shared the road with in Texas were mostly courteous and rarely in a hurry to pass you on the two-lane, but on I-10 suddenly everyone wanted to run over me, and most of those cars seemed to have Louisiana plates. It didn't help that there was roadwork happening on the road for many miles, so the two lanes we had were narrow.
Our last Texas stop was at a rest area near the border, near the town of Orange. Orange's slogan as you head east is "Your last taste of Texas." I suppose "last" became "first" if you were heading west. We joked that it was our last taste of Texas for today, for we will be back in the state a week from now on the journey home. We also noted that this part of Texas resembled the bayou country more than the Texas of cowboys-and-indians fame. The trees and water definitely had a distinct Louisiana flavor. When we crossed the state line at the bridge over the Sabine River, my first thought was that I could finally say I had been to Louisiana. That makes two new states in as many days for me, and I haven't been this excited traveling since I was a kid Ben's age.
We got off I-10 at Lake Charles, which I had thought was supposed to be some stunningly beautiful Cajun city. Far from it. It sits on a lake all right, but it is heavily industrial, and the only attraction is its riverboat casinos that sit behind a couple of Vegas-like gambling palaces. We had thought to buy lunch here, but instead wound up hooking up with state route 14 in hopes of running across authentic Cajun food somewhere along the drive. Highway 14 took us through very rural farm communities that reminded us of our own Delta back home. Traffic was light, so I was able to poke along below the speed limit in most places. We passed several wildlife areas populated by cranes and egrets. This area must be the sugar cane capital of North America, because you can't drive a quarter mile without seeing another field filled with the tall green stalks.
When we still hadn't found a restaurant -- at least an open one -- by 1:30, we stopped in at a grocery store in Port Arthur to grab snacks just to tide us over. We settled on bananas and soft drinks. From the clerks and store manager to the patrons who came in, you could tell this place was a lot different than what we are used to back in California. The clerks are exceedingly polite, calling you ma'am or sir. It's not the phony politeness you get on the West Coast, but a genuine attitude that one achieves only through being brought up in an environment where those attitudes are instilled from birth. As we left, the woman who checked our purchases said, "Ya'll come back and see us again." From their accents to their mannerisms, everything about these people suggests a more relaxed pace. We clearly stick out here, if not as Californians then at least as impatient city folk.
By the time we reached Abbeville around 3 p.m., it was well past lunch time, even by Pacific Time standards. We caved in to the need to eat and bought meals at the Burger King, something I swore I didn't want to do the entire trip. We've been on the road two days and so far the score in Burger King 2, Pizza Hut 1. Still waiting to put a tally next to "authentic quisine." Did I say it's a different world down here? They may be more rural than we're used to, but not so rural as to escape the crush of corporate America. Fast food places have made inroads, which is usually the precursor to other commercial development. Someday these towns too will be homogenized like the rest of the country. I'm glad we're getting to see them now.
I was disappointed about my MP3 disks not working because I really wanted to listen to Cajun music on the drive. Fortunately, Roni found a public radio station that was covering an Acadian music festival out of Lafayette this afternoon, so we got to hear live Cajun music a good portion of the drive, until Roni got sick of it and we finally put the radio back on the country station. You can't drive through Louisiana without listening to Cajun music at least part of the way. It really frames the experience.
From route 14 we needed to get back on Highway 90 to return us to Lafayette and I-10 for the last leg of our drive into Baton Rouge. Naturally, I got turned around and wound up heading east when I should have gone west. This put us all the way down at a town called Baldwin, which left us about 30 minutes from everywhere we might have wanted to be. The place was dominated by a casino and had little else to offer. I tried to take the "shortcut" back to I-10, which only got us lost more. Because the gas-guzzling Dodge was nearing empty, I didn't want to chance running out of fuel in the middle of nowhere, so I took Roni's advice to retrace our steps and return to Lafayette on Highway 90. Once in Lafayette, I bought gas for $1.80 a gallon at a Shell station.
All of the getting lost cost us a couple hours on our trip, more than making up for anything we had gained on the Texas end of the drive. We shuffled along I-10 as the sun descended, trying to make it to Baton Rouge before dark. Along the way the scenery grew decidedly more swampy. I-10 became long causeways across swamp-filled forest land. When you looked down you could see the moss-covered banks supporting the bridge pilings. I wondered how many alligators we might have driven over and not even known it. I tried to focus on the banks in hopes of seeing one, but as the driver I had more important things to keep focused on. We traversed a number of bayous before we came upon someplace called Henderson Swamp that just blew my mind. This thing was like a giant lake with trees growing right out of the water. They weren't normal looking trees, but rather ones with conical-shaped trunks that ended in tufts of leaves and branches. Many of the tree tops had broken off, leaving the lake scattered with the cone-like trunks sticking out of the water. It was like something out of a sci-fi novel. I wondered if there is a way to get back to that swamp easily and investigate it some more during daylight. Perhaps there are other swamps in the eastern part of the state just as interesting. I can't wait for the swamp tour we have planned for possibly Tuesday.
We found our Hotel -- a Comfort Inn -- relatively painlessly. Baton Rouge isn't huge, but it is the state capital and a college town, so driving in the dark here wasn't exactly fun. After checking into room 424, we ventured out into the night looking for a restaurant. I was famished by now, having had only a muffin and juice for breakfast, some trail mix, a banana and a Whopper Jr. to tide me over for the "real" meal I hoped to find tonight. We wandered for over an hour looking for the right restaurant, never finding one to suit everyone's taste. Eventually we wound up at a Lebanese cafe where we had a very nice dinner of gyros with hummus sauce and wild rice. How strange to come all the way to Louisiana, the heart of Cajun country, to eat Lebanese food served by waiters who ask if "y'all have everything you need?" I'm not complaining; the food was excellent and didn't leave me with that greasy food hangover I get on these fast food-filled adventures we take.
It is pretty late now -- 1:37 -- and I am tired from 400 miles of driving today. We want to get out to tour plantations tomorrow so I'd better rest now. I may let Roni do some of the driving and rest up a bit.
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