Penetrating Louisiana
We arrived in Louisiana last weekend, but only just. We barely made it 20 miles inside the state before exiting the Interstate and setup camp at the Intracoastal Park. This unscheduled stop came thanks to a meetup with Tricia & Cody of @OurWanderingRythm who refereed us to the place. A few nights of watching the barges be slowly pushed past in a non stop train, testing out a new BBQ, and just plain relaxing ensued.
For a whole $12 a night we had we pretty much had the place to ourselves, other than the mosquitoes that appeared… with leather jackets and brass knuckles I might add. Definitely not as mean as Arizona mosquitoes, but so far Louisiana mosquitoes are pretty mean, and well organized. We tried to have a camp fire, but we were chased back into the Airstream after only a few minutes. We spent then next half hour squashing all the little buggers that made it in the door with us; a few dozen in the few seconds the door was open. Kerri is mosquito-crack. They go after her blood with a frenzy. It is because she is so sweet :-)
On our one full day we had in the area we set out to tackle the Creole Nature Trail – All American Road. When I hear of a “nature trail” I tend to think of the small half-mile, paved, hiking trail nearest the main Visitor’s Center in a National Park. So, when Kerri says, “we are going to do the Creole Nature Trail” I packed pretty light. It didn’t take long for me to realize this trail was different. We would be driving for half the day, all while being educated – thanks to a cool phone app – about the communities, swamp lands, oil rigs, oil pipelines, and many of the birds and critters that live here. We tried to hike out some of the boardwalks and trails but were once again attacked by the biker-mosquitoes. Instead we kept the A/C running and stayed in the truck, taking it all in from behind glass. This also meant that not a whole lot of photography happened along the way.
