Louisiana Part 2

After leaving New Orleans we headed further south into Louisiana and followed the coast for a bit.  I found this part of the country really fascinating....calm waters,

 lovely holiday homes,

trailer homes on stilts,

 and prawn trawlers parked up in little waterways next to homes...

We stayed the night in a little town with the plan being to visit some plantation homes and hopefully getting on a fan boat tour of the swamps.  The first plantation home we pulled into was under construction, so we decided to leave on the "roundabout" road we thought we were supposed to be on.  We stopped to take some photos of some old buildings...

when a car came towards us, with headlights flashing...we waved and called out to come on through but she wound her window down and gave us a blast...said we were on private property and would have to pay for any photos we took!! So not sure what the above 2 photos would be worth! We thought we were on the land of the plantation which is open to the public, but apparently not!
Next stop was Oak Alley Plantation and Antebellum Mansion in Vacherie, Louisiana, on the Mississippi River, which was recommended to us by Robert in Alabama..wow, wow and wow!! It was built around 1837-39.  The oak trees were planted about 300 years ago and were absolutely magnificent. It was steamy, steamy hot and they offered some welcome relief.

We visited a reconstruction of the slaves quarters, which was very sobering

the whole place gave me mixed emotions.....

After a few hours wandering through the grounds

we made our way to Atchafalaya Basin Landing and Marina in Henderson, Louisiana where we had booked an airboat/fanboat tour of the swamplands. It was hot and steamy weather and as soon as I saw the boat I knew if was going to be good...

Our guide was a guy called Tucker, who had a great Louisianan drawl.... he asked us where we were from and were we familiar with Crocodile Dundee and the famous line from the movie...'that's not a knife". After we had been riding for a few minutes he stopped and said to us..."that's not a knife...This is a knife" and pulled out a HUGE knife from his pants....which he said was a Louisianan pocket knife! A great character!

The boat ride was bloody fantastic! We loved the scenery....it was another world and all you imagined it would be.
This is a duck hunting hut, which had a kitchen at the end.  Tucker would drive his boat into it and park up and then they would blow their duck whistles and wait for the ducks.  Truly another world for us, as we had watched Duck Dynasty and thought it wasn't real!  It is!! I asked him if they camped in the hut and he said the mozzies were too unbearable...so no.

 The cypress trees were my favourite..

and driving up between the two parallel bridges of the I 10 was amazing as we had been driving on it earlier and it was so chaotically busy...a 40 km bridge!!...so when we were underneath it, it was peaceful, serene...such a contrast!

 Fortunately Tucker got to sit next to Stuart, so Stu was able to offer advice on how to drive the boat....I think Tucker really appreciated it!!!

It was a fantastic afternoon..2 hrs in the boat....$38 each...money well spent!

Here is a link to a video of the boat tour...LOUISIANAN SWAMP TOUR...it was loud, fast, quiet, slow, scenic, relaxing, exhilarating....the best...and we were on a high leaving there on our way to Texas!!!