Cajun Country
Louisiana Regions
Stretching across the Gulf of Mexico and up into the south central Louisiana, is the region known as Cajun Country. Here, along the breath-taking bayous, the first French Canadians settled in and forever changed the landscape and culture of our state. Resourceful, stoic and inventive, these were the people who turned soup into gumbo, washboards into musical instruments, and made the swamp a mystical paradise.
In Cajun Country you'll discover crawfish étouffée, dance to Zydeco music and learn a whole lot of new and interesting words. In Lafayette, you'll find two fascinating living history museums – Acadian Village, a charming re-creation of the past featuring a blacksmith shop, doctor's museum, a quaint little chapel and the Mississippi Mud Museum where you can see a 400-year-old dugout canoe, and spear points used by warriors centuries before the birth of Christ. At Vermilionville, you can listen to authentic Cajun music and learn the two-step. Cooking and craft demonstrations take place throughout the day. On the way to Vermilionville, stop at the Jean Lafitte Acadian Center, where you can catch a short film that dramatizes the plight of the Acadians.
Southeast of Lafayette you can take a swamp tour in the Atchafalaya Basin, where you'll see snowy egrets in graceful flight, blue herons tall and still against the blazing sky, moss-covered cypress trees and other magnificent sights. In the quaint little town of St. Martinville, take a picture or two in front of the Evangeline Oak, the inspiration for Longfellow's poem. Shadows-on-the-Teche, a jewel of a plantation home in New Iberia, offers one of the best-documented tours in the country. Nearby on Avery Island, you can tour the TABASCO® hot sauce factory, Jungle Gardens and Bird City. Jungle Gardens has over 1,000 varieties of camellias, and Bird City is one of the largest egret rookeries in the world. In late summer, the trees around the lake are white with egrets.
All along the Cajun Coast, down into Morgan City, Raceland, Houma and ending (literally, the road ends) in Cocodrie, you can venture into the swamps for wildlife adventures or into the warm Gulf of Mexico waters and catch your limit on a deep sea fishing excursion. Just north of Lafayette, in Sunset, call on Chretien Point Plantation, where a pirate was shot on the staircase by the mistress of the house. (Some say his ghost is still there.) You'll recognize the staircase – it was reproduced for Tara, in Gone With The Wind.
In Eunice, Louisiana, where Cajun and Zydeco music thrive, you can visit the Liberty Theater, home of the "Rendezvous-vous des Cajuns" radio and TV show, better known as the Cajun Grand Ole Opry. In Mermentau, you'll be treated like visiting royalty at le Petit Chateau de Luxe, a romantic French castle right out of a fairy tale. Now you need a prince? Try your luck in Rayne, the Frog Capital of the World. The 39 murals that adorn the city leap out at every turn.
Visit Lake Charles, where you can enjoy a day of sun, sand and surf fishing on the "Cajun Riviera." And don't go home without seeing an alligator in the wild! From Lake Charles you can travel the Creole Nature Trail All-American Road through one of the nation's last great wildernesses. Adults will also enjoy one of the many casinos in the area. And kids of all ages will love the Imperial Calcasieu Museum, offering a look into an old-time barbershop, pharmacy and parlor. There's something for everyone in Cajun Country.
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There is so much to see and do in Louisiana. Here are a few ideas to get you started.