Cruise of the Week - Small Ship Cruises

LOUISIANA COMBO:
CAJUN COUNTRY PLUS A MISSISSIPPI CRUISE

By
Shirley Linde

Cajun culture is high energy. We learned about it … and how to keep up with it … on a recent exploration to southern Louisiana with the Society of American Travel Writers, combined with a Mississippi River cruise on American Queen.

We stayed in Lafayette , the hub of Cajun land and the heart of Cajun culture. Doing day trips from Lafayette, you can hear the Cajun music, learn to dance to it, see the art, gorge on the spicy Louisiana food, and meet the friendly people day and night.

Louisiana climate and food may be hot, but Cajun culture is about as cool as you can get; and the people are outgoing. Everyone could be your friend in Lafayette .

Acadian (Cajun) culture has been in Louisiana for almost 300 years. The history: -- beginning in 1604 settlers left France and began moving to eastern Canada; then when he English took control there after war with France, the Acadians made a deal to remain neutral in any future conflicts if they would be left to live in peace. But a new governor in 1755 ordered them to swear allegiance to the crown of England. When they refused and reaffirmed their desire to remain neutral, the governor confiscated their lands and forced them to leave. Some returned to Europe, some moved to other parts of Canada, some to areas in the colonies later to be the United States. Over the next decades thousands of Acadians from all these areas began moving to southwest Louisiana. The name Acadian got shortened to Cajun. Their bonds were close and their culture survives today.

Music and dancing seem to be part of the Louisiana soul. Whether it’s Cajun, zydeco, or swamp pop, people here like to dance. I learned the Cajun two-step and jig, danced with a charming man named Mac at the Friday outdoor street dance in the middle of downtown, waltzed with the waiter at Mulate’s Restaurant, learned some more from the champion two-step teacher at our Saturday night pig roast in Vermillionville, ran into Mac again and a crowd of others at the regular Saturday morning breakfast zydeco dance at Café des Amis at Beaux Bridge (whoever heard of dancing from 8:30 to 11:30 on Saturday morning!). With the band was a 5-year-old boy playing drums with total professional cool. I bet on him being a star.

There are musicians in most families, and sometimes there will be three generations playing together at community jam sessions. On Saturday afternoon there is a serious jam session at Louisiana Heritage and Gift Shop where musicians drop in (there were 16 musicians playing when we left). On our Cajun music trail we met Junior Martin, an accordion craftsman, and his daughter who have a large shop for making and repairing accordions and where we learned just how complicated accordions are. (Diatonic accordions make one note when you push and another when you pull; piano accordions play the same note whether you push or pull; a melodion has 10 buttons, came from Germany and was modified by Cajuns; most zydeco music is in the key of A or G, Cajun music in B flat, and Russians prefer the key of C, and you have to change the reeds to change the key an accordion plays in). Martin said in the morning when the workers come in to the shop they decide whether to work or play and once they start playing they may suddenly find the whole workday has gone.

There are many differences between Cajun and zydeco music -- different kinds of accordions; fiddles and guitars with one and not the other, a triangle in Cajun, a washboard in zydeco, but many bands play a mixture of styles. Zydeco, originally the music of blacks and creoles, now incorporating blues and soul, is, by the way, French for plain beans, and is known from the song “Snap beans don’t need salt!”

Wherever you go, you see and hear the blending of types of music, food, and language. A typical greeting: Bon jour y’all.

Places we visited in the area that we think would be of interest when you go:

In Lafayette , be sure to explore downtown museums and shops, including the Jefferson Street Market and Acadiana Center for the Arts, and try to make the Friday evening street dance or the second Saturday of the month art walk. You can also visit Acadian Village with authentic Acadian structures including the home of senator and Hadacol inventor Dudley LeBlanc and the Jean Lafitte National Park Acadian Cultural Center. The University Art Museum has both local and world art.

At Avery Island you can visit the Tobasco factory where the family-owned company has made pepper sauces from crushed peppers, vinegar, and nearby-mined rock salt for 130 years. Be sure to drive through the park to see the lovely ancient trees.

Vermillionville has structures and artifacts reflecting life in the area between 1765 and 1890.

In St. Martinsville the Cultural Heritage Center has a mural depicting the 1765 arrival of the Acadians in Louisiana, a genealogy center, and exhibits on free people of color in Louisiana who before the Civil War were active in business, owned plantations, and indeed sometimes had large numbers of slaves of their own.

For wildlife, you may want to take a swamp boat trip to see alligators and birds in the bayou.

THE AMERICAN QUEEN

The perfect way to top off a vacation following the Cajun Trail is with a night in New Orleans to experience the mix of cultures there – French, Spanish, English, Creole, Acadian -- with that same gumbo mix in the food, architecture, art, and music. You can explore jazz clubs and museums, stroll the French District or simply drift from restaurant to restaurant and shop to shop. Then a perfect desert is a cruise on the American Queen paddlewheel steamboat.

A typical cruise on the American Queen is three or four nights roundtrip from New Orleans with stops in Natchez , Baton Rouge , and St. Francisville. You can book just the cruise and drive there, or packages are available that include air, a night in New Orleans and vouchers for meals and New Orleans attractions. Sometimes there are 2-for-1 offers if you book early.

American Queen is filled with antiques and the ambiance of old river days. Public areas have Tiffany-style lamps, old steamboat photos, an old victrola, and a real bird in a gilded cage. Great for river watching is the “Front Porch” with rocking chairs and a two-person swing. No Dramamine needed here. The Grand Saloon show lounge with mezzanine box seats is modeled after the Ford Theatre where John Wilkes Booth shot Lincoln . The Queen can hold 436 passengers, and has both inside and outside cabins, some of the outside cabins opening onto a promenade deck.

Every departure from river towns visited is accompanied by loud calliope music and you can take a turn playing it yourself. Every day a riverlorian told us about the river and steamboating days and you could watch and follow our progress day or night in the chart room.

The first night a bad fog developed on the river and we maneuvered to the riverside, and as typically done, simply tied up to some trees (but not so simple for the deckhands sloshing about through the bush with flashlights and poles looking for some sturdy trees). Because of the fog we could not keep our schedule to get to Natchez but instead went to the little river town of St. Francisville . The next day we spent in Baton Rouge. Shore tours included such things as city tours, a tour of the destroyer USS Kidd and memorial museum, visits to historic homes and plantations, a visit to Louisiana State Penitentiary, and a visit to Vicksburg Battlefield Museum .

Our favorite tour was the Louisiana State University Rural Life Museum with 26 buildings packed with old tools, machinery and antiques and an hour-long show with Cajun humor, music, dance demonstrations and dance lessons.

Onboard was a house band that played for parties on deck and at night in the show lounge, and there were piano players in the two smaller lounges, one overlooking the huge bright red paddlewheel. Evening shows in the theatre featured a jazz combo starring Preservation Hall veteran Wendell Brunious plus Broadway and popular music shows each night by house entertainers.

Highlight was Cajun night with music by LaFleur et Basille with their wild and wonderful music and the well-known uproaringly funny comedian Ed Taylor who kept us laughing with his Boudreau and Thibodeaux Cajun stories.

Until I see you again Bon jour y’all.

*****

Photos courtesy of Cafe des Amis, travel writer William Schemmel, and Delta Queen Steamboat Company.

To Book an American Queen cruise, click here.

   TO MAKE A RESERVATION:

   We work with several agencies and tour operators who are experts in small ships.

   If you want to make a reservation, fill out the form at the Reservation Request Page.