Circling the U.S. Chapter 75: Mardi Gras Beads

Monday, February 24 - Wednesday, February 26, 2020 

What do you think of when you hear the words "Mardi Gras?" New Orleans, right?

I guess I never thought about it, but it never occurred to me that Mardi Gras would take place anywhere else. We quickly found out that Mardi Gras is celebrated throughout Louisiana in the weeks leading up to Fat Tuesday. In fact, people told us that the first Mardi Gras festival in the United States took place in Mobile, Alabama.

We talked to people, trying to get advice on where we should go to get the best Mardi Gras experience outside of New Orleans - larger city or small town? We decided to go with the smaller towns and, after researching the parade schedules of the towns and cities in this part of Louisiana, we settled on one in Patterson scheduled for Monday and then another one in Morgan City, on Tuesday (Mardi Gras).

Our plans made, with only 20 miles to Patterson, we enjoyed a leisurely morning before saying our good-byes to Russ and Paul.

The only hills in Louisiana were on the bridges. (You can see it in the background.) Otherwise, we rode along quiet, flat country roads.

The countryside was occasionally marred by industrial plants. Many of them processed liquid natural gas. With so many jobs based around the oil industry you can understand why people here don't embrace a green economy.

We arrived in Patterson around noon, just as vendors and a band were setting up in the town park. The parade was set to begin at two o'clock, but didn't get to us until three o'clock.

We walked around the small town, mostly residential with just a few businesses. The park had a new playground overlooking the river. Kids of all ages were out and about, on vacation for the week of Mardi Gras.

The band was terrific, playing great Zydeco music. While we listened to the music and waited for the parade we shared a plate of fried catfish and french fries, and an order of boiled crawfish with corn on the cob and boiled potatoes.

Trying to fit in, we had our beads and Mardi Gras colors on. 

Every parade is put on by a different krewe, which is a club that you join by paying dues and you pay money to ride in the parade. Every krewe has a king and queen. This was the Krewe of Amani parade. The queen is sitting in the back of the float.

And here comes the king.

Drinking appears to be a large part of the celebration.

The parade took about an hour to get to us and lasted about half an hour. It consisted mostly of floats playing loud music with people on board throwing out beads and other paraphernalia.

Rob's packrat genes kicked into high gear these two days when he grabbed every string of beads he could get his hands on. If not for me, he probably would have left Louisiana with at least an extra ten pounds of Mardi Gras memorabilia in his panniers. (Since I always have to wait for him, and I carry more weight anyway, I've appointed myself the gear czar. He's always trying to sneak extra junk into his panniers, but eventually I find it and make him throw it overboard. Some guy in a KFC gave him a metal belt buckle in the shape of a bicycle. That had to go.)

Plenty of beads don't make it around people's necks. Throughout Louisiana we would see them on the shoulders, even on highways, where I doubted parades would have been. Were they thrown out of car windows? 

We heard there was a block party after the parade where the Zydeco band would be performing so we went to check it out. We found it on a residential street crowded with people hanging out around barbecues and drinking beer. Music blared from speakers. We were the only white people in the crowd but no one looked askance at us.

The band was set up next to a bar in an enclosed garden. We would have had to pay to sit and listen. Because it was getting late and we still had some miles to ride, we decided to pass.

As we were walking our bikes through the crowd, a young woman came running up to us. "Y'all didn't hear us calling you," she said. "Come and have some chicken." We'd been sitting next to her family at the parade. We walked back and were introduced to her aunt and other family members. They served us just about the best barbecued chicken I've ever eaten, and beer to wash it down.

We spent the night at a Days Inn in Morgan City and talked about our plans for the next day. After enjoying a small town parade, we decided to press ahead to Houma which promised a bigger affair. We'd have to ride 40 miles to get there. The parade began at one o'clock, but we figured we could get to the later part of the route so we'd have enough time. I made a phone call and confirmed that we had a place to stay with a Warm Showers host outside of town. We'd have plenty of time to get to their place before dark. Little did we know. 

Tuesday, February 25, Mardi Gras, I had King Cake on my mind. On our way out of Morgan City I was heading straight for a donut shop at a T in the road. I had to stop. Rob, my accomplice, didn't complain. We shared a King Cake donut. 

I was taken aback when I saw the sign for this development: "Waterproof Plantation Estates." I asked Rob, What word do you think of when you hear the word "plantation?" He said, "slavery." Okay, maybe that's a northern bias. Maybe in the south people have moved beyond that history. So I asked a number of people that question and, in my informal survey, most people answer as Rob did. So why would  anyone use a word that has such negative connotations to name a housing development? Or want to live there? Maybe, just like the confederate flag and statues, it is so much a part of the culture that people don't even think about it.

We passed a number of beautiful homes with azaleas blooming. I looked forward to seeing spring open up before us as we made our way up the east coast in the next few months. Although we were following the coronavirus news. at that point we didn't think it would impact our trip.

We arrived in Huoma at 12:30 with plenty of time to spare. Someone told us the parade wouldn't get to us until three o'clock. We found a place to watch it right in front of the queen's reviewing stand. A police officer told us it was a good place. We thought so. We locked our bikes, set up our chairs, and wandered around looking for something to eat and watching people. It was a giant street party.

When I saw Charlie's jacket I knew I had to get a picture of him. We had great fun visiting with him and his wife Amanda while we waited for the parade. They spend their retirement working as bit actors in movies. Charlie had to show me pictures from all the movies he's been in.

Their granddaughter was one of the queen's attendants for that day's parade. That's her picture.

I heard someone say, "The first drunken casualty."

In this parade, the queen doesn't ride in a float. Rather, she waits  with her attendants for the king to arrive.

The queen will use the ramp to join the king on his float.

While the parade had started hours earlier, it didn't get to us until after five o'clock. Someone said a float had broken down. They said it happens all the time. Fortunately, we'd been in touch with Ray, our Warm Showers host, who said, not to worry about riding in the dark, he'd come get us.

The king arrived, the queen joined him, and there was a ceremony of some sort. We had no idea what it was all about.

The parade continued as darkness settled around us. Towards the beginning was a college band that stopped to perform, putting on an excellent performance, even as many of the musicians and dancers looked exhausted and hot. Then came many large floats with loud music and inebriated men throwing junk - mostly beads. Often, they threw bags of beads. Charlie told us that they hold back special things, like signature plastic cups and larger beads, for people they know. So he calls out a common name, "Hey, Michael!" Or Dave, or Tom. It worked at least once and a plastic toy came our way.

People told us that it can cost a couple thousand dollars to ride a float, and you have to bring along your own supply of beads. So what people do is they go to numerous parades where they pick up as many beads as they can - it's not hard to literally get piles of them - then they don't have to buy any.  

I was not impressed with the floats. Someone told us that the floats are often only slightly different from year to year. They just didn't seem all that creative or beautiful. Amanda said that we should come back, stay with them, and they will drive us into New Orleans for the Mardi Gras parade there, which is the real thing. Maybe some day.

I admit it. I thought the parade was a disappointment. But I'm glad we were in Louisiana for Mardi Gras and able to experience the holiday, from tasting the varieties of King Cake, to meeting people and seeing how they get so into dressing for it, and watching as Rob got caught up in the excitement of catching as many beads as he could get his hands on, and then helping one of our spectator neighbors fill her coffers of beads for the next year's celebration.

True to his word, when the parade ended Ray came and picked us up. The following day, Wednesday, February 26, we spent the morning working out our route into New Orleans and the afternoon wandering around Houma. We stopped by the post office to send home a box of beads. (We also left a pile for Ray and Vanessa's neighbor to use when she rides in a float next year.) We especially enjoyed the Finding Our Roots African American Museum located in the former Black high school.

In the evening Vanessa and Ray entertained us with tales of their many RAGBRAI (Ride Across Iowa) adventures traveling on the bus that Ray outfitted especially for that event.

Ray and Vanessa live in a tiny house about five miles outside of Huoma. They sleep in a loft above the living room and their daughter has a loft above the kitchen and bath. The bathroom has a full-size bathtub and tiny washer and dryer. The house was custom built with repurposed lumber and exquisite craftsmanship.

It was too cold and windy to sleep outside. I slept on the couch and Rob got the twin-size air mattress. It worked great.

I've been curious about what it's like to live in a tiny house. Thanks to Vanessa and Ray's generosity we got to find out. It was very cozy.

One of the first things Ray said to us was, "I wish I'd moved to Louisiana years ago. The people here are so friendly." It's true. Rob and I noticed that, unlike other places, people in Louisiana are more likely to say hello as we'd ride by their homes. When we were riding through one town, a car passed us really close and angrily honked its horn. Two people out in their yards called out, "I'm sorry."

Circling the U.S. Chapter 74: Louisiana Part 2

Saturday, February 22 - Sunday, February 23, 2020

On Saturday, February 22, we had a short ride of 25 miles to New Iberia. Along the way I took the following pictures.

For a number of days we saw these mounds of dirt covering people's yards everywhere and wondered what they were. They were too big to be mole holes. When we asked Father Thomas about them he said, "They're made by crawfish." And Rob and I both immediately had the same response, "I thought they lived in water." Father Thomas said, "They do. You have to realize that the water table is about a foot below the surface here."

In New Iberia we enjoyed lunch at A Spot for Tea where we shared crawfish soup and a shrimp and crab bisque, both delicious. Then we explored the Bayou Teche Museum, which turned out to be the best small-town historical museum we've visited so far. We learned that the Cajun area of Louisiana was also settled by the Spanish and I learned how sugar cane is grown and processed. I was impressed that, in one display describing who settled the region, even if they didn't have names as the white settlers did, at least slaves were counted as people.

These two women at the Bayou Teche Museum were a joy. They let us keep our bikes inside while we went for lunch, recommending A Spot for Tea where they told us we would get great food, but to be prepared to wait for it. They were correct on both counts.

A bicyclist we met in California told us that she always stops in art galleries because people who work there often have time on their hands and are happy to talk. The same may be true of the people who work, often as volunteers, in small town history museums. In New Iberia we got talking about the predominance of Catholicism in Louisiana. One of the women told us that it was very hard growing up Protestant where she was labeled "Not Catholic" by the other kids.

King Cake is emblematic of Mardi Gras. Someone had brought one into the museum and the ladies shared it with us. This one was like a streudl, with layers of dough wrapped around a cream filling, rich and delicious. We were told that you can get a King Cake at any grocery store, including Walmart, but we found out that they are not all the same. A few days later we had one that was just a coffee cake shaped and decorated to look like a King Cake. The one commonality is frosting and green and purple sprinkles.

We passed this mural on the way to our Warm Showers destination, finding out later that the building houses an excellent restaurant.

Who knew people could get excited about antique fans? There are about 7,000 antique fan collectors in an international organization. Our Warm Showers host, Will, is a member. And it just so happened that we timed our visit with Will and his wife Kathy to happen the night of their annual "fan meet" that they host in New Iberia. A number of the attendees gathered at Will and Kathy's for the evening, some staying overnight. So we got to meet about a dozen other folks who get excited about old fans. There were not many women in attendance and at least one I talked to came as a supporting wife. However, there was a newly married couple who share a love of antique fans, having gotten to know each other through their attendance at fan meets.

Will is also an accomplished guitar player. We found out we have a common fondness for John Prine so he treated us to some John Prine songs after dinner.

[As I write this on April 26, 2020, I will note that John Prine is, sadly, a casualty of the Covid-19 pandemic.

As we were riding through northern Wisconsin we passed countless American flags, usually pallets painted to look like flags, in front of people's homes. And whenever we did, one of John Prine's songs would inevitably come to mind:

"Oh, your flag decals won't get you into heaven anymore.
We're already overcrowded from your dirty little war.
Jesus don't like killing, no matter what the reason for.
Your flag decals won't get you into heaven anymore."

Early in our life together Rob and I enjoyed listening to John Prine in concert at Boulder's historic Chataqua Theatre. We share a love of his song lyrics and music.

John Prine, may your legacy live on in the hearts of so many people you've touched with your music.]

Kathy and Will are both of Cajun ancestry. Kathy told us that she grew up speaking French first.

Kathy is a retired social worker and told us about a time when she took some of her elderly clients on a tour of the local historical plantation, Shadows-on-the-Teche.

Kathy said, "One of the woman, an African American, said, 'My people built this house. I was never allowed inside.'

"I told her, 'Well now you can go inside,' and as she went in and looked around, there were tears in her eyes.'"

Most of the folks hanging out at Will and Kathy's were southerners and I decided to throw out a question that had been nagging me for some time, but especially that day as I'd seen a Confederate flag flying in front of someone's house. I asked the group, "Why would someone fly a Confederate flag?" One gentleman, about fifty years old, said that he grew up in Vicksburg, Mississippi, where they saw a lot of fighting during the Civil War. He said they would fly the flag out of respect for those who died in the war. There are monuments for both the Southern and the Northern men who gave their lives. But he also said that today he wouldn't fly the flag because of the hatred that some people express along with it.

Someone else said that, while he agreed that the Confederate statues should be removed from public parks, hed didn't agree with them being trashed. Rather, they belong in museums as part of the history of the region.

Will has no idea how many fans he has. His house is filled with them and so is the garage.

Will and Kathy are incredibly generous. In addition to their house, where the fan guests stayed, they have a cottage on their property, where Rob and I slept. They told us that they were spared Hurricane Katrina's destruction and when they saw people camped outside the local motel, they told them to come on over. They put up about 13 people. When Rita missed them a few months later they did the same thing. 

In the morning Will made pancakes for everyone. Kathy slept in, but was up in time to see us off.

Our disappointment after leaving Will and Kathy on Sunday, February 23, knew no bounds.

Will and Kathy recommended we stop in a bakery on our way out of town. Will said, "They'll have a green light on if the bread is fresh out of the oven." We found the bakery. It was closed.

They also raved about the food at a their favorite restaurant in Franklin, the Forest Inn, part of the Best Western Motel. It, too, was closed.

We stopped at a Burger King to use the restroom. It was empty except for a couple of older men sitting at a table. Rob asked them if there were any restaurants open in town and they said, "Why do you think we're eating here?" Apparently the answer was no.

We decided to stay and do some work on the internet, as we didn't have many miles to ride. Fast food places aren't bad stopping places. They all have free internet. We'll usually purchase a milk shake or fries and then mostly eat our own food. (If there's a sign saying "No outside food" we ignore it. We try to be discreet. No employee has ever complained.) But we've become discerning. We don't like McDonald's because they have a buzzer going off every minute or so letting the kitchen know that the fries are done; drives me nuts. I don't like the shakes at DQ; KFC and Popeyes don't have shakes.

After our education at the Bayou Teche Museum, we recognized the sugarcane growing in these fields.

The water table in Louisiana is so high that graves are partially above ground. 

We passed many bayous. I had to take a picture of this swing that looked so inviting, a real change from all the fenced off properties in Texas.

Louisiana is flat. The only hills we had to climb were the bridges.

We again crossed the intracoastal waterway with its frequent barge traffic.

We ventured away from the main highway where our Warm Showers hosts live out in the middle of nowhere. Russ grew up on the land, a sugarcane farm that his grandfather bought in the 1930's and his father also farmed. Now the land has been divided among the heirs and the remaining farmland leased out for sugarcane.

Staying with Paul (left) and Russ (right) took us about nine miles out of our way, but it was so worth it. The countryside was beautiful and they were both very gracious hosts, generously sharing their love of good wine with us.

Russ and Paul's house has an interesting story. Once upon a time it, along with many just like it, was slave quarters in Franklin. Then it became housing for sugarcane field hands before sitting empty for a number of years. A developer realized the land these houses sat on, next to a bayou, would be suitable for high end homes. He offered to sell each house for $500 to be removed from the property. If the lot was completely cleared within 60 days he'd return $400. So the house cost $100, plus the cost of moving it. Russ did have to do some work on it after it was relocated. The result is a cozy two-bedroom cottage in a beautiful, peaceful location. Paul joined Russ about ten years ago and together they run a stained glass studio, also on the property, where they give classes and create stained glass windows. 

[On April 25 I received this email from Russ and Paul: 
We are currently isolating and our business has been closed since March 18th due to the pandemic. Luckily we have a great place to isolate and it is more like a preview of retirement. We have some money set aside, so the lack of income is just a small inconvenience. I also saw this coming waaay before our president and started stocking up on non perishables and supplies back in January. So we are comfortable and content, only needing to venture out every couple of weeks for fresh vegies. My garden is just starting to bear, so we will be soon be needing to go out less often. I really believe this is no where near being over. The wine club helps with that aspect, I have a case arriving on Wednesday :)]