In the Boot

On the sole of the Boot – the boot of Louisiana, that is. That’s where Palmetto Island State Park sits three hours or so west of Grand Isle with a whole lot of watery, marshy, reedy bayou in between. And don’t forget bridges! This part of the country must be a bridge engineer’s toy box with islands to connect, marshes and inlets to traverse, rivers and the Intercoastal Waterway to span.

Palmetto Island State Park, near Abbeville, is in the midst of live oaks and palmettos with a surprisingly northern woodsy feel, especially with the campfires going at several of the campsites and the filtered sunlight shining through the trees. The temperature also may have had something to do with it. Long sleeves and fleeces have been our wardrobe since we left Florida. There was a touch of frost on the Mini in the morning.

After arriving at the park, we walked around LaFleur Lake, one of three small inland lakes here. It’s a lovely peaceful little lake with its perfectly calm water making perfect reflections. However, on the far side, near one of the unoccupied backpacking campsites we walked past, we heard a low loud growl.  We stopped. And then we heard it again. And then we did an about face and walked quickly away from campsite #4. It sure sounded like a bear growl and we weren’t sticking around to find out if it was. When Michael told the park’s host about the incident, she told him 2 bear cubs had been seen recently, but not the mama bear. And on the message board by the bathroom, a sign reads, “This Is Bear Country.”

After leaving Palmetto Island State Park, we really drove along Louisiana’s coast, on two-lane highway 82 across the boot’s heel, where land and water intermingle for miles before becoming just land. Here, where there isn’t water or marsh, there’s grassland. The area’s main occupations appear to be cattle raising, shrimp fishing and crab potting.

                                            

And then we came upon Cameron National Wildlife Refuge in the southwest corner of LA across Sabine Lake from Port Arthur, Texas. We drove the dirt Pintail Loop ever so slowly, marveling at the hundreds of mallards, moorhens, coots, the white ibises and white-faced ibises, great blue heron and egrets. Oh, and two mostly hidden resting alligators. We didn’t feed them.