Louisiana, day 1 and 2

i’m consistently experiencing that all my planned activities take longer than expected. this is not yet a big deal. i’m currently situated in a wal-mart parking lot in lafayette, louisiana, where i plan to spend the night. i had expected to complete my lafayette visit by noon today, and be on the way to new orleans this afternoon.

yesterday i got on the road early as planned from lake livingston, and headed for kisatschie national forest, but due to poor planning, it took me a long time to find the actual forest, so to speak. louisiana, as far as the parts i have seen so far, has been almost entirely forests and lakes, with a few towns and sugarcane fields thrown in for variety. which makes it a little difficult to find a particular forest.

my gps is a mixed blessing. you tell it you want to go to kisatchie national forest, fine, it’ll take you there. never mind that it takes you to the administration offices, which are about an hour away from the actual forest. i set a waypoint manually to the border of the forest where it was located on my map, and set course for it. after driving around “inside” the forest for what seemed like an eternity, i finally pulled into a church parking lot and tried to find my bearings. when i pulled out after 15 minutes of trying to get online with poor at&t reception, i drove no more than a few hundred feet further down the road, before a big fat sign welcomed me to the forest! finally!!

to the visitor, kisatchie national forest is mainly a long stretch of road with a number of small campsites off to the sides, and some “multiple use” trails mainly used by people on 4-wheelers and dirt bikes. i took my klx out for a ride, and learned that the terrain was very difficult – loose sand, wet sand, water crossings, clay. and mostly two narrow tracks from the 4-wheelers. i dropped the bike twice (no damage and only minor bruises) and generally had a great time!

i made dinner (instant rice, pork and beans, bread) and went to bed around 8:30… it gets dark so early and there is absolutely nothing to do in the forest after dark other than sitting around a campfire, which i didn’t have – and i slept more or less without interruption until 8 this morning, with only one other vehicle on the site.

got out of bed, shaved my hair (not completely off) and beard, and washed the best i could with cold water and no shower (rubbing alcohol on disposable towels seem to work well.) decided to take the bike out for another excursion before moving on, and went out to all the little campsites, which are all more or less identical, and again up and down one of the dirt tracks… then i loaded the bike onto the van and hit the road on I49 toward lafayette.

found a visitor center on the gps in breaux bridge, which turned out to be closed. went for a walk while since i was there anyway. most of the the interesting shops were closed early (sunday). took the “scenic byway” LA31 out of town, which turned out to be quite uninteresting, and then returned to lafayette.

went online to look for a good place to eat and found favorable reviews for prejean’s – which was a very good, very large, casual cajun restaurant. i went for all 3 courses, and didn’t regret it. it was all delicious, although the deep fried cheesecake a la foster’s wasn’t as good as it sounded.

so now i’m finding myself in a wal-mart parking lot along with a couple of other overnighting vehicles. they have security here – which is comforting. there isn’t too much noise. the weather is very accommodating. i think i’m going to get a good night’s rest – tomorrow morning i plan to check out the local sights, then continue on toward new orleans in the afternoon…