The previous night we had powered on to just east of Houston, which gave us more time to travel through Louisiana. We went through Rayne, the frog capital of the world, and Lafayette, where we stopped at the visitor's center to pick up some tourist leaflets. Lawrence asked if they had a statue of Marquis de Lafayette, but they didn't know who he was talking about.

Between Lafayette and Baton Rouge is the Atchafalaya Swamp Scenic Byway, an extraordinarily long road built 20 feet above a swamp. Quite an engineering feat.

Two of the leaflets we had picked up were of plantation houses just past Baton Rouge. We stopped by the Houmas House and the Tezcuco Plantation, but couldn't take the tours because of restricted winter hours. The exteriors, though, we enough to convince us to find similar plantations while in Georgia. Driving back from the plantations we saw a Brahma bull.

Another leaflet was for a hotel, Villa Convento (their website), right in the French Quarter of New Orleans. We guiltily cancelled reservations at a bed and breakfast we had made earlier and used our laptop mapping software to find our way around New Orleans. (We highly recommend getting such software if you're going to travel anywhere.)

The hotel was perfect. The room was very old and opened onto the interior courtyard, and the special same-day reservation deal gave us free covered parking. We walked down Bourbon Street, which was still a bit tame at 7pm, and headed to Mulate's, a famous local Cajun restaurant. The band played Cajun music while elderly locals danced. It was beautiful. One couple had matched outfits and the man played a triangle he had brought. Jennifer took their picture, and the man later came over to tell us that if you want a successful family, you need to take your kids camping, keep them involved in sports, and throw them lots of love.

The more active Bourbon Street on the way home inspired Jennifer to buy a red feather boa.

Miscellaneous pictures: oh god we're in the South; typical Louisiana roadside; lots of swamps.