Galveston was this trip’s westernmost point and we now start making our way east; mostly along the coast.  We veered north for a few days to visit Avery Island and spend a quiet Christmas Eve. We Chose Palmetto State Park in Louisiana as our home base for a couple of days.  Naturally, as best laid plans go, we celebrated Christmas Eve chasing imaginary losses and finding unexpected riches in a laundromat, but you’ll have to read on to find out.

As we left the coast and drove inland, the terrain changed, we soon found ourselves driving along long stretches of rice fields.

Rice fields?  Really?

On our way to the park we drove through a town called Kaplan. Intrigued by the name and with the aid of a Google we found a fascinating history of a Jewish immigrant from Poland who figured out an innovative irrigation system for rice fields and built a rice empire in the Louisiana.  There is always something new to learn along the way and stumbling on unexpected stories along is always exciting.

Palmetto State Park, our Christmas destination is a nice park.  Clean showers, free laundry, hookups, nice big and private sites, some hiking trails,  and all for $24 a night.  We were glad we chose this park for our longest stay in this trip; three nights.

Avery Island

The next day we visited Avery Island, the home of the Tabasco Plant and Jungle Gardens.   Avery Island is really a salt dome that created a very fertile soil for the Avery sugar plantation.  Before that, Native Americans produced salt from local springs by boiling the water down.  They traded salt as far as Ohio.  Later, hard salt rock was discovered and the island was mined extensively for salt.

The Tabasco sauce was created on the island using peppers grown in this fertile soil.  Rumor has it that the same variety will not taste the same if grown anywhere else.

The Tabasco Plant tour

One may not think that a tour of the Tabasco plant will be very interesting – even if one is a Tabasco consumer.

It actually was interesting.

The self-guided tour took us through 9 stations including a museum featuring the history of the island, the famous sauce, and the people that made it.

There was Tabasco-inspired art,

art installations

and a wall of recipes.

The tour follows the process of growing, mashing, fermenting and aging in salt-sealed oak barrels, and bottling the sauce.

You can end your tour at the restaurant that offers local cuisine flavoured with – you guessed it – Tabasco,

and the gift shop that offers everything Tabasco on earth.

The gardens

The name jungle garden doesn’t do the place justice.  The name has a theme park ring to it, but in fact it was the home and property of Edward Avery McIlhenny, the son of the Tabasco inventor.  A man of endless curiosity, an amature archaeologist, botanist, and zoologist, he created a 170 acre beautiful garden with an extensive collection of plants and a home to many wild species.

Ancient Live Oaks line the roads

The are Bamboo forests with over 64 varieties of Bamboo.

Bald Cypress trees and swamps

Cypress Trees’ ‘knees’; those mysterious gnome-like protrusion that still keep scientists stumped…they are still trying to figure out their function.

The garden has about 450 (!!!) varieties of Camellias and countless of other plants, flowers, trees, and shrubs.

Our favourit spot was the Chinese Garden

a tranquil place,

seren,

meditative,

and simply beautiful.

The weather was a bit too cool for alligator viewing, but one one brave soul decided to catch some rays.

This guy/gal (how do you sex an alligator anyway?) seemed so chill that I was tempted to walk over and remove that annoying leaf that was stuck to the side of its mouth.

Anhinga – the Snakebird

The gardens are a bird sanctuary.  This odd bird danced for us and then plunged itself into the water.

Unlike most birds, it has dense bones and unoiled feathers;  as a result it is almost completely submerged in the water when it swims.  The effect is a Loch Ness Monster-esque.

The laundromat

We spent the days leading up to Christmas Eve driving around the small towns in the area,

relaxing, doing laundry, and planning our Christmas Eve dinner when disaster struck.

Tony lost his wallet and the only place we could think it may have happened was the gas station that was about 45 minutes away.  Did I mention that this was Christmas Eve and we were just about to start making our first Christmas dinner without family since 1982?

We called the gas station.   No, no one turned in a wallet.  We decided to drive there and poke around.  Nothing.

We cancelled some credit cards on the way, just in case.

Back at the campground, our spirits less than festive, we took out our clothes from the washing machine and transferred to the drier, and there is was at the bottom of the washing machine: Tony’s clean wallet and all of his cancelled cards.

Somehow we both shared the blame for this fiasco and hurriedly made our Christmas Eve roast with the aid of the trusted Smart Pot.

It was a good night after all.  Wine helped.

We left the park on Christmas Day heading towards the Big Easy.  New Orleans, here we come!

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