So Sad Shreveport - Nifty Neat Natchitoches

Poor poor Shreveport. Maybe I was only in the most depressed areas of Shreveport but I found Shreveport Louisiana to be a very down on her luck type of city. Everything seemed to be shabby and there seemed to be a hard scrabble feel to the place. At certain times in the past, Shreveport has had it's moments, for example, there was the oil and gas boom in the eighties. All that is gone, leaving a sad little town with shabby casinos as it's main business. Of course I may be wrong and it may be it is a city full of hope – who knows, I didn't see it.

I am staying at Diamond Jack's Casino RV park, one of those Casinos that seem to be just holding on. The reason I am here is to go see the Shreveport Water Works Museum which is a rare example of an intact steam powered water works. It is no longer used, but in it's day it was a technological pioneer. There were a couple of interactive exhibits, but mostly it was a large building with a bunch of old boilers. They did tell me the steps that were taken to purify water, but I found that it was perhaps not on my list of top museums to see. I would rank it behind the Lunch Box Museum in Georgia to put a little perspective on it. Maybe it was the fact that it was a dull dreary day maybe I'm just now into boilers or something.

You could push buttons and make the water flow through the various processes of water purification

See?  Big boilers.

I am now in Nachitoches (pronounced Nack-A-dish) Louisiana, the oldest city in Louisiana. What a difference a few miles makes. Historical Nachitoches is lovely – their Front Street borders on the Cane River and it seems to be a thriving little town. The first day, I do a walking tour of the river front area, mostly I stopped into the various shops and chitchatted with the clerks. It was sort of a nasty day out, rainy, windy and chilly.

Anyplace with a waterfall, even if it is not nature's doing, is my kind of place

Buildings on Front Street, right along the Cane River

Built around the time of the Louisiana Purchase, this house was built with no nails and it is still standing

Day Two is an action packed day. Nachitoches is known for it's Meat Pies, these are empanadas stuffed with 80% beef and 20% pork. My meal came with a salad bar and when I saw their salad bar I was not filled with hope that this would be an outstanding meal. I was wrong – the Meat Pie was really good and spicy – almost made me want to come back and try the crawdad stuffed Meat Pie.

The salad bar in totality

Meat Pie, Dirty Rice, Creole Corn

Lasyone's is known for it's Meat Pies

After my huge lunch, I visited the Cane River Creole National Historical Park which are plantations on three different sites. Another Junior Ranger opportunity.

Oakland Plantation is the most complete Creole plantation in the south. It was occupied by the Prud'homme family from 1788 until the 1960's. What I found most interesting was that the Creole culture in this area was very different from the slave holdings out east. There was a set of laws called Code Noir created by the French when they settled Louisiana. One of the laws was that you could not sell off slave family members, the family remains intact – at least until the children turned 14. This gradually changed as we got closer to the civil war years and as more easterners brought their slaves into Louisiana.

The Big House at Oakland Plantation - Creole architecture

Melrose Plantation was established by a family of 'free people of color' around 1803. In the 1920s/30s, it became an artist retreat. Clementine Hunter, a primitive/folk artist, was a domestic in the big house, took up painting and became internationally known. Some of her work is in the Smithsonian.

The 'African House' where Clementine Hunter painted murals all around the 2nd story

The Big House at Melrose Plantation

The oaks here are absolutely stupendous

An example of Clementine Hunter's work