Grand Isle, La., Garden Spot of the State
(For those who know, this is with tongue planted firmly in cheek)

Hello all Chubbies

Since the Alabama River trip we have not really been anywhere on the boat so when the opportunity to head down to Grand Isle, a Louisiana barrier island about 135 miles from Patterson presented itself, we seized the opportunity. We have been there a number of times but not on Mardi Gras! Friends, do not confuse this with New Orleans but we are still talking a good time. All homemade floats that are, shall we say quaint. More about that later.

We left home in a cold, 40 degrees, drizzling rain naturally we needed fuel! The price was not bad at all, 62 cents, tax included. Did two easy locks and we were good to go. Stopped at a friends dock in Houma, La. Fifty-two miles from home, to visit and spend the night. The trip to the island is easy and pleasant as we used the ICW for the most part but once we turned into the Barataria Waterway the scenery vastly improved with many homes and docks so we could get the feel of the real Cajun lifestyle. For you history aficionados, you will recall that this is Jean Lafitte’s old stomping ground. None of his pirates were around but certainly some of their descendents. The number of shrimping, fishing and oyster vessels there is staggering. One interesting site along this leg, about 36 miles to the gulf were hundreds of Dolphin playing in mid channel and right under the
boat. Mind you this is in water only 7 to 9 ft deep- that is the main channel traversed by fishing vessels of 65 to 70 ft and tugs much larger. You left-coasters should try this area and get the "feel" of the bottom. At one point there was a shallow spot in mid channel and I had to slow to avoid dragging bottom.

This was our first trip using THE CAPN chart ware. It was really fun following the real time display of our track. Getting full utility from it is going to take some practice! Incidentally, we use a DELL Inspiron 2500 laptop on board and find that the display is extremely bright and we have no trouble at all reading it in the pilot house.

On arrival the marina was deserted so we picked a slip, not many people fishing in this cold weather, and hooked up. The charge was still the same, $1/ft! The name of the marina is Pirate’s Cove, an acronym. By the way, THE WIFE napped several times on both afternoons on the trip to the island, I was only afforded the opportunity to doze while at the helm!!!

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A page from THE WIFE’s Journal
Re; Same Trip, Different View

The trip to Grand Isle was a consolation prize for not making the trip to Shreveport. Charles has his heart set on taking the boat to Shreveport for reasons known only to him. He has spoken to every person imaginable who has any remote knowledge of the Red River and based on their input, he has determined that February is not the best time of year for such a journey. Once that decision was made (not to go to Shreveport), Charles becomes rather "antsy" or "boat deprived" so something had to be done. Grand Isle is a good compromise, the trip takes 2 days to get there, spend 2 days for Mardi Gras and then 2 days home. The trip to Grand Isle was interesting, freezing in the morning, perfect in the afternoon. For the last
hour or so, there were lots of dolphins playing around the boat. No matter how many times I see them, they still literally take my breath away.

About the naps, I take as many naps as I can possibly get in, Charles thinks this is amazing and he will refer to it often. There is an art to napping that escapes my husband. The perfect nap is 30 minutes and never more than 1 hour. It is light sleeping and one should awaken "refreshed." Charles, on the other hand, is clueless concerning napping. First he considers naps "a waste of time". This is not the proper attitude, you’re pretty much doomed to a bad nap experience with an approach such as this. On those occasions when he does succumb to a nap, he crashes, a train could run through this boat and he wouldn’t know, he sleeps really hard and usually for too long to awaken groggy and "out of sorts." Not to worry, I am an excellent role model in this and I am sure he will improve with time.

As all of you boating people know well, once you’ve arrived at your destination, ground transportation is an issue. In this case, we arrived (not too much fuss as far as docking goes just "too many cleats, not enough hands") on Friday and our friends didn’t get in until late Saturday night, so we had the whole day Saturday to do something. Charles hauled the bikes over the side, this is a bit of a problem because my bike is old and sentimental (TRANSLATE, HEAVY), it has a cute basket and an adorable horn so that I can communicate with Charles if he gets too far ahead of me. Every time Charles gets the bikes off the boat he swears he will think of an easier way but this time I think he actually has! Anyway, we started riding at about 10:30 that morning, the sky was blue, the sun shining, about 60 degrees, wind gently at your back. It’s the "loveliest of days", you feel strong and energized. We cruised around town for about 2 hours, stopped to have lunch. Yes, we ate the big cheeseburger and the fries.

Decided to head back to the boat (an hour away) and you know what’s coming. WE TURN THE BIKES AROUND, the sun is hot, we’re sweating, the wind has increased considerably and is in our face and it’s a struggle just to pedal forward (but if you don’t pedal I swear the wind would push you backward) and everything begins to ache, your legs, your tush and you begin to question your sanity and you still have an hour to go! We did make it back, left the bikes on the dock and took a nap! Both of us.

The reason for the trip, Mardi Gras. There is Mardi Gras in New Orleans and then there is Mardi Gras everywhere else. Grand Isle falls into the latter category. There are no flashy costumes, no grand floats. But the atmosphere is great, you don’t have to worry about getting trampled by a crowd or stepped on picking up beads and no one flashed us (Charles is not sure this is a good thing). Thanks to our wonderful friends David & Linda Chauvin, we got to ride on a float. This was my first time to throw beads, you’ll be happy to know that I was very polite and remembered when I was young how great it was to actually catch the beads instead of picking them up off the street. It was so much fun ! Here’s another special thing about
Grand Isle, when you throw beads to someone, they actually look at you and say "thank you". There was also a boucherie (translation; pig roast) and band at the local watering hole but we opted for dinner at our friends’ brand new "camp" and ate wonderful lasagna. I highly recommend the entire Mardi Gras experience and hope to do it again, if so you’re all invited!