Best Vacation So Far!

Steve and I took off for the south a few weeks ago. We drove from New Orleans, La to Houston, Tx and had a fabulous time!

It started with this at Harrah's in New Orleans:


The coolest bar I've ever seen! Yes that is a tray encircling the bar, chilled and coated with ice. You just keep your drink on it and it stays cold. GREAT idea!!!

This, of course, led to this:




Which then led to this:



I ended up winning about $640 with this little lucky slot! It was still counting when I took this picture. :)

After leaving New Orleans, we headed to Avery Island, La. Steve had never been south before, so showing him my neck of the woods was a ton of fun! I thought that knowing where Tabasco sauce is made is pretty important in the grand scheme of things, so off we went.

Yes it really was this beautiful! This is a photo of the entrance to Jungle Gardens, a 4 acre garden of gorgeous trees and plants, along with swamp. It's a driving tour so you don't have to walk it, but you can stop your car and take pictures along the way. And believe me, this is how to do it. 4 miles ain't much, but it's halfway around the world when you have to battle the mosquitos this place had to offer!

The day wouldn't have been complete had we not eaten some boudin and some hot links along with some icy cold beer in front of the Tabasco store.


After Avery Island we headed a few hours west to Lake Charles, my home town, for the most part. We saw some significant Katrina damage that *still* is not repaired, and found a cemetary that I swear I never saw before, despite knowing that town pretty darned well. There was a crazy statue of Jesus in this cemetary and, well, being the atheistic heathens that we are, we had to make some fun:



Okay so we're not *that* bad, but we just could not resist taking this picture. But seriously, this cemetery was so cool and I have a huge interest in exploring these old places. There is just something cool about seeing graves that are over a hundred years old! And this particular cemetery held the graves of the founders of Lake Charles. Pretty darned cool.


I'm gonna start a new thread so this one doesn't get too long. I haven't even gotten to the best part of the trip yet!