Palmetto Island State Park, Louisiana
March 12, 2023
Palmetto Island State Park was our first week-long stay of the year and provided a nice break from the long-ish driving days we had had recently.
As we approached our destination, we started seeing more ponds (or flooded fields) that had these odd looking cages placed in grids in the water (sometimes with a boat nearby). Not being from the area, we had to look this up -- turns out those were crawfish farms.
Random internet image that was pretty similar to what we saw
Our greeting at Palmetto Island State Park
We are not sure why the park has the word "island" in it. Looking at a map, it does not look like an island. Then again, many of the named areas on the map surrounding the park are also called islands. The best we can figure is that there is a lot of swampland around here and the non-swampy areas are called islands.
Palmetto Island State Park turned out to be a relaxingly peaceful location with lots of nature. It was nice to have the windows open at night (lows in the upper 60s) and wake up to the sounds of birds going about their morning routine.
Our lush, tropical backyard for the week
Our first day was pretty relaxed, as our sole activity was taking a short walk to the end of our loop to check out Lake Lafleur. It was incredibly quiet and peaceful.
After a time, we started to notice a fair number of jumping fish. At first we thought we were really lucky to see it happen, but then it became apparent that it was happening quite frequently. Afterward, we learned that these are the infamous Asian silver carp (Random Asian Carp Video). These fish were originally introduced in Arkansas and other areas in the 60s and 70s in sewage ponds and fish farms to control algae. But the inevitable floodwaters aided their escape into the wild, and the rest is history. Evidently, silver carp randomly jump out of the water when surprised. There are not nearly the quantity of silver carp here as there are in other locations (such as the Illinois River), but we saw that there were times where one jumping would prompt another to jump, creating a chain reaction of three or four jumpers. It happened enough that Julie was able to get a photo:
While walking around the shore, we were startled by a rather large snake. (Sorry no picture.) Luckily, it had no interest in us, and it quickly slithered into the brush. We were pretty determined to not wander off trail after this incident. (Later, we identified the snake as the generally harmless plain-bellied water snake.)
We got slightly more ambitious on our second day and took a bike ride (just under 11 miles) around all the paths and roads in the park and some roads outside the park.
Evangeline Pond
The green foliage in the foreground is the rare Abbeville Red Iris. Too bad it wasn't in bloom yet.
So quintessentially Lousiana
The Vermillion River is not super attractive, but Julie felt obligated to take a picture of it anyway.
What luck--Rick spotted an Abbeville Red Iris in bloom! There was some poison ivy (and who knows what else) separating it from us, so we couldn't get very close.
One of the very un-busy roads surrounding the park.
The rest of the week had us doing some short (< 1.5 miles) walks around the campground, visiting the jumping fish some more, and taking care of normal chores like laundry (the campground had nice laundry facilities), recharging the water softener, and fixing a couple of minor items (toilet seal 🤮 and burnt-out indicator light on the pump switch).
Our default walk to see the flying fish and walk the campground loop!
Waiting for dinner to be cooked!
On Friday night, the campground started to fill up and become festive with the weekend crowd. It was nice hearing the sound of children running around screaming and having a good time. We also heard a bit of Zydeco music wafting through the air.
We ventured out to the historic town of Abbeville on Saturday to do some grocery shopping and go to Mass.
A quaint historic town park
We were amazed at the extensive system of wires and posts that supported this massive live oak.
The historic St. Mary Magdalen Church
This couple is not us.
Tried the new "magic eraser" feature on the phone. A little wonky, but not too bad!
Back at camp, having a "campfire"...
Our trusty little Thermocell (the thing with the circular blue light) kept the mosquitos and noseeums at bay.
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