One of my favorite places to go is in Breaux Bridge on a Saturday morning - a little cafe called Cafe Des Amis  This place is so happening, Kevin had to pay a cover charge for us to just get in the door at 9am.  We had a nice breakfast, watched some dancing - and we even got in there for some dancing ourselves

I realize it looks like I'm focused on his butt.  Truly, I just thought he had great footwork!

 We tried to go to church with Kevin and Jody.  We looked up the local church on the LDS church website.  We drove to the building.  We went in the building.  It was obvious that we had missed church.  Instead we found a table in the lobby with fliers talking about Mormon Helping Hands - the church's program to help those in need (member or neighbor) because of something like a hurricane.  LaPlace was hit hard from the hurricane, which had just happened a week earlier.  We were so impressed with the members that were willing to help.  Jasmine was one of those that helped.  She said that the homes were destroyed.
Anyway, we missed church.
Good thing - Jody was wearing a denim skirt...HORRORS!  :)  JK Jody!

We had such a nice lunch with Ms Cindy and Mr Greg.  They are some of my favorite cajuns.  And we went to one of our favorite restaurants, Katie's  It was such a lovely Sunday afternoon

We walked around City Park for a bit.  Saw some "art" at the sculpture garden.
And we found a wallet.  We got to meet Ms Trude - the friend of the wallet's owner.  They dance together.  She was so sweet and lived only about 6 blocks away from where we found the wallet.  We dropped it off with her.  Do you have a phone number in your wallet where someone can call if someone is trying to find you, as the owner?  The owner called us and was so grateful.  He wanted to meet us and give us a reward.  I said that that wasn't necessary and he said that God would bless us.  So sweet - we were just grateful that he was ok and that we had found someone who could get in touch with him.


Next we took Kevin and Jody to get beignets at Cafe Du Monde  I think that they went back several times again after we left them in New Orleans. 

We made our way Sunday evening to Preservation Hall  It is one of our all time favorite things to do in New Orleans. 

We ended Sunday night with Kevin getting to meet the clarinet master from the New Orleans Serenaders.  I think that they are going to reconnect in Phoenix for the Jazz Festival. 

We got to go on a swamp tour .  This tour was outside of Breaux Bridge - on Lake Martin and the historic Bayou Teche.  Bret hadn't done a swamp tour before - and certainly Kevin and Jody hadn't....

We only saw one baby gator. 

But the other wildlife was amazing. 

 There is a baby gator in this pic - he is pretty camouflaged

Do you see the SPIDER!?

 And how about this spider?  Look in the center of the pic

 We went to visit a plantation - The Oakley House located in St Francisville. Bret and I have taken Jasmine to this plantation before.  We just missed getting to see a civil war reenactment - and the actors were still around.  In fact a few of them went on our tour.  First they had to ditch their beverages though!  :)

Alex had a game but thanks to Kevin's wifi on his iPad, we were able to watch the game live from the back seat of the rental car as we drove from Baton Rouge to New Orleans.  Got to love technology!

When we are in Baton Rouge, one of our favorite restaurants to go to is The Chimes.  They have two locations - one right next to LSU campus and one on the "east" side.  The Chimes East is our preference - it is a tad bit quieter.
When we were with our friends, Kevin and Jody Peck, this past weekend, this was the first stop we made off the plane.  We had to wait for our table (which Bret will rarely do).  I thought it was cool that they had a text notification set up for when our table was ready - pretty easy and clever.
We ate good that night.  Boudin, blackened alligator, hush puppies, shrimp, cajun pasta, red beans and rice.  It was a nice dinner.  The best part - was that Jasmine got to join us for dinner!

Today we had our sales blitz in Thibodaux, Louisiana where we went out to the town and canvassed the area in teams to advertise our spring special. Thibodaux is almost at the end of the earth. If this map went further south, we would be at the Gulf of Mexico.



While my partner and I were out, we stopped at a couple of famous places in town.

The first was BUBBA's. There are two locations for Bubba's. We ate at one for lunch later. The one we stopped at in the morning had this great alligator in the entry. Don't you love being greeted like this?

This is just an absolutely beautiful building. I only took a picture of the doors. But look at them - rich with history. Fremins is a restaurant that is housed in an old pharmacy in 1910.


We also went to THE church in Thibodaux. St Joseph Catholic Church.
The exterior of the church was completed in early 1923 and the first mass was celebrated on January 25, 1923. Ornamental plaster and marble work on the interior was completed in 1931, when the church was re-dedicated.
This is St Valerie. I'll be honest this part of the church kind of weirded me out. She is over in the corner up at the front and this is the story of the fake body in the casket on display in the church.
Valerie is a derivative of Valeria. St. Valeria was an early martyr probably at or near Milan. According to legend, Vitalis was a soldier who, when the physician St. Ursicinus of Ravenna wavered when faced with death for Christ, encouraged him to stand firm. The governor accordingly ordered Vitalis to be racked and then buried alive, which was done. His wife, St. Valeria, was set upon by pagans near Milan and died from their brutal treatment. These things are said to have happened during the persecution under Nero, but the second century, under Marcus Aurelius, is a more likely date for their martyrdom. Their feast day is April 28th.

Isn't this guy too cute? He is ready to go hunting.
In Louisiana, they love the Fleur De Lis
And someone came up with this adaptation. It is so great because Louisiana is known for fishing and hunting. Pretty clever!When I'm in Houma and Thibodaux Louisiana, I'm surrounded by bayous. I got a lesson tonight from a new friend about how important these bayous were to the early settlers. Pretty interesting. She said that all of her girlfriends from highschool are married to men who are either shrimpers, oystermen (did you even know they existed) or men who work the tugboats or go offshore. I'm telling you it is a whole 'nother world down here....

I started the day with a goal of getting out the door by 7:30 in the morning so that I could get to a meeting in Metairie Louisiana in time for the 8:45 meet and greet.
I walked downstairs with all my luggage (which is no small feat) and loaded up the car. I went to say good bye to Ms Betty who is "playing GM" of the hotel where we need some staff. She was covering the desk because her new front desk team members are still training. But then the breakfast host called off and so she was trying to do both breakfast and front desk for a hotel that was sold out with 104 rooms.
I decided that the meeting could wait - I could at least be late. So I helped at the desk while Betty helped with breakfast. The problem with this was these....

After standing for almost 2 hours in these behind the front desk, I was on my way to the meeting. But first I decided to stop and pick up these....This helped make the day much better!

As I was driving to the airport, I saw a fish ruler on the back of a truck in front of me. Thought this was pretty cool - if you are someone who fishes a lot.

There was this weird woman today walking in Houma. We couldn't decide if she was crazy or homeless.

Check out the plastic bags around her feet.

Mr Ronnie's Donuts

One of the places that I sometimes stop when I'm in Houma is Mr Ronnie's. Actually - wait I have never stopped here. But when Clarence lived here, he would go to Mr Ronnie's and bring back a donut or two for me. Since Clarence is in Houston now and I was visiting in Houma, I thought that I would pick up my own donut.

They had Mardi Gras themed donuts.

And King Cake (which of course I brought and carried home). So far no one has eaten the baby yet!



I learned from a local that Mr Ronnie's owner is very religious. When he opened the donut shop, someone was trying to talk him into having video poker and he didn't want to have it. He gave in and within the first year of having the shop with the poker machines, his mortgage was paid off! Kind of crazy to have video poker in the back of a donut shop - but it is Louisiana after all.

and there were WHITE shoes

So I was sitting in the general manager's office at the Holiday Inn Express Baton Rouge and I saw two young adults walk by and a set of parents. The dad walked out first and he was carrying white dress shoes. The two boys were in suits and the mom was in a skirt.
So immediately I thought they must be LDS and are probably headed to the Baton Rouge temple.

http://www.ldschurchtemples.com/batonrouge/

So I ran into the parking lot to go out and introduce myself ... and see if I was right. (Anyone who knows me, knows that I like to be RIGHT!)

Sure enough, the family was on their way to the temple. One of the young men had served a mission here in Baton Rouge and had just returned home (to Utah).

I asked them how their stay had been. They said that they had been in Baton Rouge for a week and had stayed at our hotel and everything had been great.
Always nice to meet other members of the Church as I travel.

So exhausted.....

A flight to Louisiana from Phoenix is never short. This time in order to be able to make all of church, I had to pick the last flight out. That was the beginning of the end.
My flight left Phoenix late. For whatever reason, I had to go through Las Vegas. My flight left Las Vegas late.
BTW - almost every other person getting onto the NOLA flight from Vegas had a SAINTS jersey on.
GEAUX Saints! Who Dat!?!
That means that I got in LATE to New Orleans.
How late you ask!?!?!

12:45 in the morning.

Do you know that at that time of night hotel shuttles have stopped running and car rentals have closed?

So what to do? I had already made the decision not to drive to Baton Rouge before I knew my flight was going to be late, so I had a reservation at the Crowne Plaza (about a mile and a half away from the airport).
I got in a taxi and paid $16 for the ride. The hotel didn't have any change so I ended up tipping the driver with a McDonald's gift card.
The front desk checked me in (no smiles on that girl, she was all grouch). Now, let's keep in mind that I had packed for 10 days for both work and personal. I had probably about 150 pound of luggage total. My three vera bags, and two 50 pound suitcases.
NO BELLMAN! What kind of hotel is this!?
It would have not been a big deal - Bret taught me to not take what luggage I couldn't handle myself - but the grouchy girl at the front desk ....
decided that she would put me in the furthest room down the hall, down another hall, at the very end! I'm all about corner rooms but when I have all that luggage, I hate it!
Anyway, I got to my room, finished the book I started on the plane and turned the light out at 1:45AM.

That was one long travel day.