The Fading Cajun Culture…

Mary is no longer available for RV traveling, but we remain good friends.
Because we have 5,000+ postings, I’ve invited her to continue posting entries on this blog.

To view past blogs, scroll to the bottom of this page and use the menu.

I’m currently in my 24th year of full-time RVing and my lifestyle is changing, For more info click Here

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The motorhome is parked at Shady Acres RV Park in Yuma, Arizona. I may be here until March 4th.

 

In my many years of wandering, I’ve seen many interesting places. I believe my favorite area is Cajun Country in southern Louisiana. It’s like stepping back in time to 50 years ago, the scenery is unique and spectacular and the people are very friendly. And then there’s the great food and wonderful music!

 

Perhaps my bias is because I’m a full-blooded Frenchman with both sets of grand-parents coming out of French Canada. I looked it up and my last name Jaillet means “someone who lives on marshy land”! So, I guess it’s in my genes!

 

I once had it explained to me that the Cajun man thinks differently than most cultures. After making enough money to cover his requirements, instead of continuing to chase the almighty dollar, he stops working and says… LET’S PARTY!

 

I’ve made several visits to the area and feel I have explored it thoroughly and know it well. I guess it saddens me to think of this as a fading culture.  😦

 

Although during my times there, I ran across a lot of folks who are determined not to let this happen.

 

I stumbled upon the below video yesterday of YouTube and enjoyed it so much I thought I’d share with you today…

 

The opening screen says part 1, but parts 2 and 3 follow immediately. The entire video runs about an hour…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have been to many of the places as shown in this story and it brought back some wonderful memories! 🙂

 

 

 

I hope you enjoyed the video.

Forecast for today is partly sunny and 68 degrees.

Enjoying nice weather is another joy in the life of a full-time RVer!

The red dot on the below map shows my approximate location in the State of Arizona. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…

 

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures with low humidity most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

 

“Let me recommend the best medicine in the world: a long journey, a mild season, through a pleasant country, in easy stages.” –James Madison

My current travel rig is a 2006 Fleetwood 26′ Class A Motorhome and a towed 1986 Ford Bronco II, Eddie Bauer Model. This photo was taken in the desert at Slab City near Niland, California…

On October 27, 2012, I created a two-minute video titled America The Beautiful. The music America The Beautiful is by Christopher W. French. The photos, which I randomly selected, are from the states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and West Virginia (not shown in that order)…are mine. Yup, That’s me standing in front of the Post Office in Luckenbach, Texas…Y’all!

Click this link to start the video. Make sure you have your speakers turned on and go to full screen asap.
http://youtu.be/FfZUzEB4rM8

If you would like to see my YouTube videos, click this link… http://www.youtube.com/user/JimJ1579/videos

There are more than 600 photo albums in my Picasa Web Albums File. To gain access, you simply have to click this link… https://picasaweb.google.com/jimjrver

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

For more information about my books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

All original works copyrighted – Jim Jaillet -2019

A Change Of Pace…

The motorhome is now parked at Thousand Trails Thunderbird RV Resort along the bank of the Skykomish River in Monroe, Washington. I’ve been here a number of times over the past years and always enjoy it here. I’ll depart from here tomorrow..

I’m just hanging out taking maximum advantage of my Thousand Trails membership and very agreeable weather.

Mary’s personal to-do list plate, which can only be handled by herself, continues to over-flow. I’ll next likely see her when I arrive at her home in mid-October. A friend recently expressed a concern about the status of our relationship. Not to worry…it continues to function per our original agreement when we met in October, 2008. That is…I remain on the road and she will join me when her other life allows. We talk every day on the phone…sometimes more than once. It’s just the way life is!

 

Today…A change of pace…

Directly below you will see an email I received yesterday. Gallop Magazine is published in Sweden. A few weeks back they requested permission to use one of my photos (Fred’s Lounge in Mamou, Louisiana).

Being of 100% French-Canadian heritage, I also worked as a teenager as a hot-walker and groom at three different race tracks in New England…I found this to be a very well done article. I hope you enjoy it…

Press the download button to read the article…

Sorry, but I just have been informed copyright does not allow me to do this…so, I’ve taken it away!

Here’s the photo I sent them…

Oh well, one-half a photo is better than none.  🙂

It’s fun to see one of my photos in another publication which has happened several times in the past.

To read my blog entry about Fred’s Lounge, click this link…http://wp.me/pDCku-7ea

I hope you enjoyed today’s change of pace.

Yesterday was mostly sunny and 62 degrees. Forecast for today is mostly sunny and 66 degrees.

Enjoying nice weather is another joy in the life of a full-time RVer!

The red dot on the below map shows my approximate location in the State of Washington. You may double left-click the map to make it larger…

 

Enjoying 65-75 degree temperatures with low humidity most of the year is a primary joy in the RVing lifestyle!

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving”…Albert Einstein

 

 

 

My current travel rig is a 2006 Fleetwood 26′ Class A Motorhome and a towed 1986 Ford Bronco II, Eddie Bauer Model. This photo was taken in the desert at Slab City near Niland, California…

 

On October 27, 2012, I created a two-minute video titled America The Beautiful. The music America The Beautiful is by Christopher W. French. The photos, which I randomly selected, are from the states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and West Virginia (not shown in that order)…are mine. Yup, That’s me standing in front of the Post Office in Luckenbach, Texas…Y’all!

Click this link to start the video. Make sure you have your speakers turned on and go to full screen asap.
http://youtu.be/FfZUzEB4rM8

If you would like to see my YouTube videos, click this link… http://www.youtube.com/user/JimJ1579/videos

There are more than 600 photo albums in my Picasa Web Albums File. To gain access, you simply have to click this link… https://picasaweb.google.com/jimjrver

If you have not checked out my Ramblin Man’s Photos Blog, you can do so by clicking this link…http://ramblinmanphotos.wordpress.com/

For more information about my books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

All original works copyrighted – Jim Jaillet -2015

OH, FOR YESTERYEAR ONCE MORE.

Yesterday, I started on my mail.  Here it is stacked in neat little piles. Paring it down by doing much of my correspondence on-line, subscribing to less magazines and periodicals has resulted in a huge reduction from last year at this time. That said, when it all came out of the packaging and envelopes, I had two sacks of paper for the recycling and a mess on the table.

On the sideboard, my taxes started. Emptying out the old files from last year, and discarding what isn’t needed. Oh, for yesteryear!

Instead of chugging away at home, I was at the visitors center in Lafayette, LA. enjoying this beautiful pond,

from a mosaic bench, one of several  to sit on in the shade..

Near the driveway is this attractive sculpture of Rosie’s Bar.

Then, later in the day, we went to a museum where we viewed the faces of cajun life in the area. These are all pictures of pictures from the museum about Cajun Culture.

Such a beautiful face.

Simpler times.

Full of belly laughs.

And joy as they “let the good times roll.”

The groom does look a little nervous.
Its wonderful to have my pictures to look back on and remember the fun of yesterday in Southern Louisiana. Many people ask me what was my favorite place to visit on the road. Southern Louisiana was high on the list.We blogged  that area at this time in 2010.

Gautier, Mississippi

Jim says:

Yesterday I hung out at the American Legion in Gautier, Mississippi taking life easy and spent the better part of the day reading a book. Today I’ll drift further eastward. The below map shows my path that I’ve driven since leaving Mary’s home in Murphys, California on November 30, 2009.

That line represents about 2,800 miles. The “blot” in Louisiana represents our two months exploring Cajun Country.

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2010
For more information about my three books, click this link:
http://www.panamaorbust.com

LAISSEZ LES BON TEMPS ROULER

Laissez les bon temps rouler, a greeting you hear all over Cajun country. It means let the good times roll, and they do at Fred’s Lounge in Mamou, 10 miles out of Eunice. We arrived by 7:30 in order to get a seat when the bar opened at 8 A.M. Fred’s is only open Saturdays with live music, drinking and dancing. The two couples below were the early birds along with Jim and I. Calvin Daigle, standing closest, brought breakfast from Charlies Place around the corner, a heaping pile of boudin, (boydan) in a piece of butcher paper along with a paper bag of cracklins. The still warm sausage, slightly spicy with a soft texture more like stuffing than meat was wonderful. I believe it had rice in it. The cracklins were inch thick pieces of bacon fried crisp, unlike any cracklins I ever tasted. Calvin and his wife Nonie, (next to the wall,) are regulars at Fred’s. Sally and Mike Wenckus are from Golf, Ill.

Before the musicians had set up to play, a crew of guys out back iced down beer to keep the refrigerators inside full. A couple of guys set up a pot to make jambalaya. Some one asked what time it would be ready? “Oh, somewhere between 9 and 2, he claimed.” No charge for the jambalaya. Its part of the “experience.” We walked out back and claimed a heaping bowl full around noon. Good stuff.

Getting the meat started for the jambalaya.

Nonie & Cal started the dancing before it got crowded. The Cajun musicians were Scotty on Accordion, Jason on Violin, Ray on drums, who also sang, and Smiley on guitar. No fanfare or introductions, Nonie told me their names because she knows them all. They just play, with no breaks from 9 until 2. Sometimes longer. The music is broadcast live  from Freds and a different group plays each Saturday.

After a couple hours the crowd looked like this. Then, later, you couldn’t get back far enough to take a picture. It was necessary to slide between people. I slid by this one guy with a clothes pin and money attached to his beads. He told me it was too crowded to get his money out of his pocket so he carries it “up-front.” Everyone is friendly and polite. No cross words spoken or drunken behavior evident, although the rules are, no standing on the jukebox, bar, or tables. And no kissing on the lips. Leon, in the striped shirt above, told me he kissed his girlfriend and owner,  Tante Sue,  wapped him on the head with her “no kissing” stick.

These two out-of-town women have been friends for 55 years. The Justice Of The Peace, on the left, offered to marry Jim and I, and rescind it for no extra charge, but we declined.

Tante Sue keeps the whole shebang running. Between slapping beers on the bar, counting change, cleaning up a cans, bottles and glasses, she is known to break into dance with the music while playing the accordion on her shirt, reach in her holster for some “Hot Damn”, take a slug and yell “Quinta!” (which means Who Dat?) In fact, she sometimes tastes a new pint of Hot Damn before handing it over to the customer.

This couple pilgrimage to Fred’s twice a year. She once lived in Santa Barbara, CA for four years but couldn’t stay away from Louisiana. They have Targil’s Spices, you can order on line. Everyone is rooting for love-him-or-hate-him Shockey and the Saints, and gearing up for Mardi Gras.

I met Mikell above in line for the bathroom. She is almost ready for Mardi Gras and we coined some folksy wisdom, no matter where you are, be it fancy or folksy, women have to wait in line for the bathroom.