Avery Island, LA to Livingston, TX

I couldn't sleep so I'm up at 3 am and decided to post my blog for the day. Here's a couple of photos from the day before crossing the mighty Mississippi River by Baton Rouge. Pretty nice.


Up early yesterday and drove to Avery Island to tour the Tabasco Pepper Sauce plant. We wanted to get there when they opened so we could get back to the rig, hitch up and start driving. Oh, but the gate keeper at Avery Island said we couldn't even enter Avery Island until 9 am, so we had to turn around and sit on the side of the road just in front of the gate for 20 minutes - ugh!
The batteries on Lesle's camera died so this picture is for her to copy for her blog - here you go Lesle.

Then Jim and I got into the action....notice I had to get on my tippy toes to be able to see over the sign. I use to be 5'3" - I was too!
Today they were bottling and that was fascinating to watch. There are only four fill lines and all Tabasco bottling is done here at Avery Island although they ship to many countries of the world. They fill 7,000 bottles a day. Here the bottles are being filled with Garlic Tabasco and it is going to Brazil.

Of course we ended at the gift store and sampled Tabasco ice cream, salsa, etc. Everything possible to manufacture with the Tabasco logo is here including a regular, old Acme comb with the simple word Tabasco on it for $1.99. We did buy a few things like more wood chips made from the barrels the pepper mash is fermented in for 3 years. It makes a nice smoke for barbequing. And I got to eat a link of boudin (bou'den). It's a pork liver and rice sausage in a casing made with hot spices. It is steamed and reminds me of the Polish liver sausage I ate as a child. Yummo!

Back to the park and hitched up our rigs and took off for Texas. We wanted

to avoid driving on I-10 in Louisiana (very rough) so we drove northwest on Hwy 190 West. Thought we'd stop in Newton or Jasper for the night, but it started to rain hard, so we decided to drive on to Livingston. Along the way we came upon this huge - I mean huge piece of machinery being escorted down the road by a state patrol car as it was half again wider than one lane. Never could figure out what it was or its use, just knew oncoming vehicles were sure moving over and stopping until we all drove by.

Along the way we saw rice fields - never new Texas grew rice.

Texas bluebonnets are in bloom. They really are lovely.

On our last leg into Livingston we saw a couple of interesting things. Here is a cute old-fashioned gas station with modern gas pumps. And when was the last time you saw diesel selling for the same price as regular unleaded? That is not an old photo - I took it yesterday! And to think when we left South Fork, Colorado, last July we paid $5.24 a gallon for diesel.




We made it to Livingston by 5pm in a slight rain, but we got set up quickly and then went out for Chinese. Livingston is the headquarters for the Escapees RV Club so for us it feels like we are coming home to the Mother House. It's been 2 1/2 since we have been here and is nice to be back.

Remember - you are loved!