Have Books, Will Travel, Let's Eat!

It's about blooming time!

2012-02-27T12:25:00.000-08:00

As I write this, the azaleas bushes right outside my window are about ready to burst forth. It’s that awesome time of year, when colors explode in shades of pink, crimson and fushia all over the Deep South. Nothing quite matches the first blooms of spring, when the azaleas announce winter is over.

Here are a few places in Louisiana to visit where displays of azaleas are magnificent:

Avery Island

Most people recognize Avery Island as the tourist destination for Tabasco pepper products. Tourists can tour the Tabasco factory, but the companion 250-acre Jungle Gardens offers brilliant displays of azaleas as well. In addition, there are centuries-old oak trees laced in Spanish moss, thousands of snowy egrets in the “Bird City” rookery and a shrine with a Buddha as its centerpiece. The driving tour usually results in many gators sunning themselves along the pond and bayou banks so bring a camera. To enter Avery Island costs a dollar toll, and there’s a charge to tour Jungle Gardens.

Hodges Gardens State Park

More than 700 acres of gardens, both wild and cultivated, await visitors at this spot near Toledo Bend, south of Many. The gardens are a product of oilman A.J. Hodges Sr. who opened them to the public in 1956 and were later donated to the state as a park. They contain a variety of flowers, including azaleas, and a lake created from an abandoned quarry that pipes water through waterfalls and fountains throughout the property. In addition to the 5-mile walking trail, there are rental cabins, campsites and boats for use on the lake. For more information, call (800) 354-3523 or visit crt.state.la.us/parks/ihodges.aspx.

Shreveport

Heading to Shreveport to visit the impressive collections of the R.W. Norton Art Gallery, including the artworks of the American West, is reason enough. But the free gallery sits on 40 lovely wooded acres that includes extensive varieties of azaleas. These hundreds of native flowers bloom in a rainbow of colors as well, including red, yellow, orange, pink, purple, white and a mixture of many, and visitors can view them all via a walking path that includes a pond, a bridge over a stream and waterfall, benches and outdoor sculptures. If you visit Shreveport, be sure and stay overnight at one of its charming bed and breakfasts such as Fairfield Place, one of many historical properties in the city’s Fairfield-Highland district. You can even take a walk through the neighborhood and witness more azaleas — and other flowers — blooming, then enjoy a fabulous meal at one of the city’s landmark restaurants, Ristorante Giuseppi.

Centennial within a bicentennial

This year marks the bicentennial of Louisiana statehood, honoring our state’s entrance into the Union on April 30, 1812.

This year, in March, also marks the centennial of M.S. Rau Antiques, one of the most impressive antique dealerships in the United States, located within the French Quarter of New Orleans. Rau’s 25,000-square-foot store is the largest antique seller in North America by sales. Products include famous paintings, European furniture, classic jewelry and silver such as Paul Revere armorial coffee pots, among so much, much more.

This year the antique dealership will launch the Rau for Art Foundation, a non-for-profit program and art contest for New Orleans high school art students in the 10th to 12th grades. Prizes and scholarship money totaling $17,000 will be awarded to the winners and their high school art departments. Winners’ artwork will be exhibited at M.S. Rau Antiques and Fine Arts in March. For information, visit www.rauantiques.com.

Of Crafts, Coke and Cotton: Monroe joins the Louisiana Holiday Trail of Lights

2011-11-22T08:04:00.000-08:00

For years Shreveport-Bossier City and Natchitoches have teamed up with three east Texas towns for the annual Holiday Trail of Lights. This year, it’s all about the Bayou State, with Texas leaving the trail and Monroe, Minden and Alexandria joining the fun.

The 2011 trail makes a nice loop through the state with Natchitoches and its 85-year-old popular Christmas festival at the core. On its left flank will be Monroe, which offers a unique holiday experience.

Christmas on the River will be a month-long holiday celebration that includes both Monroe and West Monroe, each facing the sleepy Ouachita River. Here will be dancing lights along Antique Alley (a great place to find unique items at great prices), a downtown gallery crawl, the fourth annual Bawcomville Redneck Christmas Parade along with a parade sponsored by the Kiwanis Club and a pet parade, chili cook-off, theatrical performances, fireworks and much more.

The Children’s Museum will transform into a Santa’s Christmas Village with photos with Santa and snow falling, letters to Santa at the Peppermint Post Office, a place for children to create ornaments and a store to purchase gifts for family. In addition, there’s ice skating outside. Admission is only $5, $10 for ice skating.

The Biedenharn Museum and Gardens has built by Joseph Biedenham, the first bottler of Coca-Cola. His daughter Emy-Lou, a European opera singer, lived in the home for years, creating a beautiful garden and conservatory out back. Today, the house and garden is open for tours, along with the Bible Museum next door (Emy-Lou collected Bibles and the museum exhibits both hers and traveling displays) and the Coca-Cola Museum on the corner with its Model T delivery truck, memorabilia and machines that sell the beverage for 5 cents.

Christmas at the Biedenharn will include unique decorations of each room throughout the month of December. There will be a Chamber Arts Brass Christmas Concert on Dec. 6 in the fountain room and an open house Dec. 8-10. The Coca-Cola Museum also has a gift shop with wonderful unique gift items, not to mention a fabulous artistic nativity.

I mentioned shopping on Antique Alley — there are numerous antique shops in the Cotton Port Historic District of West Monroe, and they vary from collectibles and Americana to 18^th and 19^th century furniture. Since I like to include a book to enjoy in travels, I recommend Memory Lane Antiques with its extensive collection of old books, many Victorian with gilded covers and unique illustrations. I found an old copy of Longfellow’s “Evangeline” with photos of Nova Scotia and the original Cajun homesteads, plus a Golden Book of “Rudolph” — remember that one?

As for a great place to eat, don’t miss Cotton, formerly known as Coda Bar & Grill, run by Chef Cory Bahr, a recent Louisiana Cookin’ Chef to Watch and winner of the Louisiana Seafood competition. The restaurant, with its menu of exquisite boudin balls, red bean hummus, creamy shrimp and grits, tender pork loin and so much more, is housed in the second oldest building in Monroe.

For more information on the holiday festivities, visit www.christmastontheriver.org or call (318) 387-5691.

A golden weekend in Dahlonega

2011-10-03T14:47:00.000-07:00

Thefirst thing I needed to do upon visiting Dahlonega, a quaint town north ofAtlanta in Georgia’s sleepy Appalachian mountains, is learn how to pronouncethe name. Da-lon-a-ga was named for the Cherokee word Talonega meaning“golden.”

Thesecond thing I learned was that Dahlonega was the site of the first major U.S.gold rush, in 1828, hence the name.

Celebratingthis discovery of gold in them golden Georgia hills is the 54th annual Jaycees GoldRush Days Festival Oct. 15-16, 2011. The two-day event will feature livemusical performances by Lonesome Road Bluegrass Band, Kayla Armstrong andHeather Faraday; more than 300 arts and crafts exhibits; children’s activities;food and a 3 p.m. Saturday parade through downtown.

Accordingto the Jaycees press release, festivities kick off around 9 a.m. each day andwill include a number of special performances, such as Scotsmen playingtradition bagpipes on the square on Saturday. Festivities include a fashionshow, treasure hunt, hog calling contest and a clogging contest where at 2 p.m.Saturday the clogging king and queen will be crowned.

Ifyou can’t make the festival, be sure and visit the Dahlonega Gold Museumlocated in the courthouse in the center of town. Visitors will find acomprehensive film that explains the gold rush days and the formation of thetown, plus exhibits on the history of Dahlonega.

Visitorscan also pan for gold at the The Crisson Gold Mine, which dates back to 1847.It’s open every day but Christmas.

Outsideof its golden heritage, Dahlonega is home to luxurious day spas, wineries,places to enjoy horseback riding and canoeing, accommodations that range fromthe Smith House Hotel with a gold mine in its basement and the elegant suites of the Park Place Hotel (shown below) to hidden cabins andretreats in the mountains. Dahlonega is also close to the beginning of theAppalachian Trail and a great place for hiking and backpacking.

Theperfect book for a trip to Dahlonega, especially during the haunting days ofOctober, is “Dahlonega Haunts” by Amy Blackmarr. The book lists homes andbusinesses where folks refuse to leave with Blackmarr explaining the storiesand psychic R. Brian Keith giving his take on the spirits. It’s an entertainingread and a great way to learn about the area.

For information about Gold RushDays, visit www.dahlonegajaycees.com.For information on the Golden City, visit www.Dahlonega.orgor www.facebook.com/DestinationDahlonega.

Come home to Museum of Appalachia

2011-09-16T09:33:00.000-07:00

John Rice Irwin would travel theTennessee countryside spying historic buildings, machinery and other objects that told the history of the Volunteer State.He would stop and offer the owners money for their possessions, eventuallycollecting more than 250,000 pioneer relics.

Today, these historic objects and 30 logstructures make up the Museum of Appalachia on 65 acres outside Oak Ridge,Tenn. Not only does this awe-inspiring museum complex offer the public and visiting schoolchildren an authentic peek into Appalachian life, it sets the stage for one ofthe country’s best fall festivals.

The Museum of Appalachia’s 32nd annualTennessee Fall Homecoming will be Oct. 7-9, 2011, with five stages featuring some400 musicians playing traditional tunes from “Wildwood Flower” to “WabashCannonball.” New to this year’s Homecoming is the Carter Family III (shown above right), playingold Carter tunes as well as new songs. The band, which rarely tours, includesJohn Carter Cash (Johnny & June Carter Cash’s son), his wife Laura Cash andDale Jett (Janette Carter’s son). Also making their Homecoming debut are theSteep Canyon Rangers, the 2006 IBMA Emerging Artist of the Year, and the Roys.

Returning to the stage are the JohnHartford String Band, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Blue Moon Rising, DixieGray, Southern Raised, Cody Shuler & Pine Mountain Railroad, the ClusterPluckers, Lilies of the West, and the Quebe Sisters Band which features threesisters playing triple fiddles.

Authors appearing include BillLandry with “Appalachian Tales & Heartland Adventures,” John Carter Cashwith his new book “House of Cash,” Randy Rudder with “Chicken Soup for theSoul: Country Music: The Inspirational Stories behind 101 of Your FavoriteCountry Songs” and Jill Peterson, who founded the magazine, A Simple Life, willpresent her new cookbook, “Simple Cooking for a Simple Life.”

Advance Homecoming tickets can bepurchased through Sept. 21 at a discounted rate; call 865-494-7680 or visitmuseumofappalachia.org. The Museum is located on I-75 at exit 122, then onemile east.

About Oak Ridge, Tennessee

When the U.S. government realizedGermany was developing an atom bomb during World War II, they turned the 59,000acres of sleepy farmland in middle Tennessee into the city of Oak Ridge where 75,000civilians and military would enrich uranium, the element needed to fuel a bombof our own. This “City Behind a Fence” secretly operated for three years aspart of the Manhattan Project before the bomb was dropped on Japan. Many of itsresidents didn’t know what they were creating until the news followed after Hiroshima.

Theincredible legacy of Oak Ridge remains today, with the government facility ofOak Ridge National Laboratory. And although technological breakthroughscontinue with the new Spallation Neutron Source at the laboratory, thecommunity of Oak Ridge extends far beyond its atomic inception.

Places to visit in Oak Ridge include:

American Museum of Science &Energy (shown left) — naturally a science museum in a city full of physicists and scientistswould be well-funded and highly creative, a perfect jumping off spot to learnabout Oak Ridge’s scientific history, plus the museum offers tram tours to takevisitors inside the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Children’s Museum of Oak Ridge islocated within an old elementary school building and every corner provides animaginative experience.

Secret City Scenic Excursion Traintakes visitors inside the original Oak Ridge atomic laboratory in a fun,relaxing train ride.

Green McAdoo Cultural Center (shown right) honors12 African American high school students who were the first to attend adesegregated state-supported high school in the South.

Norris Dam was the first dam builtin the Tennessee Valley Authority system and its location was one of the reasonswhy Oak Ridge was chosen for the Manhattan Project.

For information on Oak Ridge, Tenn., visit the Oak Ridge Convention and Visitors Bureau at http://oakridgevisitor.com/.

Crystal digging in Mt. Ida, Arkansas

2011-08-19T15:20:00.000-07:00

I was on my way to Eureka Springs, leaving out of Lafayette, Louisiana, a long drive that’s hard to make in one day. I looked on the map hoping to find a nice halfway spot to rest my head — maybe Little Rock — when Mt. Ida caught my eye.

On a previous trip to Hot Springs, Arkansas, I had stopped at Crater of Diamonds State Park, the only place in America where diamonds have been found. The state park lets visitors dig through the dirt in the hopes of finding diamonds — and some have. The time I visited I didn’t find anything resembling a diamond. However, I did notice that some local merchants had gorgeous quartz crystals on display. I was told that nearby Mt. Ida offered several quartz crystal mines where visitors could try their luck.
So this time traveling through the great state of Arkansas, I stopped at the “Quartz Crystal Capital of the World.” There are several places in and around Mt. Ida that allow visitors inside private “mines” to search for quartz crystals. There are even more places where crystals and other rocks and minerals can be bought. For a complete list of both, visit the Mt. Ida Chamber of Commerce Web site. I arrived late in the afternoon and during an intense dry spell with temperatures hovering around 110, so chose the latter, purchasing six beautiful specimens for $20 from a roadside vendor named John Hashim.

Feeling pleased with myself I took my lovely crystals and spent the night at the Royal Oak Inn, a comfortable and clean motel in Mt. Ida with a refreshing pool, lots of ice and great customer service for only $39.95 a night.

Mt. Ida is also known for its live music Friday and Saturday nights on the steps of its historic courthouse. Known as The Front Porch Stage, the event hosts bands such as the Arkansas Trainwreck and Happenstance, with a web page honoring a possum queen and declaring itself “mercifully free of the ravages of intelligence.”

If you’re really into digging for crystals, you might want to try your hand at Mt. Ida’s 25th Annual World’s Championship Quartz Crystal Dig Oct. 13-15, 2011. Diggers choose from four working mines, keep what they dig and compete in cash prizes for the biggest crystals. In addition, there will be a gem and mineral show, quilt show and craft show.

Note: If you want to dig for crystals, wear clothes you don’t mind getting stained or that can be thrown away. Same goes for shoes; the sturdier the better. Some mines are kid friendly, some aren’t, so it’s best to visit the individual web sites.

Take 5 Houston - Spots to Cool Off for Free

2011-07-19T10:54:00.000-07:00

1. Along the MetroRail in downtown Houston there are places where water is spritzed into the air, falling along the rail tracks in graceful arcs. We don’t encourage people to get anywhere near the MetroRail tracks (PLEASE DON'T!) but pedestrians and bikers in the area will experience a nice wet breeze walking by at the Main Street Square stop, in addition to other water features along the MetroRail's route.

2. Discovery Green downtown includes a massive splash fountain that’s usually full of kids running through but don’t let your age stop you from enjoying this incredible fountain that makes cooling off so much fun. The water emerges in spurts, but in syncopated times, leaving you guessing which is part of its fun.

3. The Williams Waterwall near the Galleria rises above the Gerald D. Hines Waterwall Park as a multi-story horseshoe-shaped fountain. It’s both cooling and dramatic (we’re talking TALL) and makes for a great day trip. Visitors can enjoy a picnic in the park, then cool off by the waterfall. Be sure and bring a towel, you will get wet enough.

4. The Buddy Carruth Playground for All Children is a massive playground within Hermann Park that offers a handicap accessible playground with interactive water play area that’s fabulous. This is a must for young children, but that didn’t stop us adults from jumping in with our kids.

5. We probably shouldn’t mention Tranquility Park downtown because more than likely jumping in this collection of fountains is frowned upon, but on the many visits we’ve had to Houston, particularly in the summer when heat indexes soar, we’ve seen lots of people cooling off in this oasis amid the concrete. Just to be on the safe side, we’ll not post a photo. But here’s another hint, there are fountains all over Houston and if you’re brave enough to “fountain jump,” you can start with Tranquility Park and spend all day visiting others.

Hip Houston

2011-07-13T09:29:00.000-07:00

In only a few years Downtown Houston has reinvented itself. Once a place to do business during daylight hours, in addition to some nightlife and the Astros, today downtown Houston owns a thriving shopping and dining scene, the remarkable, sustainable Discovery Green park and hip new places to live and stay overnight.

The new EmbassySuites is a prime example, sporting fun colors and modern furniture and designs, plus complementary amenities of free Wifi, manager’s reception at night and a full “cooked-to-order” breakfast with friendly, helpful staff. The hotel features 262 all-suite rooms in this hip high-rise, with a sitting area separate from the bedroom, both very comfortable and arranged to accommodate any mood, whether business, entertaining or a family gathering. All rooms offer a kitchenette, sofa bed, MP3 connections and flat-screen TVs with HBO and Showtime.

Swim through fountains in the indulgent pool or soak in the terrace spa, both of which overlook Discovery Green, the George Brown Convention Center and Minute Maid Park, or work out in the 24-hour fitness center. A shuttle is available to take visitors throughout the downtown area until about 10 p.m. each night.

Because of the location, visitors should take advantage of Discovery Green and its almost daily activities, whether learning yoga or zumba or listening to a free concert. Also close by is Houston Pavilions, Houston’s Theatre District (fourth largest in the country) and Bayou Place. Houston Pavilions is home to many dining options, including the House of Blues. Since we arrived mid-afternoon, we voted for Guadalajara, another colorful hip spot downtown, and its Happy Hour, enjoying margaritas and appetizers for a discount.

Along that vein I would recommend “Houston Classic Mexican Recipes” by Erin Hicks Miller (Pelican Publishing), a collection of recipes from the city’s many great Mexican and Tex-Mex restaurants.