Explore Louisiana’s Cajun Country: Beyond Gumbo and Gators

Most travelers come to southern Louisiana expecting to find gumbo, accordions, and maybe a few gators. However, the mix is far richer.

The southwestern region of Louisiana is officially called Acadiana, but when I told people I was planning a road trip there, I found myself saying, “I’m going to Cajun country.” I was drawn to the region’s heritage and hoped to enjoy authentic Cajun food, listen to zydeco music, and maybe explore the nearby swamps. What I didn’t expect was the soul-stirring natural beauty and a unique community, with a layered history that continues to thrive and adapt.

I was traveling with my friend Katherine, who lives in New Orleans. Together, we set off on the three-hour drive to Lafayette Parish, which welcomes roughly 3 million visitors each year. Here, in the center of Acadiana, there are weekly Rendez-vous des Cajins concerts featuring the region’s fiddle-and-accordion-driven music, along with cultural events like the Festivals Acadiens et Créoles.

Interestingly, Canadians comprise the largest group of international visitors, which makes sense considering the history. The word Cajun is an anglicization of Acadien, the French Catholic ethnic group expelled from eastern Canada by the British in the 18th century during what became known as Le Grand Dérangement, or the Great Upheaval. Thousands ended up on the bayous of Catholic, French-speaking Louisiana.

Our first stop was Vermilionville, located on the outskirts of Lafayette. This living-history museum showcases the groups that resided along Bayou Vermilion in the late 18th and 19th centuries. In the old schoolhouse, Katherine and I were surprised to see the chalkboard filled with the repeated line, “I will not speak French on the school grounds.” Evidently, the current celebration of Cajun culture is a renaissance, a response to a time when that heritage was denigrated. (English was mandatory in Louisiana public schools from 1921 until 1974, causing a significant decline in the number of native French speakers by 2010.) Today, there is a concerted effort to revive the culture and language, even the Acadian brown cotton spun by the refugees.

However, while the Acadian experience is a vital story, it’s not the whole picture. Outsiders often conflate Cajun and Creole cultures (and cuisines) of Louisiana, and it’s evident that the definitions can be quite nuanced. In Louisiana, the term Creole refers to “the children of the colonies”—the descendants of those who lived in the area during European colonial rule. Vermilionville is a site of many histories: Native American, French, Spanish, and West African.

D’Jalma Garnier III, a Creole musician at Vermilionville, noted, “The Acadians didn’t get here until 1764. People think gumbo is Cajun,” he added. “It’s from Senegal! Gumbo comes from the West African word for okra.” Before European colonization, Louisiana was home to more than a dozen tribes, including the Chitimacha and Choctaw. The French brought enslaved Africans, who were forced to work in the indigo and tobacco fields alongside captive native peoples. Regardless of whether they were there by choice or by force, each group contributed its own traditions to Louisiana, creating something entirely new—something Garnier referred to as creolizing. “I like to spread our créolité,” he said, playing a Creole tune with “clear Caribbean African” roots.

Unique Views of Beautiful Louisiana Bayous

Much like Creole music, the rest of our trip was partly improvised. We embarked on an airboat ride on the bayou—having signed a waiver absolving our guides of responsibility for the actions of mosquitoes, alligators, and Asian carp, known to jump out of the water and into your lap. What struck me even more than airborne fish was the serene beauty of the Atchafalaya Swamp—the country’s largest wetland, located between Lafayette and Baton Rouge. The sound of flapping alerted us to the presence of egrets, their flight rippling the reflection of cypress trees in the water.

We continued our nature adventure at Rip Van Winkle Gardens, 15 acres of semitropical parkland on the banks of Lake Peigneur, located a half-hour south of Lafayette. This area is home to roseate spoonbills, white egrets, and peacocks. Notably, the gardens also include an 1870 Steamboat Gothic-style house built for Joseph Jefferson, an actor who gained fame touring the country in an adaptation of the Rip Van Winkle story. The gardens are truly located on Jefferson Island—one of five salt domes, mounds of minerals pushing up through the sedimentary rock, that are connected to the shore of the lake. Some of these mounds formed traps for oil and natural gas. In 1980, a salt mine under Jefferson Island collapsed after being punctured by a Texaco drilling rig. The Jefferson home was spared, but as Lake Peigneur drained into the breached mine, it created a whirlpool that swallowed up another house built on its banks. Today, only the house’s chimney remains, rising mournfully out of the water.

The next evening, at the Wednesday Cajun Jam at the Blue Moon Saloon in Lafayette, fiddlers and accordionists accompanied a young woman singing in French while Katherine accepted an invitation to dance from an older gentleman. It turned out he was an engineer who had come to the area in 1970 to work for Morton Salt and remembered the day the dome collapsed. This experience left me with a sense that Acadiana is a place where the past and present coalesce beautifully.

We spent our last day kayaking among the tupelo and cypress on Lake Martin, guided by Janenne deClouet, founder of Duc in Altum tours and a paddling philosopher who believes in the healing power of nature. “It’s kind of a ministry,” she said of guiding kayakers. “You get people out into Creation and see them rest.” As we paddled, she pointed out alligators, egrets, and duck blinds, then drew our attention to a leaning cypress that formed a sort of arch. “I call this the torii gate of the lake.”

It eerily echoed the bright red, and entirely real, Shinto gate we had seen at Jungle Gardens on Avery Island, another salt dome about an hour south of Lafayette. (It’s most famous for being home to the Tabasco factory, with the torii leading the way to a 900-year-old Buddha—a gift to hot-sauce scion Edward Avery McIlhenny in 1936.) “When you pass through the torii,” deClouet remarked, “you let something go that has been weighing you down.”

Once a year, deClouet helps lead the Eucharistic boat procession along nearby Bayou Teche, celebrating the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. Acadiana is deeply attached to the Catholic faith of its French forebears—yet the ancient Buddha appears to be perfectly at home here too. We set out to learn one people’s story and instead discovered something richer: that everywhere we went and everyone we met was a living embodiment of this region’s créolité.

Cajun Country Must-Sees

Where to Stay

For a memorable night in Lafayette, a city of 125,000 at the heart of Acadiana, consider staying at the food-focused Maison Madeleine just outside town. Don’t miss the Jesus Bar, a cocktail spot filled with Catholic icons occupying an outbuilding on the property. Near Avery Island, Olive Branch Cottages, formerly housing cane cutters, offers a canoe for paddling on Bayou Teche.

Where to Eat and Drink

In Lafayette, the elegant Café Vermilionville features classic dishes like alligator Dijon and duck roulade. The Cajun Jam at the Blue Moon Saloon is the place to be on Wednesdays. For a modern twist on Cajun cuisine, check out Café Sydnie Mae in Breaux Bridge. Near Abbeville, close to Avery Island, Suire’s Grocery is a nostalgic plate-lunch general store famous for its turtle sauce picante and pecan pies.

What to Do

Rip Van Winkle Gardens presents a fascinating aspect of Jefferson Island history, where you can even rent a cottage and enjoy the sight of peacocks outside your window. Jungle Gardens on Avery Island is renowned for birdwatching and wildlife. Experience the bayou with McGee’s Louisiana Swamp & Airboat Tours, offering airboat, motorboat, and canoe tours led by knowledgeable Cajun guides. Duc in Altum facilitates small-group kayaking excursions and photography tours. Lastly, to gain an immersive understanding of Acadiana’s multifaceted past, the living-history museum at Vermilionville is an essential stop.