Nacogdoches, Louisiana

The first thing you need to know is, it's pronounced "nack-a-tish."

Well, maybe you didn't need to know that, but I needed to tell you.  I like to pronounce words, especially names, correctly.  At least, as correctly as I can with my Texas twang.  I'm told it's not just a Texas twang, it's a Texas twang with a heap of country on top.  (I started to say I sound rural, but rural is one word I cannot pronounce to save my life.  Ties my tongue in knots every time.)

Now that's out of the way, maybe we can get on with this story.

We finally left home yesterday morning around 11:00.  (We were supposed to leave two weeks ago, but there have been issues...not really problems, just ... issues.)We drove through Palestine and Rusk, arriving at our destination, Ajax Country Livin' RV Park, around 7:30 last night.  We had never been through that part of Texas before, and we dearly love going down new (to us) roads.

The RV Park is great.  I wish we were staying longer than two nights here.  It's in the country, but just about half a mile from I-49.  It's small, it has a little lake (with a resident alligator, of course) and the people here are so friendly.  It's not fancy at all, but it has full hookups, and the space we are in, although grass, is perfectly level.  And roomy.  Tim's already been fishing twice, even though we spent most of today sightseeing.

Nacogdoches is an awesome, beautiful, quaint, wonderful town.  Like a little country New Orleans.  The historic district is right on the Cane River.  We spent a night here once about 15 years ago, and were told that the man who wrote Steel Magnolias was from here, and he wrote the play about his sister who died, and his mother and all her friends and how they supported each other.  Also, the movie was filmed here.

Here's a few photos I took with my little phone camera.  It's not a great camera, and I'm not a great photographer, but you can get some idea of the beauty of the town.

So so so so pretty!

Nacogdoches is famous for many things...several movies have been filmed here, it's the oldest town in Louisiana, it's on the Camino Real...but the thing the locals seem most proud of is .... the meat pasties.  Go figure.  They're like empanadas, only bland.  Besides, this town is very Cajun/Creole/French, for Pierre's sake, and I always thought pasties were kind of an Irish (maybe Cornish? or Welch?) kind of thing.  Whatever.  We ate lunch at Lasyone's Pastie Shop, one of the oldest restaurants in this old town.  I got the beef pastie, because the only other choice in pasties was -yuck- crawfish.  It was pretty good, but basically just a ground beef turnover.  No onions or veggies or much of anything in the way of seasoning.  But still, good.

Okay, I just looked up "pastie" on Wikipedia..."A pasty...(sometimes known in the United States as a pastie or British pasty) is a baked pastry, a traditional variety of which is particularly associated with Cornwall, the westernmost county in England.)

So.  Now we know.

After lunch we visited a couple of plantations.

This is Oakmont Plantation.  Look at those trees!

Here's some more of them.

And here's the Cowboy! He's excited to be here.  Really.  That is his excited face.

And here's me at Melrose Plantation.

That pretty much wraps up today.  Tomorrow is another travel day for us.  Hope everyone at home is well and happy.  As always, big thanks to our sweet daughter and son-in-law for watching the house and taking care of the animals while we're gone.  We couldn't do any of this if not for them.  We are very blessed indeed.