Tag: Breaux Bridge La.

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Shake Your Trail Feather: Paddle your way to a fun fundraiser on Bayou Teche, or even take the land route, you’ll still pass a good time

Bayou Teche gets specked in colorful watercraft during the Paddle Parade.

FYI: The Bayou Teche National Paddle Trail stretches from Port Barre to Patterson. That’s 135 miles and a heckuva lot of paddle strokes.

FYI: However, come Saturday, October 22, 2022, the TECHE Project’s Paddle Parade on the Teche, as part of its annual fundraiser, Shake Your Trail Feather, isn’t nearly the length of Louisiana’s sole National Paddle Trail.

FYI: In fact, you’ve got two paddling options: a 4.5 mi./2-hour paddle, or a 6.5 mi./2.45-hours.

FYI: No more FYIs, the story follows…

by DOMINICK CROSS/story & photos

BREAUX BRIDGE — Like all festivals and other fun-filled indoor/outdoor events and activities so far this year, Shake Your Trail Feather returns to full form and function on and along Bayou Teche at Parc des Ponts, Saturday, October 22, 2022.

The annual fundraising fete comes in two parts beginning with the morning Paddle Parade that gets rolling 9-ish a.m. with shuttle busing/registration and such. Paddlers will be serenaded by two bands, Amis du Teche and Cajun Fire, on two barges along the bayou route.

And then, along the banks of the bayou at Parc des Ponts, the party in the parc commences at 11 a.m. with lunch trucks, libations & beverages, merch sales, kids activities and catch some fine live music by Horace Trahan and the Ossun Express, from noon to 2 p.m.

The Mississippi Kite is the event’s bird this year. That means decorations, in some fashion or another to honor this small, but mighty bird of prey, will adorn the two music barges floating along with the aforementioned paddlers.

It is hoped that paddlers, as well as landlubbers in the parc, will costume themselves in Mississippi Kite regalia.

“Every year we have a theme bird. This year it’s Mississippi Kite,” said Patti Holland, executive director of the TECHE Project. “So we have Mississippi Kites that are going to be flying from the barges on strings on bamboo poles kind of hanging out there and some of them are going to be mounted on cypress.”

The decor will include moss and palmetto and feather boas.

“We’re giving out prizes for the best dressed birds,” Holland said. “So people should don their feathers and come shake them.”

Kayaks and canoes wrap-up their journey as the Paddle Parade comes to an end at Parc des Ponts in Breaux Bridge.

Some paddlers even decorate their kayaks and canoes.

A kayak raffle, courtesy of Pack & Paddle, will be held.

As of Tuesday, October 18, 2022, Holland said about 85 people have already registered for the Paddle Parade.

“We had 35 people show-up at the door last year,” said Holland. “So we had like 150 people registered last year. And we’re probably tracking to have about the same this year.”

At Shake Your Trail Feather, look for sticker decals to attach to a snake-shaped (like the bayou itself) outline on your kayak/canoe (as RVs do when camping around the country) to indicate where you’ve paddled, like, from, say, Breaux Bridge to Parks.

Also look for a Towns of the Teche poster “which is kind of cool,” said Holland. “It has symbols for the different towns on the Teche and has the cultural write-ups of the symbols that represent those towns.”

For example, Breaux Bridge is the crawfish; St. Martinville is the Evangeline Oak; and Arnaudville is Deux Bayous.

Paddling through COVID

The TECHE Project’s annual funder did paddle atop Bayou Teche during the COVID-19 pandemic the past two years, but stopped short of holding the terra firma activities because they’re smart like that.

“We missed the the Party in the Parc for two years,” Holland said. “But we did have the Paddle Parade both years because it was something that could be done outside and people could space.

“But you couldn’t do live music and serve alcohol and food for a couple of years,” she said, adding with much enthusiasm: “So we’re back in the parc.”

The pandemic was actually a boon to such outdoor activities.

A paddler sports a feathered hat as she got into the spirit of the Paddle Parade.

“Paddling took off during the pandemic. It was something people could do,” said Holland. “It’s relatively inexpensive to go out and buy a kayak and hit the water.

“It was good for the paddle culture,” she said. “I think RVs and paddling took off during the pandemic.”

Proceeds from the TECHE Project event go to building the Bayou Teche National Paddle Trail, which will provide access docks and other amenities for paddlers in the 15 towns along Bayou Teche.

Currently, 13 docks have been installed and there’s two more yet to do.

“One’s going go to Poche Bridge where the paddle starts off,” said Holland. “And the other one’s going in at Leonville.”

The organization has been in the dock-installation business some seven or eight years. When the remaining two are completed, one may wonder if Shake Your Trail Feather will continue.

“Hopefully,” Holland said. “The (Paddle) Parade has gained some momentum. So, yeah, I’d like to think that Shake Your Trail Feather is going to continue on and there’s always going to be amenities that we’re going need for the paddle trail.”

And these amenities would be kayak lockers, trash cans, benches, upkeep, etc.

“Even though we do turn them over to the towns for long-term ownership and maintenance, there’s always little ancillary things that the TECHE Project brings to the trailheads,” said Holland.

Paddle Parade particulars

Paddlers are asked to register before Saturday, October 22, 2022.

Tickets for either the shorter or longer paddle are the same price ($15 for adults and $10 for kids 12 and under). The day-of price will be $18 for adults and $12 for kids 12 and under. All tickets include a festival pin with this year’s bird, the Mississippi Kite.

There will be a pre-paddle shuttle ($5 cost at the bus) from each location. The shuttle bus leaves Lil’s on the Teche at 9 a.m. and Parc des Ponts at 9:15 a.m.

Please note that registration does not include kayak rental, lunch or shuttle. If you are interested in renting a boat with a life vest for the Paddle to the Party, contact Bayou Teche Experience, Pack and Paddle or The Backpacker.

The parade is limited to non-motorized watercraft.

TECHE Project

Overall, TECHE Project has been around since 2008 and has some 400 folks bent on making Bayou Teche a healthier waterway for the wild inhabitants in and around it, as well as for humans for fishing, kayaking, canoeing, boating, tubing and, yes, swimming.

These paddlers have left the Paddle Parade and are ready to check out the Party in the Parc.

As of 2021, 58 tons of trash and debris has been pulled from the Teche. So that, coupled with the docks, the rare National Paddle Trail designation, all put a smile on Holland’s face.

“I’m really amazed at what we’ve done,” said Holland. “We’re nearing completion on a first class paddle trail and we’ve got the only National Water Trail in the State of Louisiana and I think there’s only 33 nationwide.

“So that’s quite an accomplishment,” she said. “And we’ve kind of changed the mindset of people living and playing up and down the Teche to have more pride in Bayou Teche.

“The bayou’s much cleaner now than it used to be,” Holland said. “Now when we go out to collect garbage, there’s not that much out there.”

Twilight on the Teche

A TECHE Project membership party, Twilight on the Teche, is scheduled for November 5, 2022, 6-9 p.m., in New Iberia. Food, beer and wine are on tap.

The event is free for current members and $25 for those who want to join the nonprofit or renew their membership. Live music by David Greely and Chas Justus.

A pre-party Sunset Cocktail Cruise, 5-6 p.m., is $12. Tickets are limited and available on Eventbrite. RSVP: techeproject@gmail.com or 337.706.2323.

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Writing a poem is one thing; reading the poem aloud a different matter altogether

Toby Daspit and Liz Burk read their poetry Wednesday, 6-8 p.m., at Taunt Marie in Breaux Bridge, La. Open mic to follow.

by Dominick Cross

BREAUX BRIDGE — Writing a poem is one thing. Reading it aloud to an audience, another.

Liz Burk, who with fellow poet Toby Daspit, having done the former will do the latter, 6-8 p.m., today, July 27, 2022, at Tante Marie, 107 N Main St., Downtown Breaux Bridge. Sponsored by The Festival of Words Cultural Arts Collective, an open mic will follow their reading.

Burk explains the writing/reading distinction.

“It’s an enormous difference between writing and reading,” said Burk. “The reading is really a performance. Sometimes I even change it just a little bit so that it kind of reads easier to an audience.

“The writing involves different parts of your brain; it involves thought, you know, what do you want to say, what are you trying to create,” Burk said. “And once it’s written, then it’s a question of how are you going to read it.”

And the answer is: Find the groove.

Liz Burk

“People say that if you really want to know how good a poem is, the poet themselves should read it out loud to themselves because poetry, no matter how political and how didactic, it’s supposed to have a kind of rhythmic and musical quality to it,” said Burk. “And you really can’t tell about that until you read it out loud to yourself. If it doesn’t sound right, no matter what I’m saying in it, I have to go back and edit it.

“But the reading it aloud, even to one’s self, that’s not so much the performance part,” she said. “The performance is more when you read it to an audience and you slow down and you read it so that it’s understandable. But not everybody does.

“And I try to remember to do it that way,” Burk continued. “To read it out loud to yourself, you can see a lot of things that need editing.”

Burk has three books out and we may hear a couple of poems from the two earlier ones, Learning to Love Louisiana and Louisiana Purchase. There will also be new works in the reading.

“They’re mostly about how I ended up in Louisiana. Some of it is my reaction to Louisiana,” Burk said of her first two books.

In her third book, Duet, Burk wrote poetry based on photographs by her husband, Leo Touchet. (Editor’s note: A really cool concept that works.)

Burk has been writing poetry for two decades.

“I took my first writing class about 20 years ago,” said Burk. “Sometimes it feels like longer to me, but I didn’t write poetry up until then. After I finished my dissertation, I was done with putting words on paper for the next 40 years. You know, done with it.”

That all changed when she returned to school and enrolled in a writing class.

“Honestly, I didn’t think I was going to start writing poetry,” Burk said, adding she hadn’t read much poetry, nor was she an English major. “But poetry suited my short attention span. I was able to focus and pool that divergent mind into a straight and narrow path. So it worked well for me to tell my stories in poetry. That’s how I got to writing poetry.”

In addition to her three published collections, Burk’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Atlanta Review, Rattle, Calyx, Southern Poetry Anthology, Louisiana Literature, Passager, The Literary Nest, Pithead Chapel, PANK, and elsewhere.
Burk has now branched out into creative non-fiction, creative fiction.

“I’m writing prose,” she said. “Some people say my poems are so ‘prosey,’ I thought, well, I might just go ahead and write prose.”

As a result, “I write poems and I have too many words and I write prose and I don’t have enough words. So I’m kind of juggling between the two right now.”

The upside is that as COVID wanes, there’s no shortage of inspiration.

“Everything got kind of stale and dried up around COVID. We were just so isolated. I just really, during COVID, I wasn’t inspired. But now, I’m writing more now that I’m getting out and it feels like life is beginning again.”