Monday was the last day of our trip. It was a high of 73°, so by far the nicest day of our trip. It felt AMAZING. I even wore the sandals I had packed!
We
got up at 9, packed up, said goodbye to our cottage, and loaded the car. 
Then we drove down to
the gift shop/restaurant area where we had our complimentary breakfast.
We could order anything off the breakfast menu. Adam had an omelet with
grits, a biscuit and coffee.
I had a crawfish omelet with etoufee sauce
on the side (it was supposed to be on top, but I hate celery), grits, a
biscuit and orange juice. It was nothing special but nice.
Then
we went and checked out of our cottage at the office and bought our
"discounted as cottage guests" tour tickets. We were not impressed with
the discount - $19 each instead of $20. What savings!
The tour lasted 45 minutes and was
of the first two floors. Unfortunately, it was a really big tour group
with a large foreign group that talked loudly amongst themselves the
whole tour which was quite distracting. Even when the guide stopped
talking multiple times because of them, they still just didn't get it.
The view from the veranda was amazing!
The
house wasn't all that impressive, but the grounds made it worth it. I
was fascinated to find out that the house had been abandoned for many
years. During Reconstruction following the Civil War, it was sold at
auction for a very low price. Subsequent owners could not keep it up,
and it fell into disrepair. By the time it was bought and restored in
1925, the entire first floor had been taken over by cattle. The original
marble floors were destroyed.
Before leaving, Adam got a refreshing mint julep. I hate mint and bourbon, so none for me!
This plantation was a Creole plantation, which made it very different than Oak Alley which was an Anglo plantation. The Creoles were the people who had lived in Louisiana before it was part of the U.S., and they were heavily influenced by the French. Creole plantations had colorful raised big houses and could even be run by a woman; as was the case at Laura. Since the plantation was owned by the same family for many years, they have a lot of info on their history which makes for a fascinating tour.
They still grow produce in the gardens, and give it to their visitors and staff. We had some of the oranges!
It was an hour and a half long, but seemed much shorter as we toured the big house, grounds, gardens, and slave quarters. Laura Plantation actually has preserved a few of their slave cabins. Interestingly, the Br'er Rabbit and Br'er Fox tales were said to be first collected at this plantation and then written down.
We
left the plantation around 2:30 and took the River Road back towards
New Orleans. Along the way, we went by Evergreen Plantation where parts
of Django Unchained was filmed and I snapped a few photos.
I also snapped photos of the interesting scenery like sugarcane fields,
abandoned buildings,
other plantations,
the industrialization along the river,
and the giant bridge we went over.
Then
we made a brief stop at Destrehan Plantation just outside of the New
Orleans suburbs. It was beautiful! I wish we would have had time to take
a tour.
We grabbed a quick lunch at Taco Bell on our
way to the airport, and turned in our rental. For once we actually
checked a bag so we could bring back some hot sauce. At least it doesn't
cost anything because we have the Delta AmEx.
Our
flight was at 5:50, and we were a little late to get home because of
congestion at MSP (we were descending forever). Curt and Chester picked
us up at the airport at 8:50. It was so nice to see the little guy!
Stef - all the info on the Laura tour, seeing Destrehan, warm weather!
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