Family Fun

Airboat Adventures, Lafitte

BRING THE ENTIRE FAMILY

by Dawn Reiss

We are hunting for gators. The kind that live in the bayou, lurking in cypress swamps and like to be fed marshmallows.

When the alligators hear the sounds of pontoons and airboats running, they know visitors are coming.

For now, our pontoon at Airboat Adventures is simply trying to leave the dock in Lafitte, Louisiana.

“In the event you drop your cell phone or camera in the water takin’ a picture of the wildlife out there, please get my attention as quickly as possible,” says Earl “T-Earl” Polkey, the 6-foot-9 captain of our boat. “That way I can tell everyone else to wave bye-bye to your phone.”

The crowd laughs.

Recently, the crew set a new record of losing 17 cell phones during four tours.

“I’m gonna get y’all some gators guys,” he tells us, as the crowd cheers.

Polkey has been navigating this swamp since he was 8 ½ years old. He grew up here trapping muskrats, minks and alligators, anything he says to help put food on the table to help his mom and dad.

The last time he got bit by an alligator, Polkey says it cost him 72 stitches and three days in the ICU.

“We can’t stop ourselves,” Polkey says. “We see an alligator we want to play with them.”

As the boat glides deeper in the Barataria Bayou, French lyrics by Jamie Bergeron and the Kickin’ Cajuns croon in the background. We ride in the bow of the boat, looking out over the water’s edge, admiring the Spanish moss hanging down from the cypress trees and the lime-colored duckweed.

“Hey, look,” my son shouts, as he spots a gator zig-zagging through the water.

Then he sees another. >>

Airboat Adventures, Lafitte

“He’s the gator spotter,” someone says to me. “We need someone like that.”

Polkey stops the boat.

He hands my son a marshmallow to throw in the water. With his left hand, my son tosses it in as an alligator catches it, in its mouth.

“Yeah,” my son shouts. “He ate it.”

Polkey moves to the other side of the boat. “Do you know what that is,” he asks an unsuspecting passenger.

“Oh, my,” she says, as she turns to see an alligator swimming towards the boat.

Polkey opens the metal side gate and leans over the water as he kisses the alligator on its head.

“Why do you think we call it Airboat Adventures,” he says with a laugh.

More marshmallows are tossed. Eventually, the boat moves into other parts of the swamp. Shows like “NCSI: New Orleans,” “True Blood,” “True Detective,” and movies like “Interview with a Vampire” and Disney’s “The Princess and the Frog” have been filmed here.

Moved by the Zydeco music, my son decides to dance on the boat. Flipping his legs up into the air, he kicks and spins around on the metal floor, much to the delight of other passengers who clap for him.

After nearly two hours on the boat, we head back to the dock. My son high-fives “T-Earl” and heads inside the gift shop to see “Sugar” a rare albino alligator.

Later in the day, we return to Airboat Adventures for a private ride on an airboat. There are larger varieties, but this one is perfect for my son, who has just turned 5. He doesn’t want to go too fast. This captain takes it slow and eventually opens it up so we are flying across the water after my son asks to go faster again.

We wanted our Louisiana trip to be filled with off-the-beaten-path experiences. It’s hard to believe this swamp is only 35 minutes south of New Orleans. As we later learn, Jefferson Parish is the largest county (parish) in Louisiana, in terms of land. There’s a west bank and east bank that divides Jefferson Parish on either side of the Mississippi River.

Here on the west bank, we take a rangerguided “wetlands walk” through the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve’s Barataria Preserve that’s part of the National Park Service. From the visitor’s center, there’s a plank wooden trail that wanders directly over the water through

NOLA Motorsports Park, Avondale. Jean Lafitte National Historical

Park & Preserve, Marrero.

swamps and marsh. There’s a junior ranger program where my son earns a wooden badge after playing bingo with plants and animals he discovered on our hike.

Being below sea level, the alligators duck in and out under the boardwalk when they don’t like to be disturbed. Here, wildlife is not to be fed or disturbed. Massive black grasshoppers nearly as large as my hand cling to mangrove trees near flowering buttonbush plants that look magical with their white poof-ball-like wands.

We opt for lunch in historic town of Gretna to feast on crawfish queso and a sloppy roast beef po’boy at Gattuso’s. It’s the best we’ve ever had. Nearby there’s an 1859 firehouse, home to the oldest, continuously active volunteer fire company in the United States.

A day later, we head to “The Pen,” a 4-mile long rectangular-shaped lake off the Barataria Waterway. It once was farmland. Now it is a fishing oasis filled with redfish, flounder, drum, channel cats, blue crabs, alligators and shrimp. In Southeast Louisiana, this is the place to come. Locals will tell you one day the fish won’t stop biting and the next they cease to exist.

We hop into a boat with Kody Slocum from Jean Lafitte Harbor Charters. The harbor is one of the largest full-service marinas in the state.

After making our way out, we find open water.

“Let’s go in the front, bud, me and you,” Slocum tells my son. He casts it for him. “Let it drop to the bottom,” Slocum says. “Let it get a tight line until you feel something tug.”

“I can feel bluegills tug,” my son says. But this isn’t like fishing in Wisconsin.

“There ain’t going to be no bluegills here,” Slocum says. “This is going to be a little bit harder bite. You’ve got to hold on or they’ll take you for a ride, okay?”

He gets a fish on the line, but it gets off. Soon, a shrimper, Bruce Roquille, shows up in a flatbottom fishing boat. He shows us his basket of shrimp he’s caught with his net. With the full moon, the last five days have been a “shrimp moon” he says, because the shrimp migrate with the stronger currents of falling tides.

“Just like a new moon,” Roquille says. “Only you can’t see them then because it’s dark.” Soon afterwards, I get a Black Drum on the line. I fight with it. It’s big at 16-inches, but nothing like the 32-inch Black Drum my partner, Jim, soon gets. He >>

Westwego Shrimp Lot.

Jean Lafitte Harbor Charters.

Deanie’s Seafood, Bucktown/Metairie.

fights with it back and forth. Sweating and reeling.

“That’s the good fight right there, this is what you want,” says Slocum as he reaches for a net. “Lift up and reel. Lift up and reel.”

Minutes tick by. Eventually, he reels it in as Slocum scoops up the drum in his net. They highfive each other.

“Yeah, Daddy,” our son cheers. “Let’s keep it.”

Our adventures continue as each day passes. We don helmets and race go-karts at Nola Motorsports Park in Avondale. With more than 80 track configurations (including a .95-mile SKUA Pro Circuit) on 30 acres of track, it’s the largest karting track in North America.

It’s blazing fast. After 10-laps around, we get our scores and step onto a podium honoring gold, silver and bronze finishers. We visit the Speed Shop with its Porsche showroom and fully functional mechanic shop. My son proclaims he wants the Yokohama-sponsored No. 77 “tigertoothed” Porsche, as I remind him to “not touch anything” while taking a picture.

After visiting the Westwego Shrimp Lot, where seafood is brought in daily, we stop at Segnette Landing for lunch. My son, who adores Raising Cane’s French fries—one of the few things he can eat out because of his food allergies— enjoys fresh fruit and fries, while we nosh on flaky crawfish pie, crab cakes and scrumptious bread pudding that makes us want more. Outback, there’s a patio to view alligators swimming or visitors can jump on a swamp boat tour.

We head north to the East Bank of Jefferson Parish. In Metairie, we visit the 155-acre Lafreniere Park, Jefferson Parish’s largest East Bank Park with its 20-acre lagoon, an old-time carousel and 18-hole disc golf course. We grab a sno-ball—finely shaved block ice that’s infused with flavors like strawberry, cantaloupe or the stuffed variety made with chocolate and condensed milk poured over on top.

We grab charbroiled oysters, crabmeat au gratin and carrot soufflé at the original Deanie’s just blocks away from the Bucktown Marsh Boardwalk on Lake Pontchartain. Another night, we are pleasantly surprised by the upscale food and great service at the Boulevard American Bistro in Elmwood with its house made cream spinach dip and tender Cajun-seasoned grilled redfish.

We visit the Kenner Planetarium and Space Science Complex in the historic district of Rivertown. It’s a hidden gem, a trifecta that combines a science center with dig-for-dinosaur bones, electricity, bugs and bicycling-with-askeleton exhibits, with a space-themed section that includes a mini shuttle launch vehicle for kids and a walk-through NASA International Space Station prototype, and a 118-seat, 50-foot domed planetarium. It’s so much fun, my son doesn’t want to go.

Kenner Planetarium and Space Science Complex.

Despite all that we’ve done, my son finds nothing more fun than doing laser tag at Adventure Quest Laser Tag in Harahan. We enter the building, and he shrieks with delight. It’s a sensory overload with every arcade game imaginable, an escape room, glow-in-the-dark mini golf, bumper cars and laser tag.

The neon-infused two-story, 6,000-foot laser tag area is massive, big enough for 36 players. We enter a room and join “Team Blue” to compete against “Team Red.”

After a quick safety intro, we don vests and laser guns. “The beauty of laser tag is you don’t know anyone you are playing with but it doesn’t matter, you are going for targets, lights and everybody has a good time,” says Suzanne Provenzano, owner of Adventure Quest Tag.

Each team enters off the opposite side of the room. It’s modeled after the Indiana Jones movie, “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” We sneak around like ninjas, firing laser beams at colorful circles on the maze of walls and lights on other people’s vests.

Eight minutes tick down until the game is over.

As we exit and look at the digital scoreboard, I realize our team has won and I’m at the top of the leader board with the most points.

My son squeals with delight and says, “Let’s do it again.”