My sister, Delilah Devlin, my niece and I went on a research trip to learn more about the Louisiana swamplands on our way to the Authors After Dark Conference. Talk about a blast!
We drove all the way down to Grand Isle to get a feel for life on the edge with stilted houses, braving the hurricanes and storm surges. I learned about the marsh grasses that flow on top of the water. 
I always thought they were firmly rooted in the ground on little islands. Not!
And the air boat tour was the highlight of the trip. Our guide gave us a great ride blasting through the swamps, over an earthen berm and marsh grasses, through the cypress forests and don’t forget the interaction with the alligators! I touched the tail of a 12 ft 
long male ‘gator. What a thrill!
Needless to say, we got a lot out of the trip to the swamps. I’ll blog about the sugar plantation mansion tours next time. In the meantime, I hope you enjoyed a trip to southern Louisiana!
Look for my latest Ugly Stick Saloon release BOOTS AND LEATHER:
cowgirlbeth
Delilah Devlin
desiree01holt
empetrova
Gem
jenniferjakes
Lissa Matthews
maricarr
marietuhart
Myla Jackson
Randi Alexander
Rebecca Zanetti
sablehunter
sandys37
SaydeGrace
Sophie Oak
staceyespino
I’d love to visit Louisiana and I have a friend there, so I’d have a place to go in particular. Someday….. thanks for the tour. Have the book, haven’t read it yet.
Glad you had some fun doing research. I love air boat rides.
Tiss, hope you love BOOTS AND LEATHER.
Joanne, air
boat rides are awesome!
Sounds like you had a great trip! Love the pictures and looking forward to your post on the sugar plantation mansion!
Sounds incredibly cool – an area I long to visit, but I travel so rarely I am not sure I’ll ever get there. Must be great to be able to add first-hand research info into your book!
Yeah, I learned a lot and look forward to incorporating it into a book.
That is awesome Myla, I haven’t scoped out LA’s swamps but I did get to when I went way south into Florida once when we took the kids to Disney world. The airboat ride was the best and of course messing with the alagators was exciting too. I think it is neat to do research and actually get to go where you plan to write about. Even when people do back ground searches on their heritage it is awesome to go see where they once lived and how things looked back in time so I completely understand how you feel doing research. It totally puts you in the zone as your scenes come alive on the page. glad you had fun at AAD, I went last year and had a blast. I missed it this year due to health issues but I hope to go next year.
So you’ve had THE experience on the air boat. Awesome! Our guide took us spinning around. The whole time I could picture chase scenes in a romantic suspense. Can’t wait to use them.
That sounds fantastic and exciting. Everytime I see an airboat on TV shows it reminds me of CSI Miami and Heracio (probably spelt his name wrong – LOL) I get all excited because the chase is on and their hunt to get the bad guy becomes on the edge of your seat exciting when they use those fast airboats – so cool. I can hardly believe you touched one of those alagators – girl you are braver than I, LOL I’d be too scared they’d turn around so fast and bite me – LOL
Sounds like Sookie Stackhouse country! meet any vampires?
Now you can’t tell us you were writng a cowboy book unless roping alligators is a new way of ranching….