390. Cameron, Cameron Parish (LA44)

My white whale has been met and bested! I’ve planned three trips here and all of them had to be discarded for various reasons. Having to come here in concert with finishing the rest of the state would have created a giant complication no matter how I could plan it. From a nomenclature perspective, it’s interesting because back home we have one of these and one of these. I actually didn’t originally plan on coming here; I was picking up a bunch of challenges in Galveston. I ended up done with a lot of time on my hands and a desire to try a new night photography method so I came. But now it’s time to get a little more serious. If you have read anything I’ve written, you know that I will mock another state, especially Louisiana, in a heartbeat. Not right now, though. Cameron Parish is in pretty bad shape. Nobody needs to be hit by a hurricane, much less two in as many months. I’m not entirely sure I saw a habitable home the entire time here. Nothing but trailers and RV parks. Every house had mounds of trash sitting out front that had been cleared from within. So much of so many people’s lives cast aside and left on the sidewalks…

A new feature I’ve never seen on any other courthouse, not only does the courthouse have two annexes, one East, one West, but both are raised. Forward thinking or something like that. I don’t have a lot of photos because I don’t want to memorialize this place as ruin porn, but I knew that I had chosen a bad time to come here. Even being here was a big risk from a caching perspective. Because of the hurricanes, the reviewer has disabled every cache in the parish and there weren’t that many to begin with. I got it into my head that if I could find one, even disabled, I could claim it and be done here. I could finish the rest of the state in two days without having to worry about this heel. How did that go? The first attempt was at a guard rail at a roadside by a stream. I couldn’t find any sign of it and it’s quite possible it could have been washed away or I just didn’t get into the detritus off the side. The second attempt was supposed to be a nano at a gas station, but as I approached in the darkness, all there was to see was the giant cover over where the pumps would be and the backhoe waiting to finish the demolition. The third attempt was made looking for a key holder on a different guard rail. Not only did I fail to find it, but I learned the hard way that the insects of Louisiana acknowledge no master. Usually flying things avoid me like the plague, but that that morning. The came for me and would not quit. I would almost say that drove me away, but I got a pretty thorough look and just plain couldn’t find it.

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The trip was also complicated by the fact that if you come the most direct route, you have to take a ferry to get here. Since the ferry doesn’t run at night, I had to go to Lake Charles and go down on the non-ferry side. I had hoped that I would be done here before the sun rose, but it was not to be. The Daystar did not hesitate to find ways to shine in my face. At least the ferry would be running and I could get across and try for some on the other side. Except for one minor, unpredictable flaw. According to the county and state websites, the ferry was supposed to be back in service already. It was not. So I had to take the long way back again and down to take another shot on the other side of the river, a 70 mile drive to reach the other bank. Except I didn’t have to. The building to be demolished? Turns out it looks invisible in the middle of the night. I guess the backhoe was just parked there for the night because it was gone now. I pulled in, went up to the building at the GZ and guess what I found?

Not a nano, but good enough for my purposes! And once I logged it, the reviewer reactivated it, making it the first cache returned to service in the parish. Go me! At least there’s one active cache here! And now I could get out of this sad and sorry place.

I hope this parish gets a lot more of the help it needs. Unfortunately, this is the Land of Marshes and Poverty. I can’t say that that will happen. I made my way back to Houston to grab a bunch of caches before heading home. I had been planning a trip for a while and there was still more to prepare for. That planning would eventually bear fruit. Three weeks later, when Thanksgiving lunch was eaten and games and family stuff was done, I hit the road for a new adventure, one that would begin in…