LOUISIANA

Seventeen distinct courses by designers including Arnold Palmer, David Toms and Pete Dye. After your round, you’ll find our “Sportsman’s Paradise” has so much more to offer with great food, fishing, music and gaming.

Sci-Port Discovery Center provides a fun, educational environment for people of all ages to explore and actively engage in the world of mathematics, science and technology. Sci-Port serves to spark curiosity about the world around us, provides hands-on tools for using scientific discovery in everyday life, and encourages a passion for life-long learning.

Southwest Louisiana’s sole state park, Sam Houston Jones, is notable for its pine and cypress forests and trails for avid and casual hikers alike. One trail even leads to a historical stagecoach road. Most of the preserve is in its natural state and it has become a save haven for a variety of wildlife, including more than 200 species of birds that migrate through the area.

At the entrance to the Longleaf Pine Trail, you’ll find a well-maintained 18-hole disc golf course. Two boat launches have been constructed for boaters’ convenience, allowing access to the west fork of the Calcasieu River and Lake Charles 10 miles south.

The shops, restaurants, museums and historic districts of Lake Charles are a 15-minute drive from the park entrance. Other nearby attractions include the Creole Nature Trail Scenic Byway (which takes visitors through prime bird- and wildlife-watching territory and to Holly Beach on the Gulf of Mexico), South Toledo Bend State Park and Cameron Prairie, Sabine, Lacassine and Rockefeller national wildlife refuges.

Entrance fee: $3 per person; free for seniors age 62 and older, and children age 3 and younger.

Just three miles from the quaint Northshore town of Mandeville is Fontainebleau State Park, a convenient and scenic getaway with some truly spectacular kayaking. It also happens to be a short drive from New Orleans, which means that within an hour after leaving the French Quarter, you can be paddling pristine streams full of native fishes and cypress trees.

Fontainebleau was once the site of a sugar mill; the plantation fell into disrepair long ago, but today you can tour the brick structures that remain. Outside, you’ll find a pier stretching over enormous Lake Pontchartrain and a man-made beach & water playground.

An old rail line at the north end of the park has been converted into part of the Tammany Trace, a 27-mile path that visitors can walk, bike or horseback ride through. By the way, this and the other trails in Fontainebleau State Park offer fabulous chances to see some of the more than 400 species of birds and other wildlife that live or migrate through the park.

There are plenty of other state parks nearby including Fairview-Riverside, St. Bernard and Bayou Segnette. The sights and sounds of Mandeville and Covington are a short ride a way (and for intrepid travelers, both are accessible via the Tammany Trace). Swamp tour operators and kayaking outfitters are in the area as well.

Entrance fee: $3 per person; free for seniors age 62 and older, and children age 3 and younger.

Walk the streets where jazz was born. Learn about America's first black governor. Hear how enslaved blacks fled the plantations to fight for the Union army. And how one man's refusal to move from his seat on a train led to a long struggle against segregation and the eventual triumph of the Civil Rights movement. It all happened right here, in a place like no other. Louisiana.