Baton Rouge, Louisiana | Family Road Trip
Confession, this is NOT a road trip TO Baton Rouge, we just strategically passed through on our way to Pensacola, FL! You can read about our Pensacola trip here!
From our place to Baton Rouge was just about 4 hours of a drive. We hit the road around 8:15. My completely arbitrary time that I wanted to leave was 8am so I was a happy camper. Especially since I didn’t start packing until 6:30 am the day we left.
We plopped the kids in the car with their LCD doddle tablets and they were set for about an hour. After that we put on the Paw Patrol movie DVD. I used to pack a bunch of crap for the kids but it made the car a MESS and honestly, the movies suffice. We don’t watch a lot of screens in our normal life so road trips 1-2x a year… they get the tv. Whatever.
Husband drove the first leg and I worked on my computer a bit editing some pictures and answering emails. Then my computer died (bc I didn’t charge it the night before… because I didn’t even start packing until the day of the trip) so I just listened to music in my headphones and kept scaring the poo out of husband because I would just randomly start singing or blurting out rap lyrics. Ya’ll my musical taste is ALL over the place. Someday I’ll make my Spotify playlist and post it here but today is no that day haha.
We made it to Baton Rouge & LSU’s campus with no additional stops. I was thrilled. Got there around 12:15pm and headed to The Chimes restaurant. Parking was $3 for 2 hours and we walked along the outskirts of campus and saw this beautiful door. The photog in me was happy. I think the kids are over me taking their pictures – they just humor me. For that I’m so grateful.First we ordered fried aligator mostly bc if we DO orders to move in January, regardless of where they are, I want to soak up all the Louisiana, Cajun, Crole life stuff I can. 3 of the kids loved it, one wasn’t a big fan.
We stopped at our favorite place in Baton Rouge/LSU area to eat: The Chimes on Highland.
While we waited for our food the kids colored their little kid menus but noticed that there was writing all over the brick where people had signed their names. They asked the server if they could write their names and she gave them the OK so they got their graffiti on.
The food didn’t take a crazy long amount of time but they did get a little antsy. Sitting upstairs there were barely any other people eating up there so we let them wander. They found this “Big @ss Fan” (Mom, what does ASS mean? that’s fun) and had fun talking into it while dad watched sports news.
We wrote on the walls some more and I walked around photographing crap because well, I am who I am. I love a good vintage sign.
You can see how weary she is of the fried alligator. Clearly she’s the one who wasn’t a big fan. Until she gets to be the comedian.
I ordered a roast beef and gravy poboy and it was amazing. Unfortunately right as she brought the food out my top bun fell off. They quickly brought me another. No bigs. The fries were crispy and delish. Everyone devoured them.
All these dang kids had fried chicken and fries. Go figure – except for this cutie who had fried catfish – her favorite. She’s totally my foodie. She’ll eat ANYTHING.Next, we headed back to the car but on the way noticed the Christ The King at LSU Catholic Center and, since I’m a big fan of Fr Josh Johnson & Fr Andrew Merrick (and their CTK@LSU podcast where they publish their homilies, ya’ll… SO GOOD) I knew there was a perpetual adoration chapel in there. We stopped in to say “hi” to Jesus. It was WONDERFUL to see a bunch of college students sprawled out sitting and lying on the floor just spending time with Christ. I WISH my college experience would have been Christ filled like that. All of life is a journey to heaven and I’m thankful for mine but MAN.. that was awesome to witness. No pics in the chapel well bc I’m not a total jerk. Reverent silence and all that.
At first we couldn’t find the chapel so I asked a sweet college gal and she pointed directly behind me. The kids were so cute because they found her afterwards and said “thanks for telling us where Jesus was!”.
Oh they also had a FREE coffee shop for studying. We didnt’ stop in but looked in through the windows. My kids come in places like bulls in a china shop and it prob is not super accommodating for people trying to study.
Next, we tried (and failed) to see Mike the Tiger in his Habitat on campus. Ok, we DID see him but he was napping under a bush and it was totally disappointing. You can see it on one of the twins faces. She was NOT amused and was tired of walking. Kinda perfect bc we were going to spend another few hours in the car.
We stopped in the gift shop right next to the habitat (didn’t buy a dang thing, Go Hokies) but did play a bit. We originally went in to use the restroom but they didn’t have one open to the public. We had to go across the street into the athletic administration building for that.
Kids pretended to be tigers trapped in a cage and then we hit the road for Pensacola. About 25 min after this was taken my check engine light came on in the van. Not only did it come on but it was blinking. Aka “pull over now there’s a serious problem with your engine”.
This has happened 2x before. Both times I’ve tried to get it looked at but upon restarting the van the light goes out. Apparently once a light goes out then the problem has self resolved and no mechanic can really do anything about it bc its not *technically* a problem. We watched the stupid dash lights like a hawk the rest of the drive. The car ended up breaking down but not the engine THANK GOD and the issue happened as we pulled in the driveway at the AirBnB in Pensacola. More on that here.
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