Bayou Byways - The Most Scenic Drives in America: 120 Spectacular Road Trips - page 777

bayous—was thought so strategic to commerce during the steamboat era that sugar barons
built their palatial homes conveniently right alongside it.
As Rte. 182 nears Franklin, you can't help but notice that you are indeed in sugarcane
country. In spring rows of newly planted crops fan out from the highway, each stalk yield-
ing about one tablespoon of sugar. In fall, cane trucks heading for the mills slow down
traffic, and stalks burned off before they are harvested fill the air with plumes of sweet-
smelling smoke.
In town roam beneath tunnels of live oaks, which shade some 400 historic buildings,
or follow Irish Bend Road to Oaklawn Manor. Once the hub of a 12,036-acre sugar planta-
tion, this restored 1837 Greek Revival structure is named for its surrounding groves of live
oaks—among the largest in America. As you amble beneath them in their shade, examine
their branches for signs of resurrection ferns. In dry weather these plants shrivel into non-
descript brown curls, but rain transforms them into lush, lacy green fronds.
5. Shadows-on-the-Teche
Near Jeanerette several antebellum homes hide like shy southern belles behind fans of
magnolias and live oaks. But the real treat lies farther ahead in New Iberia, site of an
exquisite 1834 plantation house called Shadows-on-the-Teche. Breaking with tradition,
this coralbrick, white-columned mansion stands with its back to the bayou. Beginning in
the 1920s the builder's great-grandson, William Weeks Hall, used the estate to entertain
celebrities, including the film director Elia Kazan, who described it as “the most beautiful
house I've seen in the South.”