Dane Ashford

Walking through a quiet cemetery in the heart of one of America’s most storied cities, you might just…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 21

Few things reveal the soul of a place quite like a bowl of gumbo simmered with decades of…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 21

Most people drive past the gravel bars without a second glance. Rockhounds do the opposite: they pull over,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 20

Most aquariums stop at fish tanks. This one hands you a sifting screen and points you toward a…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 19

Long before the beads start flying and the brass bands strike up, the real work of Carnival happens…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 19

Past the front gate, the first thing you notice is the giraffe leaning over the railing with the…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 18

Plates arrive still hissing, the butter and garlic pooling around shells that glow with the blackened edges of…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 18

Nothing prepares you for the moment a giraffe leans its entire head through the window of a converted…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 17

The best food in Louisiana does not always come with a reservation. Sometimes it comes wrapped in wax…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 17

Shelves line the walls from floor to ceiling, each stacked with jars that catch the overhead light and…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 16

A good bookstore or library slows you down in exactly the way a road trip should: unexpected, quiet,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 16

Something about the way the beads catch the light through the front window makes you slow down before…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 15

Half a block from the most famous square in the French Quarter, squeezed between centuries-old buildings, a shop…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 15

There is something oddly satisfying about watching a process that starts with tiny red peppers and ends with…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 14

I have always believed that the best way to understand a place is to walk through it slowly,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 14

The best book cafés in Louisiana understand something that regular coffee shops do not: a good reading spot…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 13

July in Louisiana does not ask permission before it turns the air into soup, which makes an air-conditioned…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 13

Walking into a bookstore that has been open since the 1940s means walking into rooms that were never…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 12

Every musical tradition in New Orleans traces part of its lineage back to one open patch of ground…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 11

Seafood buffets in Louisiana carry expectations that few restaurants can match, plus this one raises the bar by…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 11

The line starts forming before the signage lights up. A bakery on the eastern edge of New Orleans…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 10

Summer in Louisiana does not ask whether you want to get in the water, it tells you. By…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 10

The watermelons arrive on truck beds, not grocery carts, and by the time the judging tent opens, the…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 9

Louisiana does not ask you to choose between a plate lunch and a white-tablecloth dinner because it believes…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 9

Fried catfish in Louisiana is not a side dish or a suggestion. It is the whole point of…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 8

Twenty miles sounds daunting until you realize the trail loops around a lake that changes color with the…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 7

Louisiana is not known for caves. The state is flat, wet, plus built on sediment that does not…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 7

The sign out front says donuts. The display case inside confirms it with rows of glazed originals stacked…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 6

Walking through the narrow aisles feels like stepping into a different century. Olive oil bottles line wooden shelves,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 6

Most visitors to this part of Louisiana head straight for the French Quarter without knowing that twenty minutes…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 6

The first thing you notice is the consomé. It arrives in a small cup alongside the birria tacos,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 5

Morning in this city starts differently than it does anywhere else. The diner counter has been spinning stools…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 5

Ghost tours start at sundown, but the dining room fills long before that. The 1796 inn has earned…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 5

The menu is short. The sandwich that built the reputation is shorter still: thick-cut bologna griddled until the…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 4

Louisiana does not advertise its fossils on bumper stickers or highway signs, but the Cane River Site sits…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 4

Three exclamation points spell the name on the sign outside, plus the energy inside matches every one of…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 3

Driving through the countryside, the restaurant barely registers as a destination. A modest building on a residential street,…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 3

Eating out without gluten used to mean scanning a menu for the single item that might work, then…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 2

Walking through the door feels like entering a fabric library where every shelf holds a different chapter. Bolts…

By Dane Ashford · Jul 2