#3: [24-Mar-12]

#1: [04-Aug-01]

#2: [20-May-07] (incomplete)

17-Jan-2025 --

Following a nearly week-long conference in New Orleans and in the midst of a lengthy driving day, Jack and I were more than happy to swing by this fairly accessible confluence and stretch our legs a bit. After spending several consecutive days in the heart of NOLA (which was very much enjoyable in its own right), visiting a quiet and relatively secluded spot in the forest sounded highly appealing.

We kicked off the day (many hours before the confluence visit) by driving the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, one of the longest bridges in the world — over 20 miles of featureless surroundings on a pencil-straight road. It was pretty cool and unusual to us travelers, but we figured it gets old quickly for the typical day-to-day commuters. This was followed by a couple hours of interstate driving until reaching the south-central Louisiana town of Opelousas. From here, we began following a more direct route along a sequence of smaller US and state highways, each a little prettier than the one before. By the time we reached our final 10 mile (16 km) approach, driving the (short) length of LA 458, we were in very eye-pleasing country. 31N 93W lies in a section of the Kisatchie National Forest, the only forest designated as such in Louisiana.

After a couple extra miles of meandering along quiet forest roads north of Fullerton, we sought out the gravel road (Rustville Rd) that would lead us close to our target. The confluence falls just beside a dirt track which branches off to the east from Rustville Rd (I assume said track is a Forest Service maintenance road). Despite being dirt (in a climate that could've easily turned it into mud), the track was more than good enough for my city-slicker sedan. We still wanted to move around a bit, so we parked the car about 100 meters from 31N 93W and strolled over to the spot. The surroundings were beautiful and very quiet; I only heard the sound of a gentle breeze blowing through the numerous tall/skinny trees. Probably would not be the case outside of wintertime, I'm sure the bugs go nuts in a hot and muggy climate like Louisiana. As for the tall/skinny trees — they were longleaf pines, a tree native to the Deep South region (but unfortunately not as common as they once were before widespread logging).

We were soon looking directly at 31N 93W from the road, presumably at or very near a tall stump we christened the "confluence stump". It was time to zero-meter the GPS — I quickly found that it would be a slow zeroes dance: although it was only 10 meters to the "real" spot, much of the wiry vegetation around the stump was covered in thorns. These plants had a tendency to tangle around our legs, requiring careful maneuvering to avoid getting sliced up. And so, we spent a few minutes intently stumbling around in circles like madmen in nature's waist-deep barbed wire, no more than 30 feet from the dirt road. Once the GPS decided we'd danced enough in the thorns, I snapped the zeroes shot and got the directional photos. In our case, the confluence stump fell just a bit to the west, but well within the ±3 meter error range (it may very well represent the exact point).

Longleaf pines abounded in all directions, both standing and fallen. Some of the fallen ones had evidently been decomposing for a little while and were mushy when stepped on. I spotted a few patches of bright orange fungi growing out of these rotting logs, a nice dash of bright color in the dormant vegetation. No taste test to report this time, but I'm sure a confluence mushroom would make one feel very centered. The weather was perfect: under overcast skies, the temperature hovered in the upper 50s (~15°C) with a light southerly breeze (heard through the trees, as mentioned before). A conclusion I'm beginning to come to: winter is prime confluence hunting season, at least at lower latitudes — I'd take a dry 60°F (15°C) over an 'air feels like soup' humid 95°F (35°C) every time, which is the day-to-day reality of a Lousiana summer.

With overarching objectives to fulfill (outside the scope of our confluence visit), we had no choice but to head back to the car after about 10 minutes on site. I can see the appeal of camping here, something Aaron B actually did during his 2012 visit (perhaps an idea I'll try in the distant future)! Jack and I departed southwest toward the nearby town of DeRidder where we stopped for lunch (at a place called Ms. Burger; they had some of the best fried okra I've ever had). Between the confluence, scenic roads, and good food, we felt very satisfied with our brief swing through west-central Lousiana. However, the day was far from over: from here, I was to leave Jack in the Houston area before starting my retreat back to the north side of the Red River. The clock read about 1 pm — 5 hours into what would ultimately be a 16 and a half hour day. I think (half-jokingly) that visitng 31N 93W helped refresh me and reinforce some sanity that would've otherwise rapidly depleted on the soon to come traffic-clogged stroads of the Houston exurbs.