Crossing Mark's cattle guard, I was hoping to take a break having driven damn near 40 miles to get there, but no, out of the house charges Mark doing a Tonto mount onto the back of his bike. "Ready to go? Oh, here's some brown sugar from the mill, you got room?" Adding the sugar to the trunk brought its weight up to 95 lbs. I heard my rear suspension moan in disbelief.
Off we "roared". Actually both of our bikes are very quiet, a requirement for where we go. We like to see stuff and not be the center of attention. The fact that we went the wrong way on a one way street is another matter. That did solicit a bit of attention.
That's pretty much the ride report. Oh, I forgot to tell you why I was there, which may have been a purposeful oversight. My wife had asked what I was doing, like she cared. I told her I was going back to Opelousas to meet a guy and we were going to ride around the inner city looking for the route of a long gone railroad. We've been married for almost 43 years, or more, and I can still make her eyes bulge in disbelief. It's a gift. She knows better than to resist the inevitable and simply extended her wishes that I be safe and try not to get arrested this time because she was turning her cellphone off. With a warm and fuzzy feeling I pulled a 12 o'clock high wheelie slamming into my gate. It was an auspicious beginning to the day. Oh, why was I going to Opelousas, the same reason I gave my wife. Now pop your eyes back in.
Here we go:
I'm posting these shots as it's the easy way to share Mark's and my findings concerning the historical route of the Opelousas, Gulf and Northeastern Railroad as it crossed Opelousas in the early part of the 20th Century.
That railroad extended from Melville to Crowley. Mark and I know all of its route except for inner city Opelousas. That void, when you have done so much research and travel in order to understand it, was simply, "troubling". We attached the city fast and furiously.
First stop was the location of the OG depot, between
the east and west bound lanes of US190 seen on the
map on the previous page of this article.
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This was either the depot spur or where the OG turned east
after coming up from Crowley and Rayne through Church Point.
Below is looking south at the same evidence. Those rails crossing
190 are where the T&P continued north, after buying out the OG.
The T&P would go up the back side of Louana Oil and then head
northwest to Ville Platte, eventually reaching Bunkie after crossing
the Southern Pacific which also came up from Opelousas. Pretty
dramatic picture, huh? Yea, I got tingles, too.
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Mark and I rode around to see if we could find the continuation
of these rails further north. We didn't but we did ride up that one
way street the wrong way and were yelled at, so that portion of
the ride was not a total loss. I did the same thing up Louisiana
Ave. in Houston one time. Dude, that was a rush. It was one
old van vs. 6 lanes of manic Houston traffic. I think I experienced
what a quarterback feels when there is no protection. Both kids
and the wife screamed. it would not be the first or the last time
I'd hear that. Now I just take situations in stride. At first I though
of riding back past the person that yelled at us, then figured it
would be better to keep going. Of course as I was deciding I
was circling in the street and Mark was following me. The list
of tickets would be confusing. Back to football. I think the judge
would have thrown out the lesser penalties and only hit us with the
big one, like, maybe "endangerment".
Next we went to where I'd seen the train on the previous page.
Actually, we didn't go to the previous page, we went to the place
where the train was on the previous page. That didn't help. Forget it.
It was across the street from where the MP depot had been. Mark
noticed that the warehouse was angled away from the main line and
surmised that this might be the place where the OG changed directions.
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We again rode around and around very slowly looking for
a grain of evidence and found none. We had no map and were
basically sifting sand looking for a button.
Mark suggested that we head for the Indian Hills Golf Club area
and see if we could pick up the rails from the east end of town since
nothing was working here in its center.
We rode out to a road right off of I-49 mysteriously named "Short Line".
In a ditch we found this. No BS, it's a trestle timber.
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Across the way the ROW continued. We plotted the ROW
lining up known points outside of town. RR's like straight
lines where possible and that fact made finding what was next
possible. Sorry, below is not a sincere effort.
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But, it gives you an idea of the task at hand.
There was also this mysterious cement near the trestle timber.
I was inclined not to show it. But, someone out there might know
what it is and help in this archaeological investigation.
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Yep, buttons in a pile of sand.
Here's the part that the straight line rail projection led us to.
Mark had noticed what looked like "fill" on the edge of the
golf course.
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He was right. We took out our shovels and began to dig.
Several grounds keepers approached and asked what we
were doing. I presented my Walmart Toy Dept. fireman's
badge and suddenly it was all "si senor, have a good day senor,
if we can help, senor". Best two bucks I ever spent. Evidently,
there had been another witness and they had called the police.
Soon there were sirens.
Below is what we uncovered. No doubt we could have uncovered
more if we hadn't had to hide.
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Looking the other way, as we ran, the club was still using the trestle:
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And, look what we found while laying low in the ditch.
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No, those were not bought at the garden supply place.
I thought I had another rail plate, but it was a wooden
shim. Very interesting. I bet the shim was used to level
the rails placed under the rail plate. I should have gotten
a better picture of the pattern.
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After being missed by several tracking dogs, I carry a can of
Dog-Away, we headed further east and went north of 190
to try to trace the line as it headed to Port Barre where a
street is named OG Line. The next pictures are of our wanderings.
Only one place is surely the line, the rest are guesses.
This is out Rachal which is near I-49. It's the "for sure" one.
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The next one is a "pretty sure" one, location, a secret.
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Here's a "maybe, maybe not" but still a pretty road down
a rail type cut. But, it's not straight. I'd show the lovely
lake but that would pinpoint our location.
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That's it. I headed home, fast and furiously, just missing
the beginning of the afternoon monsoon.
One day I'll gather all the pages and information and put
it together. I can't see doing that until the final piece of the
puzzle is found. More sand, one button.
Possibly that button was found. Click Here to see what you think.