LA Geography B, Baton Rouge, NOLA and the trip there

 The past couple of months I've been busy with other things and haven't had much time to do a lot of blogging.  Now I'm home for a while and I plan to get caught up with things I've been thinking about and things that I've  taken photos of.
    This post is all about a mother's pride.  Previously I've written about my son winning his schools geography bee with Accretionary Wedge #43 Aw-43 My favorite illustration.  Then he had to take a test and based on how well he did on that determined whether he made it to the state level or not.  We hadn't heard anything for the longest time and thought he didn't make it.  We were just proud he won his school which is known for its academic excellence.  We started to plan our spring break which was the week of March 26-30th.  All of that got tossed to the side when we got the letter saying he made it to the State level.
    So on March 30th we drove down to Baton Rouge, LA.  We took Interstate 49 to LA-190, and then LA-190 to Interstate 10 and into Baton Rouge.  I've been wanting to go down south on this route for awhile.  The main reason is because LA-190 crosses over the Morganza floodway and the Atchafalaya National wildlife Refuge.  Two places I wanted to see how the opening of the Morganza spillway had effected it.Here's what Wikipedia had to say about it.  Morganza_Spillway  and the   Atchafalaya_Basin.  
I wanted to see if the area was destroyed like it was when Hurricane_Katrina  destroyed parts of New Orleans.   I had never seen such destruction as I did when I saw the area a year later after Katrina had hit.  Every year I could see the area rebounding but there are still some areas that have never fully recovered like this area that I look at along this trip. There is some green so its not a total loss.

 So while we traveled I did take some pictures of the Morganza Spillway and the Atchafalaya Basin.  I remembered Ron Schott's last year taking a trip in this same area and the images he took along the way as seen here: Meandering East and South (6-1-2011).  Ever since then I've been curious as to if the area was still flooded or had it gone back to normal swamp conditions. I was pleased to see that the effects of the flooding were relatively minor and most of the area was back to its normal conditions.  Having drought conditions in the area  for the last couple of years probably help speed up the process.
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It was good to see that the flooding hadn't destroyed the farming in the area either.  In fact it probably helped it.  Look at how lush this crop is.

Crops growing in the Morganza Spillway area along Hwy 190

 I had an image for the sign for the Morganza spillway, it wont let me download it but it is just as well because unfortunately you can't read it.

 But here are some images along the spillway bridge.  As you can see the area is very green and lush in vegetation.  With only an occasional area that still has some standing water..

Then we crossed the Atchafalya River at Krotz Spring

The levy for the Achafalaya River

 The river was to its banks but really wasn't over flowing it.

Atchafalaya River

The main reason for the post is about the Geography bee so enough of the natural state geography and on to the important stuff.

LOUISIANA GEOGRAPHY BEE

     There were about 100 students there from all over the state.  Each student had to have won his school's geography bee. After they won their school then they had to take a test.  Based on the test results only the top 100 students were allowed to come to the state to compete at the state level in Baton Rouge, LA.
    The students eligible were from the 4th to the 8th grades. So there were both elementary and middle schools present at this bee.  In fact my son saw his 4th grade social studies teacher there who was there with another student of hers.  The teacher sponsoring the geography bee for the school is also invited to attend.  The teachers are the only ones that can challenge an answer given. My son's teacher could not make it so it was comforting to him to have this other teacher there for him.
   Here's a picture of my son with his 4th grade teacher Renae Pullen.  (This teacher I might add is an absolutely incredible teacher.  She has won so many awards for her teaching skills- which she rightly deserved to get.  My son has been so fortunate to have her - I know she was a big factor in his getting here.)

    The competition started at 9:00 am and if you were not present at that time then you were out of luck.  Needless to say just about everyone there came early because they didn't want to be late for this.  They called off the names and then broke them into 5 groups of about 20 each.   They were then taken to separate rooms where they were given 8 rounds to answer the geography questions.  Based on how you did with these questions determined who would go on and who was eliminated.  I know I liked this way so much because my son was so nervous about not wanting to be the 1st kid to be knocked out of the competition.  This way only the top ones went on to be in the final ten.
   As it turned out there were only 3 students that got all 8 questions right.  They then went to the students that had gotten 7 out of  8 right.  There were 8 of these, of which my son was one of them.  Since they only had ten spots to compete on the stage and 11 students eligible they took those students to a different room to answer another round of questions.   

   Below is some of the 11 students that were picked, raising their hands so they could go on to the next level.

trying to see who will go on to be in the final 10

As it turned out with the first round only one student missed it and they ended up with their final 10 to compete on the stage. 
Here's a picture of them competing on the stage.  NB: you could only take pictures between rounds and not during the actual questioning phase. 

The final contestants in the Geography Bee

   And here's the screen and the result when it got to the final round.  My son placed 6th. 

 I would also like to note that my son dreamed of doing this ever since his brother did it when he was in 4th grade and got to the state level too.  Now their two medals proudly hang side by side along with other medals they have earned through the years..

 
NEW ORLEANS

After the geography bee we decided the next day to go down to New Orleans and spend the rest of the weekend there.  Here's some pictures I took along I-10 showing the vegetation growing again in the area.  After Katrina this area looked like a bomb had hit it and no green could be seen. It was good seeing it looking alive again.

   Here's some images of Lake Pontchertrain along I-10.

Lake Pontchertrain along I-10.

 What I couldn't get over was seeing all of the pollen just sitting on the water.

Lake Pontchertrain along I-10.

marshes along 1-10 near Lake Pontchertrain

One of the things my son wanted to see was the National World War II Museum. 

We parked on this street.   Andrew Higgins invented the Higgins boat which was used in D-Day.  My husbands aunt was Mr Higgins secretary during the war.  She is now deceased but whenever she ever talked about Mr Higgins she always had the utmost respect for him.   I know she would enjoy seeing this street now named after him,   and thus the picture. 

 Here's a Higgins boat at the museum.

Higgins boat @ The National World War II museum, New Orleans, LA

 This is the lobby of the National World War II museum.  My son loved seeing the planes hanging from the ceiling.  I was impressed with all the flags of the different services that were used during the war. 

The lobby of the National World War II museum.

An airplane in the National World War II Museum

 We had planned on spending the rest of the weekend in New Orleans but didn't make reservations at a hotel.  Which is usually no problem and we have been able to get rooms before doing that,  but this time we were totally out of luck.  We did not realize it was the weekend of the National collegiate basketball playoff which was being held in this place:  The Super Dome. 

New Orleans Superdome

New Orleans Superdome.

Here's a different angle of the Superdome.  This is what most people see from the Interstate.

 As you can see the whole place was filled with people coming from all over the country to see these games. So we just spent our time at the museum and walked around some and then headed back home.









I missed this image that I wanted to include.  I thought it was neat seeing the State Capitol over the I-10 Mississippi Bridge.

Baton Rouge and the State Capitol building as Crossing over the Mississippi River.

 I muse:  I wonder if how well my son will do next year?