
On The Road With RL Reeves Jr: 2018 La Fete Des Vieux Temps in Lafourche Parish
Cheramie spent 54 years hewing boats from hunks of wood on Bayou Lafourche.

Lafourche Parish dance hall
Men like Mr Rodney are a dying breed in Acadiana and it’s a pleasure to listen to him tell his stories. On trapping back when Moses was young: “We skinned them muskrats and threw the meat in the water. You didn’t have to watch out for gators but the water was thick with cottonmouth snakes.”
Festival of Old Times is a linear progression of the old Sauce Piquante Festival that had a multi-year run before sputtering to a halt three decades ago. We travel from New Orleans each year to visit and spend some time with the Cajuns down on Bayou Lafourche.

Rodney Cheramie and his stash of fresh pig’s blood in Lafourche Parish
Mr Cheramie commands the festival’s boucherie.

A vessel of fresh pig’s blood in Lafourche Parish Louisiana
Mr Rodney’s crew then slowly cooks all the bits of the creature and the crowd eventually feasts just like they have in Acadiana for centuries. Cheramie’s son Rodney Jr will take control of the venture at some point as his daddy is 78 years old, and will lay down his butcher knife when he “gets old”

One of Rodney Cheramie’s helpers stirs a pot at Festival of Old Times in Lafourche Parish
Where does he go when he’s in the mood for some commercial boudin?

Rodney Cheramie and his son Rodney Jr at Festival of Old Times in Lafourche Parish

A cauldron of cracklins at La Fete Des Vieux Temps in Lafourche Parish Louisiana
Was it all the boudin that made your heart go out? He laughs, I guess it was all that pig I ate.

A friendly carnie at Festival of Old Times in Lafourche Parish
Cheramie gets up to tend to the blood stew. The butchers have cubed the fresh pork meat and are simmering it over an open fire. He prods the meat to see if it’s time to add the hog’s blood he has on reserve in a ice chest. It’s not ready.

A well-worn machine gun at a carnie’s booth in Lafourche Parish Louisiana
I mentally imagine how many thousands of pounds of cracklins he’s cooked over the years.
When I was a kid visiting Louisiana in the 70s, boucheries were common affairs but nowadays when you get wind of one they feel like something special. That’s part of the Festival of Old Times mission: to educate the youth and make sure that they know about hog butchery and making cane syrup and all the other old-timey traditions.

Rodney Cheramie Jr at La Fete Des Vieux Temps in Lafourche Parish Louisiana
Near the boucherie tent a sauce piquante competition is taking place so I amble over and make my way down the row of booths chatting with the cooks. Alligator, pork, rabbit and turtle are on offer.

A scene from the boucherie at La Fete Des Vieux Temps in Lafourche Parish
Lafourche Parish lost something special when the Sauce Piquante Festival folded up but La Fete Des Vieux Temps has slid into the role nicely. We run down to the bayou a few times a year to visit with Sergis Adams at his little country market, hit the Gheens Bon Mange Fest or French Food Festival. It’s only 45 minutes from New Orleans but you may as well be on another planet as the pace and way of life are worlds apart.
I prepare to leave as a small child walks by Cheramie gestures towards him “he’s gonna be running these boucheries soon. This is our future.”

The future of Acadiana
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