Boondocking at Bayou Teche Brewery
Our first attempt at boondocking was at Bayou Teche Brewery in Louisiana…and it went pretty smoothly! We found the boondock spot through Harvest Host, called the brewery to make sure our planned night was ok, and headed over after our two night stay in New Orleans.
We planned on arriving much earlier in the day, but we had some issues in New Orleans that we had to take care of. A cold and rainy morning made departure even more delayed and enjoyable (sarcasm).
We pulled into the parking lot of the brewery at 4:55pm, just in time for happy hour. Or so we thought. The taproom closed at 5pm!
We didn’t even unhook the 5th wheel when we arrived. We just ran inside to meet our hosts and hoped it wasn’t too late to enjoy the taproom.
The people at Bayou Teche were extremely welcoming, even to “those people” that show up 5 minutes before closing time wanting to sample some beer!
To Lauren’s IPA-loving delight, we sampled four different IPAs.
Swamp Thing IPA
Cocodrie Double Dry Hopped IPA
Giant Hop Double IPA
Brass Techeticles Triple IPA (18%!)
Our experience at the brewery: We had read reviews of the brewery staying open late, having drinks and chatting it up with visitors for hours after closing time, so we were hoping this would be one of those nights. Unfortunately we noticed them getting ready some kind of company meeting, so we drank our flight rather quickly, purchased a 4 pack of the Giant Hop IPA to bring back to the RV for pizza night, and called it a night.
We met 3 of the staff members and every one of them were chatty and welcoming. We could definitely see them as the type of people that would stay after closing and visit (dang meetings!). The tap room was small but had a nice homey feel to it. You could tell that their outside patio was where all the action usually was. For a small brewery, they had a surprisingly large tap selection. From the four beers we sampled, the beers were outstanding (we found out weeks later that the brewery was voted best in Louisiana!). If we would have had more time, we would have each gotten a flight and tried more of there draughts.
Before getting the RV ready for the night, we checked out the outside of the brewery, which is located on the family-owned farm. On a nice warm evening, this would have been a great place to enjoy some live music, food trucks, outdoor games, and meet some new friends. Tonight however, the cold rainy weather had followed us from New Orleans, so after 2 minutes of walking around, we ran inside the RV for the rest of the night. Time to heat up the oven and relax in the RV for the evening!
Boondocking Experience: This was our first attempt at boondocking, and we weren’t quite ready for it. Our generator was still new inside the box, and we hadn’t purchased oil or fuel stabilizer yet, so we decided to forgo the use of a generator for the evening. Our lights run off of battery power and our heat/fridge run off our propane, so basically we were only without power to our outlets, meaning no TV or charging of electronics.
We also hadn’t gotten around to cleaning out our fresh water tank yet, so we bought a few gallons of water for drinking, washing hands, flushing toilets, etc.
For a one night boondocking stop, going sans running water and generator was no problem. However, we made sure to have all of that ready for our next boondocking stay at Walker Honey Farm and Winery.
One good thing about boondocking for a night, getting ready to leave the next day is super easy. The plumbing , water, and electric were never taken out and set up, and we never even un-hitched the truck! The next morning, we moved the slides in, hopped in the truck, and hit the road for Lake Conroe in Willis, Texas!