Parish Wins Grant for Paddler’s Guide
St. Martin Parish has been selected as one of six recipients of the Atchafalaya Wild Grant, a special initiative marking the twentieth anniversary of the Atchafalaya National Heritage Area. The program supports projects that promote conservation, outdoor recreation, and deeper public engagement with one of Louisiana’s most vital landscapes. The recognition places St. Martin Parish among a select group of recipients chosen to help commemorate this milestone year. The honor was conveyed this week in a letter from Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser.
The proposed project centers on creating a paddler’s guide for St. Martin Parish Tourism, highlighting especially lesserknown waterways. Three years ago, in my role as Nature & Culture Correspondent for St. Martin Parish Tourism and parish liaison to Louisiana’s Recreational Trails Program, I compiled a basic paddler’s guide, identifying paddle routes and public access points in the parish with precise geo-coordinates. Building on this prior work, I’ll be using grant funds to author a comprehensive and userfriendly guide to exploring the parish by paddlecraft. The guide, which will be published in both print and digital editions, will feature photographs and maps, along with brief descriptions of the spotlighted paddle routes.
Grant
With ten public boat launches and year-round access to waterways such as Bayou Teche, Lake Dauterive, Henderson Lake, Lake Martin, Catahoula Lake, Lake Fausse Pointe, and the greater Atchafalaya Basin, St. Martin Parish offers incredibly diverse opportunities for paddlers, fishermen, birdwatchers, photographers and nature enthusiasts. The grant will help refine and expand resources that make these experiences more accessible, whether for residents rediscovering their backyard or visitors encountering the parish by water for the first time.
The more I’ve paddled, the more I’ve come to realize that the history of St. Martin Parish is inseparable from the history of its waterways. Just in terms of sheer beauty I would hold our paddling trails up against any in the country, but they’re more than scenic, they’re the arteries of our history and our culture. Our communities were organized around water, and our cuisine and culture grew directly out of that water. When you experience the parish at water level, you can really feel that history.
In addition to promoting recreation, my hope is that the project will align with broader conservation goals by encouraging thoughtful, low-impact use of natural spaces. By guiding visitors toward established routes and access points, it supports stewardship of sensitive habitats while fostering a deeper appreciation for St. Martin Parish’s ecological complexity. When you spend time out on the water, and you’re close enough to the water that you can reach out and touch it, you can’t help but connect with this one-of-a-kind place in a deeper and more meaningful way.
Sponsored by St. Martin Parish Tourism More at experienceatchafalaya. com/blog
