LOUISIANA

The swamps and wetlands of Louisiana are a sportsman's paradise but for canine hikers, not so much. It doesn’t help that the primeval jungle trails through Jean Lafitte National Historic Park & Preserve ban dogs. A 17-mile loop around Lake Chicot will enable your dog to sink paws into some good Louisiana swamp mud. Centrally located Kisatchie National Forest is the canine hiking magnet of the Pelican State with sandy, paw-friendly trails that roll through piney and oak woodlands. Anything from a full-day loop in the Kisatchie Hills Wilderness to a backpacking expedition on the 24-mile Wild Azalea Trail to quick hits on the nature trail are on your dog’s hiking menu here. Louisiana has the fifth most shoreline in the country with 397 miles but sand beaches are a novelty in the Pelican State; the Gulf of Mexico-washed sand of Grand Isle welcomes dogs as does the Fiddlers Loop around the island’s main lagoon. Louisiana is peppered with salt domes formed by evaporated minerals and the ancestral home of McIlhenny’s Tabasco sauce on Avery Island permits dogs to explore a jungle botanical garden cultivated from a sand mining pit. Louisiana’s laid back culture lends itself to strolling with your dog in places like the Cane Bayou in Fontainebleau State Park, around the plantation grounds of the Houmas House or through Audubon Park in the Big Easy itself.

The Best Day Hike You Can Take With Your Dog In Louisiana

Fiddlers Loop Trail
Grand Isle State Park • Grand Isle

Resting on the eastern tip of Louisiana’s only inhabited barrier island deep in the Gulf of Mexico, Fiddlers Loop Trail takes more punches from nature than just about any other footpath in America. A hurricane arrives, on average, every three years. This century alone Isidore, Lili, Cindy, Katrina, Rita, and Gustav all have visited.

Despite the occasional upheavals and the crush of summer visitors a stick’s throw away, this is an exceedingly tranquil canine hike, circling a lagoon for about 2.5 miles. The south side of the loop travels through a tidal marsh and the trail through the grasses can range from slippery under paw toout and out flooded. Those namesake fiddlers crabs are much in evidence as are just about every species of American shorebird.

A long wooden boardwalk - a popular roosting spot for brown pelicans - crosses the lagoon and deposits canine hikers in a long alley of wildflower-bearing bushes. The splashes of year-round color continue all along the northern side of the loop.

Following the Fiddlers Loop Trail hike Seaman can climb the six-story park observation tower for views of the gulf and Grand Terre Island to the northwhere pirate captain Jean Lafitte andhis band of salty sea dogs once holed up. He is not allowed on the beach but for fun in the waves head next door to the town and miles of tail-friendly sand on one of Louisiana’s rare beaches. Grand Isle tilts just enough to the northeast for splendid beach sunrises.

HIKING TIME: 1-2 hours

(from the book 300 Day Hikes To Take With Your Dog Before He Tires You Out: Trails where you won’t be able to wipe the wag off your dog’s tail)