More than 400 festivals take place in Louisiana each year. There’s the Jazz & Heritage Festival in New Orleans, the Strawberry Festival in Pontchatoula, Festival Acadiens in Lafayette, the Crawfish Festival in Breaux Bridge, the Tamale Fiesta in Zwolle, the Folklife Festival in Monroe, the Meat Pie Festival in Natchitoches, the Cotton Festival in Ville Platte…you get the idea. Even if your group won’t be participating in a local festival while in Louisiana, you can rest assured that you’re in a state that knows how to celebrate.
After meeting in Louisiana, “people will most remember the friendly, hospitable people, our succulent cuisine and the one-of-a-kind atmosphere,” says Katie Harrington, Public Relations Manager for the Lake Charles/Southwest Louisiana CVB. In Louisiana, every meeting becomes a singular celebration, so give your group a chance to enjoy the party!
Alexandria
Located in the center of the state, the Alexandria/Pineville area offers a wide array of accommodations and meeting facilities at budget-friendly prices. The Alexander Fulton Hotel and Convention Center is located in the heart of downtown Alexandria, with 11,088 square feet of meeting space and 173 guest rooms.
Aside from a variety of hotels with meeting space, the city also offers a number of off-site venues, such as the Alexandria Museum of Art, Inglewood Plantation, historic Lloyd Hall and Conference Center at the Greens, with meeting space for up to 150 people. And when the meeting’s over, Alexandria offers a veritable gumbo of cultural activities, living history, world-class recreation, art and much more.
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Houma
Known for spicing up meetings, Houma offers modern meeting facilities, including everything from sensibly-priced hotels to a 100,000-square-foot civic center. In Houma, those modern facilities blend with the unique culture, history and hospitality of the Bayou Cajuns in the heart of America’s wetlands, less than an hour’s drive from New Orleans. With exciting swamp tours, spicy Cajun cuisine, unlimited charter fishing, lively Cajun dance halls, birding trails, an exotic wildlife park, Mardi Gras celebrations and more, your group will never run out of things to do in Houma.
Creative meetings can include a tour of cypress swamps, a visit to an elegant plantation, or a walking tour of the historic district. Adventurous attendees can hook a big one on a fishing charter or simply enjoy local fish, shrimp, crabs, or oysters in a Cajun cottage.
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Jefferson
Often called the “Gateway to New Orleans,” Jefferson Parish offers all the comforts, entertainment and amenities to make a meeting memorable. Facilities include the Alario Center, which includes a 2,200-seat Main Arena; the 70,000-square-foot Pontchartrain Center; and The Balcony, a premier reception hall.
Attendees can enjoy first-class shopping, historical districts, farmer’s markets, exciting nightlife and world-renowned cuisine. And for those who bring their families along, kids will love Jefferson’s new Kenner Planetarium and MegaDome Cinema in Rivertown. For groups that love the outdoors, some of the richest, most treasured fishing in the world takes place in the bayous, lakes and tributaries of Jefferson Parish, and the area’s swamp tours are world-renowned for showcasing nature’s beauty up close and personal.
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Monroe
Conveniently located between Jackson and Shreveport in northern Louisiana, Monroe-West Monroe is a prime spot for meetings. The area offers 2,000 hotel rooms, more than 70 homegrown restaurants and many shopping choices. Bottom line: Monroe-West Monroe has what you need to make your next meeting a success.
The Monroe Civic Center includes 15 meeting rooms, a 14,000-square-foot conference hall, a 7,600-seat arena, and a 30,000-square-foot equestrian pavilion. The nearby West Monroe Convention Center includes three conference halls, two dining rooms and an executive board room. The area also offers plenty of shopping, Louisiana cuisine, spas, golf and outdoor sporting options.
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Southwest Louisiana
Also known as the Lake Charles area, Southwest Louisiana offers state-of-the art meeting facilities, world class gaming, horseracing, golfing, Cajun food, music and festivals. Some of the top meeting facilities in the area include L’Auberge du Lac Casino Resort, Isle of Capri Casino, the Lake Charles Civic Center and Prien Lake Park. And the area’s accommodations are expanding: By the end of 2009, Southwest Louisiana will have 2,096 new guest rooms, for a grand total of 6,564.
Also coming online this year will be two full-service Holiday Inn properties and a Marriott Springhill Suites. In addition, Sugarcane Bay Casino, a $400 million resort, is under construction and is scheduled to open in 2010. And the destination is “anxiously awaiting the opening of a new $27 million passenger airport terminal this spring at Lake Charles Regional Airport,” says Katie Harrington, “which means that getting to the area has never been easier.”
While in Lake Charles, groups can visit the Mardi Gras Museum of Imperial Calcasieu, with the world’s largest Mardi Gras costume display, and talking, motion-activated mannequins that tell the story of Mardi Gras. There’s also the Creole Nature Trail All-American Road, the Charpentier Historic District, with more than 40 square blocks of Victorian-era homes, and numerous church tours.
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St. Tammany
Also known as “Louisiana’s Northshore,” St. Tammany Parish includes “a number of communities well-suited to hosting SMERF meetings and events,” says Renee Kientz, Communications Director for the St. Tammany Parish Tourist Commission. “We’re located on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain, just 45 minutes from downtown New Orleans, yet [we’re] a destination in our own right, offering visitors the cosmopolitan pleasures of urban life, as well as the relaxing pleasures of great green spaces, soft adventure on land and water and beautiful scenery. We’re where New Orleanians come to get away, and have been for more than a century.”
Most larger meetings in the area are held at the 45,000-square-foot Northshore Harbor Center in Slidell or the 28,000-square-foot Castine Center in Mandeville. Some popular meeting hotels include the Holiday Inn Covington, which offers more than 8,500 square feet of meeting space, the Courtyard by Marriott, with 3,200 square feet of space, and the Rivers Retreat Center, with a 2,800-square-foot conference center and a 3,500-square-foot screened pavilion.
After the meeting, enjoy boat tours of Honey Island Swamp and Insta-Gator Ranch, or a visit to the Global Wildlife Center. Other interesting places include the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Maritime Museum, Pontchartrain Vineyards and Olde Towne Slidell.
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New Orleans
The state’s largest city offers plenty of options for meetings of all sizes. The centerpiece of most large meetings in New Orleans is the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, located along the mighty Mississippi River, within walking distance of the French Quarter, Jackson Square, the Aquarium of the Americas, Riverwalk Mall and 30,000 first-class hotel rooms.
After a recent year-long, $60 million renovation, the Morial Convention Center is fresh, sparkling and already hosting a full schedule of events. With 12 separate but connecting exhibit halls, the center offers 1.1 million square feet of contiguous exhibit space on one level, as well as 140 meeting rooms, two luxurious ballrooms and a 4,032-seat, acoustically divisible conference auditorium. The auditorium can be divided into three separate sections equipped with lighting, video and audio production technology with high-speed internet access via tier-1 provider, T-3, ISDN, and WiFi.
Nearby hotels include the Hilton New Orleans Riverside, with more than 130,000 square feet of flexible meeting and event space and more than 1,600 guest rooms, as well as the JW Marriott, Loews and W Hotel New Orleans. An array of attractions are close by, such as the Audubon Zoo, the National World War II Museum and world-famous Bourbon Street.
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