Saturday Night at the Zydeco

Planted in the Cajun prairie of Evangeline Parish—off Veterans Memorial Highway between Eunice a few miles to the south and Mamou just a little further to the north—Lakeview Park and Beach plays host to a traveler’s refuge resembling something of a Cajun summer camp: swimming, fishing, singing, dancing, campfires, fellowship. This sentiment is echoed by first-and long-time guests of the venue.  

“Lakeview’s been around since the ‘sixties,” says Bonnie Pitre Kyzar, co-owner of Lakeview Park and Beach, as she bounces her 11-month old son, the next generation to enjoy the Park, on her lap. “Every day, we have people come in…they tell us their stories about what they remember from the Park—it’s an institution around these parts. We have this name everyone knows and it was important to us, coming and bringing it back to life, to preserve that.” 

It’s true, the owners, Kyzar, Laura Pitre and Lance Pitre, have tried to maintain as much as they can of the original Park, while making the necessary functional updates. Even the sign at the Park entrance dates to the early days: an original with bright colors, bulb lights, and geometric shapes. And while the 42-acre RV Park was established in the 1960s, it sat as a blighted piece of property for almost a decade when Eunice natives and siblings Laura and Lance Pitre purchased the property with plans to revitalized the Park back in the early 2000s. 

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“When we bought the place in 2003, it was a mess,” says Laura, who lives on-site full-time, overseeing operations. “The beach was a mess; the Park was run-down, overgrown, with electrical wires running from one tree to the next tree to the next tree, junk-piles everywhere…There was a cockfighting pit in the old office…a tree had fallen on it from Hurricane Lily. It just needed a lot of love. It took years to update and we finally officially opened Labor Day 2009 with about six campers here!”

The overhaul included build out of 95 tree-fringed RV sites; the addition of four quaint cottages and some lakeside acreage set aside for primitive camping; renovation of a stately, yet unassuming general store; rejuvenation of an old swimming hole flanked by a white sand beach and palm trees, a playground and a couple of beach bars; cleaning up and stocking the 13-acre lake with fishes for sport and eating; and the relocation and rebuild of a picturesque, old, wooden barn to the site. With these added amenities, people starting arriving, and these days, there is a waiting list for weekend reservations at Lakeview.

“On Fridays, campers are backed up to the road,” says Laura. “Friday and Saturday nights, the place is alive. Then Sundays, I wake up, get ready for church and it’s full…go to church, return, and they’re gone, and it’s pretty quiet until the next Friday.” 

Adding to Lakeview’s appeal are the ongoing activities held throughout the year (apart from during the Park’s downtime in December and January). “At Lakeview, we host several special events,” says Laura. “These include a traditional Cajun boucherie, the Saturday night barn dances, Black Pot Camp…many others. It's through these experiences that we are able to [continue our culture] like see a pig from go farm to table during our Boucherie [and] feast on yummy [traditional] dishes such as backbone stew, boudin, cracklings, hog head cheese, freasurs and ponce.”

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The events are indeed special. An arts and crafts weekend is held each month, mothers and fathers are celebrated on their respective weekends in May and June (with a Men’s Beauty Pageant, complete with a Best Legs contest, planned for June 17^th of this year), Saturdays and Sundays throughout the month of October are filled with Halloween activities, and Saturday nights bring musicians to the Park. 

The popular Saturday night music series, free to campers, sees vacationers streaming into the dignified, old, gray barn as music starts thundering from the structure. The barn becomes a dance hall, complete with a bar offering one-dollar jello shots, beer, and liquor, and revelers of all ages circle the dance floor in a synchronized, measured groove. Folks from far and wide frequent these Lakeview Saturday concerts, paying a small fee at the door. 

With the concerts and many of the events, Kyzar and the Pitre’s stay true to their mission of preserving what belongs at the Park: they stock the line-up with South Louisiana musicians. Celebrated Cajun and zydeco bands, Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys, Geno Delafose and the French Rockin’ Boogie, Horace Trahan and the Ossun Express, and the like are found on the Lakeview stage. 

“We learn to two-step, waltz, jitterbug and zydeco dance while listening to our favorite musicians play on a Saturday night in the barn,” says Laura. She and her sister, Bonnie, danced the Cajun French Music Association circuit as kids. Cajun by blood, their family has long-valued the traditions of their culture.

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In July and August, the Saturday music series moves to the Beach where campers can dance (or float, or sit) waterside and listen to the tunes. The change of venue comes with a change of time, with bands playing from mid-day to 7 PM. More changes to come include expanding the current bath house, renovating the old dance hall that sits unused in the middle of the Park into a hotel, adding a building with a commercial kitchen for meetings, indoor activities, and pop-up dinners, and moving the maintenance area to better utilize the acreage. With each improvement and new activity, the owners are ardent about continuing to grow and expand their offerings to include more and different types of visitors. 

“Our culture is what sets us apart from all other places,” says Laura. “It's our music, food, language, and love of family and neighbors that makes us Cajun.  It's beautiful and unique…. Black Pot Camp [in early October of each year] is an intense four-day workshop of full of classes shared with some of the most talented people you'll ever meet.  There you can learn about many aspects of our culture including music, dancing, and cooking.  By living out our traditions here at Lakeview, we keep our Cajun culture alive...”

For more information on events and to plan a visit, check out Lakeview Park & Beach online: www.lvpark.com