Just outside New Orleans, Jefferson Parish offers an easy escape from the city and a completely different kind of afternoon. One minute you’re exploring the swamps, and the next you’re racing around a professional kart track. My afternoon in Jefferson Parish began with a walk through the shrimp lot and lunch by the bayou in Westwego before shifting gears to wildlife and fast engines.
Walk Through the Westwego Shrimp Lot in Jefferson Parish
Before lunch, I spent a few minutes walking through the Westwego Shrimp Lot, an open-air seafood market where vendors have been selling fresh-from-the-boat catches since 1977.
The market includes two rows of brightly painted seafood stands lining a large parking lot. The buildings are hard to miss, painted in bold colors like pink, red, and yellow, and each vendor operates their own stall.
At the back of the property, boats arrive with catches brought in from the Mississippi River, nearby bayous, and the Gulf. Fishermen distribute what they’ve caught among the vendors, who then sell directly to customers. Depending on the day and season, the offerings can include shrimp, crawfish, oysters, catfish, blue crabs, alligator, and just about anything else you can think of.
The market is at its busiest first thing in the morning when it opens and the vendors close their stalls when they sell out, but there were still several vendors open when we arrived. I got a good look at the beautiful blue crabs and learned how to tell a male from a female. Males have blue claws and females have red-tipped claws.
I also saw crawfish piled into huge sacks, which fascinated me.
Even if you’re not buying anything, it’s an interesting place to wander for a few minutes and see the seafood trade up close before heading further into Jefferson Parish.
Lunch at Segnette Landing Restaurant
Just behind the shrimp lot sits Segnette Landing Restaurant, a casual spot overlooking Bayou Segnette. The menu leans into Cajun cooking, with plenty of seafood dishes, including a local favorite, white beans and shrimp.
We started with crab dip and a Cajun board with boudin and hog head cheese. I’ve had boudin many times, but this was my first time trying hog head cheese. The name is revolting, but it actually tasted great.
I also sampled the chicken-and-sausage gumbo (tasty!), and for my entrée, I ordered a braised beef po’ boy on Leidenheimer French bread. It was salty, juicy, messy, and loaded with slow-cooked beef and a handful of pearl onions, with gravy soaking into the bread. Delicious!
I don’t eat seafood myself, but my friend ordered the seafood platter to share with her husband and said it was excellent, especially the crab cake.
Airboat Ride with Ultimate Swamp Adventures
After lunch, it was only a short walk to the dock behind the restaurant where Ultimate Swamp Adventures launches its airboat tours through Bayou Segnette. Airboats handle shallow water and marshland with ease. When the engine starts it’s loud, so everyone gets protective earwear. Then the flat-bottomed boats skim across the water and zip through narrow channels traditional boats can’t reach.
Our airboat moved between open marsh and cypress swamp, giving us a look at the different environments that make up this stretch of Louisiana wetlands.
Marshland is mostly open water filled with grasses and low vegetation, whereas swamps are wetlands dominated by trees, like Louisiana’s state tree, the bald cypress. They’re easy to spot, with their distinctive knobby cypress knees poking through the mud, and Spanish moss often hangs from the branches.
That moss once supported a surprisingly large industry in the late 1800s and was even used to stuff the seats of early Model T Fords.
The ride also doubled as a wildlife lesson. We spotted several birds, including a great blue heron, which can grow up to five feet tall with a six-foot wingspan. They’re also one of the main predators of baby alligators. When gators hatch, they’re only about six inches long, and nearly everything in the swamp will eat them.
Of course, everyone on the boat was hoping to see alligators, but we were visiting during a time of year when gators can be hit or miss.
Our guide explained that during winter they enter a kind of hibernation called brumation. Instead of actively roaming around, they settle into the mud and slow their bodies way down. Their heart rate drops and they can go long stretches without eating. They rely on sunshine and warm temperatures to become active again.
A week earlier, temperatures had climbed into the 80s, and apparently, the gators had been popping up everywhere. Then a cold front came through and shut things down again.
We eventually spotted a few resting in the water and along the banks. Our guide tried to coax one he called Betty closer to the boat, tossing marshmallows into the water, though she didn’t seem especially interested that day.
I also saw a nutria scrambling into a hollow log, but it was too quick to snap a photo. I’d never seen one before and didn’t realize how big they were, kind of like a beaver crossed with a very large rat. Unfortunately, they’re invasive and cause major damage to Louisiana wetlands because they eat enormous amounts of vegetation. To control the population, the state offers a bounty of about $6 per tail.
On our way back, we were surprised to see a cormorant holding a fresh catch as it swam through the water, but it soon tossed it into the air and swallowed it.
Our guide, Tre’, was quick to spot wildlife and point it out, so by the time we returned to the dock, I’d seen all of the above plus egrets, more herons, lots of turtles, and common gallinules. Of course, speeding over the water while weaving through the cypress tree swamps and marsh channels of Louisiana’s wetlands would have been fun even without wildlife sightings. But, I’m so glad we saw so much!
Go Kart Racing at NOLA Motorsports Park
The final stop of the afternoon brought a completely different kind of adrenaline rush. NOLA Motorsports Park is home to Throttle & Swing, an entertainment center with high-speed go-karting and an 18-hole mini golf course. It’s one of the largest go-karting facilities in the United States, and the track can be configured in more than 80 different ways.
Map of the karting course layout.
We watched a safety video and got outfitted with balaclavas to wear under the helmets, then headed out to the track to race.
Before heading out, the staff explained that go-karting here uses a two-pedal setup with one foot for the gas and the other for the brake. It sounds simple, but it takes a little getting used to, and apparently, one of the most common mistakes is pressing both pedals at once when you panic. That’s usually when people spin out or end up in the grass.
The adult karts we drove can reach about 40 miles per hour, which feels much faster when you’re sitting just inches off the ground.
It took me a couple of laps to gain the confidence to speed around the curves and pass other cars, but I was determined not to be a granny driver. Each race session lasts 10 minutes, and lap times are tracked electronically and displayed on a digital scoreboard afterwards. I came in third place and won a bronze medal. The go-kart experience was fast, chaotic, and a lot of fun.
I wish we’d had time to check out the mini golf course. It has some fun terrain and would be a great way to relax after racing.
More Things to Do in Jefferson Parish
If you have more time in Jefferson Parish, there are plenty of ways to keep the day going, especially if you enjoy being on the water or sampling local food. For dinner, you can try Seither’s Seafood in Harahan for Louisiana seafood dishes.
You can also head down to Jean Lafitte Harbor, where guides run inland saltwater fishing trips through the nearby marshes. Some of them even offer “catch-and-cook” experiences, where the fish you pull in that day ends up on your plate for lunch.
Why Jefferson Parish Makes an Easy Day Trip from New Orleans
What surprised me most about Jefferson Parish is how much variety I packed into a single afternoon. I wandered through the Westwego Shrimp Lot, skimmed across the wetlands in an airboat, and then ended up racing go-karts on a professional track.
If you’re staying in New Orleans and want to mix things up for an afternoon, Jefferson Parish is an easy side trip and a fun way to see a different side of south Louisiana.
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