Alligator Festival

The Alligator Festival is an annual event held during the last weekend of September in Luling, Louisiana. It is held at the St. Charles Parish West Bank Bridge Park under the Hale Boggs Bridge.

The Alligator Festival is a fairly small festival, but it is attended by a large number of people. Attendees come for various reasons, ranging from the small booths, to the food, to the rides. There is also live entertainment all weekend. The 2009 entertainment features The Bucktown All Stars. The Alligator Festival always incorporates favorite local bands. The vendors are also very popular. They sell a wide range of items each year, from kid's toys and candles, to clothes and jewelry. The local food also drives many each year. Hamburgers, French fries, and hot dogs are always popular, but people are driven by the jambalaya, pastalaya, fried alligator, funnel cakes, and other local, homemade dishes.

For such a small parish, it is a surprising that a largely attended festival is able to take place. The Alligator Festival is sponsored by the Rotary Club every year. They are able to collect several donations, as well, to make the festival possible. The Alligator Festival is always profitable, though, due to its continued success. The money raised is used to help St. Charles Parish, give scholarships to Hahnville and Destrehan High School students, and build freshwater wells in foreign countries. The Alligator festival is also extremely important to the St. Charles Parish economy.People from all over the world have come to the Alligator Festival, and it is a big hit among local residents.

History

The first Alligator Festival was held in 1979 at the Willowdale Country Club in Luling, Louisiana. The only thing sold at the first festival was alligator dishes made by local residents. Each year the festival became bigger and a wider variety of food and activities were offered. The festival was canceled in 2005 due to Hurricane Katrina, but returned in 2006.^[2]

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