Tiny NATCHITOCHES (pronounced "Nakitish"), in the sleepy cottonfields of the Cane River, is the oldest European settlement in Louisiana, having begun life as a French trading post in 1714. A Catholic oasis in a Protestant desert, it was swiftly fortified when its Spanish and Native American customers started to combine aggression with commerce.

With its lovingly restored Creole architecture, Natchitoches's exquisite Front Street , on the river, bears a passing resemblance to New Orleans' French Quarter, with its lacy iron balconies, spiral staircases and cobbled courtyards complemented by friendly, old-style stores. The 1717 Church of the Immaculate Conception , at Second and Church streets, has many of its original French features, including glass chandeliers and a hand-carved font. Fleur de lis on the nearby Walk of Honor commemorate celebrities with local connections, such as John Wayne, Clementine Hunter, and the cast of the movie Steel Magnolias , which was set and filmed here in 1988. Fort St Jean Baptiste , at Moreau and Mill streets (daily 9am-5pm; $2), is a five-acre reconstruction of the town's 1716 fort, with rough wooden and adobe buildings, enclosed by a tall wooden fence.

The quirky Bayou Folk Museum in novelist Kate Chopin 's old home in CLOUTIERVILLE (Mon-Sat 10am-5pm, Sun 1-5pm; $5), is filled with all manner of oddities of local interest, along with exhibits relating to Chopin herself, whose nineteenth-century novel The Awakening , about a married woman's desire for independence, shocked the nation.