Celebrating Mardi Gras! (Clipart.com)

Can't afford $400 a night for room in New Orleans during Mardi Gras? Concerned about unruly crowds?

Then drive an hour west to Houma, home of Louisiana's second biggest Mardi Gras.

Like the New Orleans one, it starts nearly two weeks before Lent. And while Houma's celebration has its share of noise and booze, fans say it's a community affair, aimed more at families, and a lot safer.

Houma's celebration features a series of 11 parades, each following a route more than eight kilometres long.

On Mardi Gras Day, there are two parades, run back to back, with nearly 50 floats between them.

Some folks bring lawn chairs and claim a street-side seat hours in advance. Others enjoy wandering along parts of the route before the festivities start. It's a diverse mix, from parents with kids in strollers to tattooed guys in muscle shirts with cans of beer in hand.

You know the parade is coming when cops on motorcycles, sirens blaring, start circling. High school marching bands strut their stuff, costumed Shriners drive funny cars, politicians in fancy sedans wave to the crowd.

The floats are the major attraction. Some are huge, with more than 30 riders who sing, yell and hurl a small fortune in coloured beads, stuffed animals, balls, doubloons, plastic drink glasses and other items to the outstretched hands of the crowd.

Toward the end of the route, the riders start unloading whatever's left, and spectators need to be wary. Lots of folks get beaned. I was hit twice by unopened plastic bags of beads -- one bystander broke a finger trying to catch something.

So much stuff is tossed out that locals bring souvenir shopping bags and laundry baskets to carry it all home.

Next year's Mardi Gras Day is Feb. 24, with the first parade going Feb. 13.

Head south along Bayou Petit Caillou toward Cocodrie (that's French for crocodile) and you can hit these attractions:

- Chauvin Sculpture Garden, created by a reclusive bricklayer named Kenny Hill out of rebar and concrete, using nothing but a spoon and a fork. It's a weird yet compelling piece of folk art.

- Cecil Lapeyrouse's Grocery Store, nearby, is a Cajun take on the variety store where you can buy mickeys of liquor or packages of fried pork cracklin, a snack much favoured here.

- The Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON) has an observation tower offering a view of the coastal marshes wetlands.

For tourism information, visit www.houmatourism or phone 1-800-688-2732.