The St. Tammany Tourist and Convention Commission has gone into the recording industry and released a hot new CD that touts the attractions and businesses in the parish.

Though the CD, called the Louisiana Northshore Driving Tour, probably won’t make it to the Top 10, the commission is hoping the CD will attract more tourists to the parish.

The CD is just one component of a campaign by the commission to get St. Tammany Parish recognized by vacationing families and other tourists. Recently, under the guidance of Communications Director Renée Kientz, the commission changed its Web site, adding more links, photographs and parish information. According to Kientz, it is the wave of the future for tourist commissions around the country, and St. Tammany Parish is joining the band, so to speak.

The St. Tammany Tourist and Convention Commission released this Driving Tour CD to help tourists see the sights in the parish. (Staff Photo by Erik Sanzenbach)

The CD is a 90-minute audio tour of the parish that can be played in a car’s CD player. There is even a map of the parish included with the CD, so drivers know where to go. Besides an overview of the parish, the CD has tracks dedicated to each of the parish’s urban centers from Slidell all the way west to Madisonville. Each track tells the history of the town, plus its major attractions, interesting shops, hotels and restaurants.

Kientz got the idea for the CD while attending a tourism conference. She saw a booth advertising driving CDs made by an Austin, Texas, firm, Adeo Productions.

“Tourism commissions are using pod casts and web casts now, but we thought a CD would be more flexible,” Kientz said.

The CD took about four months to produce, and the commission used a Katrina recovery grant to pay for it. Kientz took the Adeo producer and writer on a tour of the parish. From that the writer wrote a script and sent it to Kientz for approval.

“I was skeptical at first, but the writer really did her homework. Her script did not have many mistakes,” Kientz said.

After picking out the narrator from audition tapes, Kientz and her department had the CD recorded. Kientz also provided photographs for the cover.

Currently the CD is available at the commission’s main office on Louisiana Highway 59 just off Interstate 12 and at Bayou Country near the Oak Harbor exit from Interstate 10 in Slidell.

The Driving Tour will soon be available for download from the commission’s new Web site, www.louisiananorthshore.com. Instead of a CD, a potential tourist to the parish can download the tour into their computer or MP3 player. Kientz said the Web site is being formatted so there is a link to the Adeo Web site for download.

The Driving Tour CD and the new Web site are designed to make St. Tammany Parish a real destination, according to Kientz.

“The parish is not just a getaway from New Orleans,” Kientz said. “We are telling people to visit us first and take a day trip to New Orleans.”

She added that the parish gets visitors from most of the Southern states and is hoping the Web site will entice tourism from the rest of the country. With lots of restaurants, green space, fishing, art and boating, the St. Tammany Tourist and Convention Commission believes this is great destination for a vacation.

“It’s a very vibrant place,” Kientz said.