Visited: September 2017
In September of 2017 I visited New Orleans with a former friend Lara. I had wanted to go for years and we had a blast exploring the city and drinking disgusting local drinks.
In early fall 2017 I went to New Orleans with a former friend Lara. She was going down for work and stayed a few extra days. Long enough for me to go down and join here. I had wanted to go for years and had tried to convince people previously to go with little success.
We spent three days there and enjoyed it quite a bit. Lara rented an Airbnb for us on Urquhart street in the 7th ward in Nola as it's affectionately called. I arrived a little after Lara, but once settled in we did a walk around and then went to Frenchman Street for happy hour. Very quickly I got a sense of what Nola was about. It's very unique in the US relative to what I had seen and felt before. The taxi ride over had a long time local driving us talking about Hurricane Katrina, the local economy, crime and hospitality. I could tell that there is both a lot of crime and a lot of hospitality throughout the city. The locals love Nola and hate that it hasn't thrived.
The city itself was of course founded by the French in 1718 and was in mostly French or Spanish control until 1803 when Napoleon sold it to the Americans in the Louisiana Purchase. It's now home to a diverse group of African Americans, Caucasians and some Hispanic and Asian. The real heart and energy of the city is in the middle around Frenchman Street, The French Quarter and Bourbon street which we saw and much more.
Anyway back to day one. We spent the afternoon, evening and night walking around the city and then to Frenchman street, the a crappy ghost tour, then bar hoping!
The ghost tour wasn't the best as the guide didn't believe in ghosts and only really showed us places where ghosts supposedly haunted. However as she didn't believe in them it seemed difficult for her to properly tell stories about them. No conviction! We left it early using the moonwalk to back out.
Some day/night 1 photos:
Day 2
I will say - we did not get up too early any day and this was no exception. We went to Cafe Du Monde for some beignets and coffee. They were pretty delicious. From there we slowly sauntered to the WW2 Museum which I loved and could have stayed at all day. It was somewhat interactive in that you follow the course soldiers (different ones or just a single one) through the different fronts of the war.
Lara was a sport and hung around in the museum for a while but didn't enjoy it as much as I did.
Lots of photos below: Cafe du Monde, some from our walk to the Museum. Some in the museum including us steering and powering the ship (my job was harder). Plus some posing with FDR.
Later in the afternoon of day 2...
We went on a cruise of the Mississippi river on the good ship Natchez. In case you didn't know the Mississippi river is the largest in the US, starting in Minnesota and traveling the entire north to south route of the US to NOLA, draining into the Gulf of Mexico. There is so much more to talk about the river and its significance, however you can do that research if you like.
I will not lie. We drank a lot on this trip and the boat cruise was no different we crushed some pre cruise wine and some during cruise wine and some post cruise wine.
Some photos of the cruise - tbh the photos weren't the best as the views weren't amazing but still lots of fun and chill with some commentary along the way. Also a photo of some box wine and some food we must have eaten.
After the cruise we ended up in many cool bars and restaurants and courtyards and wandered bourbon street. I can't really remember which night was which but one night Lara was really drunk and sick and the other night I was quite drunk and not feeling well (but still vomit free since 2006 May!)
Some more photos:
We did end up at many of the famous bars noted in this article including: Pat O'brien's, Napoleon House, Lafitte's blacksmith shop and the Old Absinthe House. Plus others. One funny event from this night was we bought two hurricanes for $10 each from a really sketchy spot. They were filled super high with booze and I suspect not high quality booze. We could only get through half of one and sold the other one to someone for $10. I think I could have got $15 from him.
Day 3
Today we also started slow and took a bus tour of New Orleans. Hop on hop off - perfect for us as it got us to the Garden District filled with lovely old estate type homes you would associate with the deep south. We walked around the Garden District for a while but got tired soon enough. We then ordered a massive meal at a vegan restaurant called Seed. The food was amazing but the service was slow so I gave it a 3/5 on Yelp!!
We also walked through one of these cemeteries (one of the non-paid ones) and through the Louis Armstrong Park. We
Photos: Cemetery, Louis Armstrong Park, the bus ride!
We wrapped up the day with some dinner and really no drinks after the previous couple nights, then ended up at the world famous Preservation Hall jazz bar. It was a very small venue with maybe 30-40 people crammed into a smallish room listening to some real jazz veterans crush out some music. Felt mostly authentic although I'm sure those folks do 100s of shows a year. Still worth the visit.
Photo of Preservation Hall - no photos allowed hence this was taken from the web.
And the next day was home town. Lots of fun! Toodles poodles.
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