Monday, November 24th - New Orleans

We took the RV park's shuttle bus downtown and purchased tickets for the Hop On/Hop Off double decker bus.  We have had very good experiences in other cities with this method; unfortunately, this did not extend to New Orleans.  The speakers were crappy, that along with a horrible narrator’s voice really did not make the ride very good for us.

However, we persevered and rode around to at least get a look-see at the layout of the downtown area and points of interest.  This city is of course very old and there is a lot of history in the area. 

An Old Infant Asylum?? How would you know?

Included, as part of the bus ticket was a 45-minute walking tour through areas of the French Quarter.  From both our walk about and the bus ride we learned some interesting facts about New Orleans:

• New Orleans is located approximately 90 miles from the Gulf of Mexico.
•   We did not know that during the civil war Louisiana was not part of the Confederacy!
• New Orleans is known for more than just Jazz and Food.  They also have some great theatre arts and opera!  Yes, there is a large opera contingent in New Orleans.  There was one gentleman singing on the corner and he was very good.  Great range and volume considering all of the other noise going on in the street.
•  Much of the downtown area (e.g. The French Quarter) was not damaged by the hurricane Katrina flooding.  Those areas were actually too close to the Mississippi River bank that is actually about 15 feet higher than many of areas that did flood.  However, some of the buildings did receive some wind and rain damage. 
•  During our walk we were asked not to lean on any of the buildings (hmmm funny request!?!); this is because just a week prior to our visit one of the 3 storey buildings totally collapsed into the streets.  We saw the spot where the building used to exist and it is obvious the buildings are getting old and the city wants to do some inspections to prevent any other collapses – so, no leaning!
• We passed Harrah’s Casino on our bus tour and found that it is actually illegal to have a “Gambling” establishment in Louisiana, but there are still Casinos.  Those Casinos are for “Gaming” not “Gambling”, because “Gaming” is not illegal in Louisiana.
• We also learned that New Orleans is not the home of Cajun cooking.  It is Creole cooking here, Cajun cooking is more to the west in Baton Rouge and Lafayette areas of Louisiana.
• They leave the beads from all the Mardi Gras in the trees.

You can just see where the building collapsed -
the empty space to the left of the 3 story building

Trees with hanging beads!

We had lunch at The Gumbo Shop, Diane was not fussy on her Shrimp Gumbo, I had the Red Bean & Rice and Shrimp Creole that was excellent!

We walked through the French Market and purchased some spices called “Slap Ya Mama”!!  Interesting name J, excellent spices!

A huge building where all of the Mardi Gras
floats are created and repaired.

Evidently it is very easy to know when the New Orleans Saints (football) are playing a game in town, almost everyone is wearing “Saints” team shirts or some other item.  I say almost everyone because the ones that are not wearing Saints stuff are either tourists like us or the visiting team (it was the Baltimore Ravens today).  Wow lots of team spirit there!! Unfortunately the Saints did not win, oh well, lots of sad faces on Tuesday morning L.

We waited for our bus and returned to the campground.  We will return for a longer visit but will try to get a site at the RV campground in the French Quarter.