New Orleans knows Jazz!

This was both Mike's and my first time to New Orleans. We were both really excited to eat good food, hear good music and of course see the historic graveyards.

When we first started looking we weren't sure we could even afford to come to New Orleans. Hotels in the French Quarter often look affordable, but once you look into it you find out that they have a cleaning fee in excess of $100 ! Since we were only planning to stay 2 nights, this was like adding $50 to each night. Luckily we didn't give up, and expanded our search to within a mile of the French Quarter. We ended up in a super cool and very hip neighborhood called Faubourg Marigny. A lot of people say it's what Bourbon Street used to be like before it became, largely, a tourist trap.

We stayed in the Balcony House Bed and Breakfast. I would highly recommend it if you're going to New Orleans, but make sure you book early as we met a gentleman in the bar who wanted to stay but they were booked up.

The room that you're looking at is number 13 so if you go I would also recommend this room. Might not be a big deal to some people but we love having a little kitchenette. This allowed us to store some items that we wanted to keep cold and to make meals so we didn't have to eat out all the time.

Though I have to say that the nicest feature was that we had a private patio! As you can imagine, New Orleans is the kind of city that comes alive at night, so we often had some downtime in the afternoon and this was a lovely place to spend it.

After we checked in and situated our things in the room, we headed to the hotel bar for a snack. There we met Vesna, who was our bartender. It was like she was my long-lost sister-from-another-mister! She spent several hours talking to us until it got busy. Then she said, "Hey do you wanna go out with Kiki and me? We'll show you the best parts of New Orleans."

There was no discussion between Mike and me, just a resounding yes. So we agreed to meet them around 10:30, which was when the bar closed. I guess we were lucky that we were there on a weekday or they probably would have been open much longer. The first stop was at a punk bar just down from our hotel. It became clear very fast that Vesna knew everyone.

I was so lucky that everyone agreed to have a photograph together, because unfortunately Kiki decided to go home just after this one.

Vesna was very serious about not walking too far in this area at night, even from Frenchmen to Bourbon streets. This of course is a walk that we will do many times in the daytime.

We had a wonderful time at the last stop; it was a great band and great dancing. We then jumped a taxi back to our hotel. All's well that ends well, but I was sad about not getting some dinner! I guess that's what happens when you stay out till 2:00 a.m.

In the morning, Frenchmen looks like any other street in New Orleans. It's little bit sad really because you know how amazing it is at night, but it's all closed up. There's really no daytime activity or dining that goes on in this area.

Luckily we made our way to the French Market and ogled all of the crafts that were for sale. Unfortunately we're the kind of tourists who look and don't buy. Sad to say that nothing caught my eye.

New Orleans has history around every corner. Here's an interesting statue that may at first seem to be oddly placed in this city. It is the Joan of Arc monument on Decatur Street in the French Quarter. There are some interesting features of the monument including two cannons, which were Joan of Arc's primary weapons of choice. The statue was erected by France in 1972 as a gift to New Orleans, whose namesake, Orléans, was one of the towns Joan of Arc (1412-1431) defended from the English during the Hundred Years War (1337-1453).

There are also lots of street performers in New Orleans. This one is performing Just down the street from the oldest cathedral in America.

There is a fairly new National Historic Park in the Tremé neighborhood of New Orleans. It was created in 1994 to celebrate the origins and evolution of jazz. Unfortunately they're not allowed to give tours anymore because the local for-profit tour operators thought it was cutting into their business. But they do play jazz a few times a day and you can take yourself on a self-guided walking tour.

Just a few blocks away is a second National Historical Park in New Orleans. This one protects examples of the natural and cultural resources of Louisiana's Mississippi River Delta region. The park has cool exhibits that take the viewer through unique architecture in the French Quarter, and the linguistics that have grown up in the area. It also of course talks about the culture of Mardi Gras. The park is named after Jean Lafitte, who was a buisnessman / pirate. He also, for a federal pardon on his piracy, helped General Andrew Jackson defend New Orleans against the British in the final battle of the War of 1812. But we'll cover that later because we did end up going out to the site of the Battle of New Orleans.

We didn't spend a ton of time on Bourbon street, but that's just because we preferred the air and experience of Frenchmen Street.

Of course that didn't stop Mike from getting a beer at a few bars. It's just so odd to get to walk around with alcohol in public at almost any time of day and night.

All around the city there are constant reminders that Mardi Gras happened last month. A lot of the houses in the area where we were staying decorate their front porches with beads. I guess that New Orleans never really shakes one Mardi Gras off before the next one comes around.

The architecture anywhere in New Orleans is really beautiful. The city has worked very hard to preserve the porches, iron railings, hurricane shutters and other features that make this city so recognizable. It's one of the earliest places in America to put in place laws against changing building facades.

Another one of Vesna and Kiki's sugestions was that if we wanted good Louisiana Créole we should go to Coop's Place. They were so right! This place had the best rice and beans ever. They also had wonderful marinated crab claws and of course Jambalaya and Gumbo.

Here's another pretty and quintessential New Orleans house. They even have a Happy 300th Birthday to New Orleans sign in their front yard. New Orleans 1718 to 2018!

Also people work very hard to keep their gardens looking beautiful. I'm particularly fond of Sweet Peas, so this one was my favorite.

There is just nothing like this in Philadelphia is there?

Went down to Frenchmen street again just to walk around and hear the music. You can just stand on the street and listen to the bands play through the open doors and windows. That way you can hear a dozen bands in one night.

We couldn't leave New Orleans without having Beignets.

Café Du Monde has the tiniest menu you've ever seen. They really just do two things, extremely well. Coffee with chicory, and Beignets with so much powdered sugar it's almost enough to throw one into diabetic shock.

As you can see they are totally delicious!! Though there is absolutely no way to eat all the powdered sugar. We got 3 bags which was really way too much. I didn't think they were quite so big or so filling, and I could only eat two.

The nice thing about the time that we arrived is that we got to stand in line for self service but then eat at one of the tables because they weren't doing table service in the entire restaurant when we arrived. Oddly, like so much else in New Orleans, they're open 24 hours.

After our delicious snack we headed out to the tramcars which will take us up Canal Street all the way to the graveyards. Unlike the way they are portrayed in the movies, the graveyards in New Orleans are quite far outside the city. The streetcar ride took us almost 40 minutes but it was nice to see sections of the city we wouldn't have otherwise.

Before we started on our graveyard adventure, we decided to stop have some refreshments and play some shuffleboard. Mike won of course, but I still enjoy this game and don't get to play as often as I'd like. Many of the graveyards in New Orleans are located in the 9th Ward.

We started off in a graveyard that had very typical graves for New Orleans, but very plain ones as you will soon see. They use this style of burial in New Orleans because the water table is within six feet of the surface almost everywhere.

Because of the water table, in the late 1700's people found that, especially during floods, the water would push the coffins up through the dirt, leading to unsanitary conditions. They tried many things to rectify the problem, like drilling holes in the top of the coffins and loading them up with sand and rocks but neither of these things worked very well.

It's some ways I can't say that I'm sorry it did because the monuments that are left behind are gorgeous. This one in particular reminds me of tombs we saw in Egypt.

There are angels all over the place. As we went through the graveyard I really wished that I knew something about each of the families.

This is probably my favorite thing that we saw in any of the graveyards. I just thought it was so heart-wrenching. Also I was amazed that so many of the crypts had stained glass that was still intact. And we're not talking about new stained glass but stuff that, for many of the tombs, is clearly over 100 years old.

As Mike I walked around the graveyard, we noticed this that a very prominent funeral was taking place just to the left of this monument. There was a Cardinal and an Archbishop at the gravesite. We realized that we had inadvertently stumbled upon the funeral of Tom Benson, the owner of the New Orleans Saints and New Orleans Pelicans. The only reason that we knew what was going on is because we had been denied entrance into the St. Louis Cathedral because of his actual funeral.

This is a memorial to hurricane Katrina victims. It's shaped vaguely like the spiral of a hurricane and in the crypts at the back are buried victims who were either never identified or never claimed. It's a little bit like the Vietnam memorial in DC, which I like a lot. We just sort of stumbled onto this as we went from cemetery to cemetery, so I'm glad we found it.

When we got back into town we walked down Bourbon street from the streetcar. There had been a bar that Mike had been eyeballing since we got here and he asked to stop for a beer. I'm so glad that he did because we met Malcolm in the middle of Bourbon Street. He works at the Royal Sonesta in the French Quarter. So if you're ever in New Orleans don't hesitate to stop by and see the best concierge in the world.

The cathedral in New Orleans is called Saint Louis. It is the oldest cathedral in America and quite stunning. It's located just across Jackson Square Park.

Just outside Jackson Square Park you can get a horse and carriage ride that takes you around the city. These are totally not our cup of tea, but I almost gave in when I saw that one of them was pulled by a unicorn!

Here is the altar. You can see how beautiful all of the gold adornments are. If you looked up the right and left hand sides of the nave, you would see stained glass depicting the life of Louis IX.

There is a lot of amazing graffiti in New Orleans. None of the artists are quite as controversial as Banksy, who is the artist who did this piece. I took this photograph the way that I did because Banksy is often trying to draw attention to the plight of an area when he puts up one of his pieces. He did a number of works in New Orleans right after hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately only two of them have survived.

This beautiful mural is outside the Studio Be art gallery. Unfortunately inside this studio is the other Banksy that we wanted to see. But they were charging $10 a person to get in!

Eventually it's going to be displayed in the International Hotel in downtown New Orleans, but when the owners bought it they didn't exactly think about how they were going to get it into the hotel so it's just been chilling in this warehouse while they work it out.

If we hadn't stopped to try to see the second Banksy, we never would have seen this sign. It's amazing how much history you just trip across when you're living in a Van.

The Battle of New Orleans took place between December 14, 1814 and January 18, 1815. This is the last major battle of the War of 1812 and sadly it could have been largely avoided because the Treaty of Ghent was signed on December 24, 1814.

Major General Andrew Jackson prevented a much larger British force, commanded by Admiral Alexander Cochrane and General Edward Pakenham, from seizing New Orleans, which was the gateway to the vast territory the US had acquired with the Louisiana Purchase. Does anyone know The Battle of New Orleans song by Johnny Horton and written by one Jimmy Driftwood, which won a Grammy Award for Song of the Year in l959 ? It is historical in an entertaining way, and worth listening to.

Just outside the visitor center you can see the Chalmette Monument. It is a 100-foot-high obelisk that honors the troops of the Battle of New Orleans. We had fun climbing the 112 steps up to the observation platform at the top.

After that we took a trip through the cemetery. Most of the troops in the cemetery are from the civil and revolutionary wars, but there are a few War of 1812 veterans as well.

On our way to Texas we ran across this guy standing in front of a boat rental and sale business. It struck me as odd that the owner would want to drain the swamp, which is exactly where his customers take the items he sells. Later Mike told me this was one of the slogans that Trump ran under...I still find it odd nonetheless. Welcome to Texas!...again!