Sights and sounds of New Orleans, Part 1

This isn't strictly dog-related, so feel free to skip it, or any others, if you like, but I pulled together a few of the pics I took on our New Orleans trip last week.  We ate, we drank, we walked, we toured, we had a great time. 


The obligatory New Orleans stops

My mother and Clay with Hurricanes
 in Pat O'Brien's courtyard

Beignets at Cafe Du Monde

We happened by Cafe Du Monde on our first day there at a time when there was no crowd, so we stopped in for iced coffee and a plate of beignets (fried dough buried under a pile of powdered sugar).

One evening later in the week we had Hurricanes at Pat O'Brien's.

A miniature horse in a bar was a first for me.
All dressed up too.

Dogs, etc.

14 week old Great Dane pup on the patio of the pirate bar.

I was surprised at the number of dogs I'd see around the French Quarter, many accompanying street musicians, performers, as well as local residents.  New Orleans has a better attitude about dogs than the rest of this country; they are allowed in bars.

We saw one Golden Retriever in the same bar on several occasions.  The two shown here were one time only sightings.
















 Swamp things

Classic swamp scene

Great Blue Heron

The occasion for this trip was a convention that Clay was attending for work. My mother flew out from Kansas and she and I entertained ourselves during the day. We took a city bus tour, which was very interesting, a river boat excursion, and a swamp tour.
























The aligators were not tame but they were known individuals
and they could be tempted to approach the boat by hotdog on a stick.



This one came for the hotdog but then got spooked and swam away.

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A male/female pair, sunning themselves on a sandy spot.

The female went back to check the nearby nest,
which we also spotted.  It contained several offspring.

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One of many "fish camps" along the river. 
The residents could have been extras from  "Deliverance". 
All that was missing was the banjo music. 

Bars and booze

My favorite straight bar in the French Quarter is Lafite's.  It's an old blacksmith's shop so it has a very rustic look and feel inside.  It was supposedly the hangout for the pirate Jean Lafite, so I generally just refer to it as the pirate bar.  Lafite joined forces with Andrew Jackson and Native Americans, which was probably the key to defeating the British in the Battle of New Orleans, ending the War of 1812.  In exchange for his assistance, he was pretty much left alone to continue his business as usual. 

Drinks in gay bars were about half the price that they were in straight bars in the Quarter that cater exclusively to tourists.  Consequently, it wasn't unusual to find local straight folk in some of the gay bars. 

Sacred ground

Tennessee Williams had a home in New Orleans that is now a museum.  We went through the museum, which had a display of furniture styles that influenced New Orleans.  Very interesting.  We didn't stick around for the actual house tour, but will do so next time.

The day we arrived was the final day of the Tennessee Williams Literary Festival, which featured a yelling contest, with participants immitating Stanley Kowalski yelling "Stella" as in "Streetcar Named Desire."  The contest took place in Jackson Square with the judges on the balcony above.  Pretty amusing. 

We saw a t-shirt with a quote from Tennesee Williams that read:  "America only has three cities, New York, San Francisco, and New Orleans.  Everywhere else is Cleveland." 

For me, the holiest site in the city is probably the house where William Faulkner lived.  It's now a bookstore and you'd never know it existed except for this plaque on the wall, but it is where Faulkner lived when he wrote his first novel, "Soldier's Pay."

I felt like a pilgrim walking in literary holy land.







The Google tells me that I've used up my alloted 1GB of storage space and won't let me upload any more pictures.  I just purchased another 20GB of space but apparently the order takes some time to process, so I'll stop for now and publish a Part 2 tomorrow. 






Miscellany