Have you ever been to New Orleans??

This is actually our second time here. I didn’t think it would be a place that I would care for but the culture is so different and interesting. It’s a party for your senses! You can’t escape the sounds of the city from boats passing by on the water to the steady clip clop of the horse drawn tour carriages to the jazz music of the street musicians. As you walk along you can smell the Cajun spices wafting in the air from the dishes being prepared in the many restaurants lining every street. If you’re smart, you’ll enjoy some of the food that New Orleans is known for like a beignet from Cafe du Monde, a muffuletta from Central Grocery or a bowl of jambalaya. It goes without saying that the sights you may see are not always typical or ordinary. It’s a lot to take in since it’s happening all at the same time. Like I said, it’s a party for the senses!

Enjoying a muffuletta and a couple of beignets!

The architecture is consistently remarkable. Even as you drive through the most ordinary of streets, each house is “gingerbreaded” to the max. Even the color choices for houses are a bit unusual, but side by side, they paint a beautiful picture.

We HAVE to tell you about our very favorite NOLA restaurant, Willie Mae’s! This place is about as “unfancy” and “untourist” as you can get, yet there are long lines to get in regardless of the time or day of week. Willie is an old woman, in her nineties, who knows how to make the BEST EVER fried chicken! It literally melts in your mouth. It’s the “sides” that Howie is also in love with. You can choose from mush, fried okra, red beans and rice, green beans, and home made mashed potatoes to name a few. This place really brings out the “southern” in Howie!! We recommend that you all make time to visit Willie Mae’s if ever you’re in town!! Tomorrow, we’re planning on going for shrimp n’ grits….another Howie fav!

(I’ll be looking for something a wee bit more “northern” to order.) Bless my heart!

On Halloween day, we just couldn’t help ourselves….we went on a carriage ride through the French Quarter and the oldest cemetery in NOLA. Not scary at all, but very historically interesting. Here you must have family already in the cemetery to be entombed here….there are as many as 150 people per vault!! You have to wait a year and 1 day to add a body since the last one, allowing for proper decomposition. Then they take away the faceplate, chip away at the cement or brick behind it, and slide in another body, pushing the previous remains to the back. Pretty weird, but interesting! By the way, the pyramid shaped tomb is Nicholas Cages – just waiting for him!! (FYI – our mules name was “Stormy”.)

So as I said earlier, there are always some “different” things to see in the French Quarter. Here are just a couple for us to share.

While in New Orleans, we stayed at Pontchartrain Landing RV and Marina. A really nice campground at fairly reasonable rates, considering it was NOLA! The sites were gravel and were separated by tropical bushes and palmetto palms. While we were there, four days in all, we got quite a bit of rain – but we were able to do all that we had hoped to while in this amazing city.

Our next destination is Gulf Shores, Alabama. We plan on being at Gulf State Park for the month of November. Thanks for following us and until we meet again………… happy trails!