Our
campground is right along the Mississippi River about 18 miles away from
downtown New Orleans. It’s an easy 30 minute drive – we simply turn left onto
St. Bernard Highway and it follows the river into the French Quarter. Driving
down the road past the Port of St. Bernard, we could see the tops of large
ocean-going ships above the levee to our left.
The first
order of business today was to get some hot beignets at the Café Du Monde near
Jackson Square. There was a line of people waiting to get in, but it moved
quickly and we were seated within 5 minutes. Karen said she’d read somewhere
that you should not wear dark clothing to this place. I found out why when they
brought us our fresh hot beignets smothered in powdered sugar – the sugar was
flying everywhere.
After that,
we took a walk up Frenchman Street, where St. Louis Slim was singing some
authentic sounding blues in one of the clubs. From there, we headed up Royal
Street and caught the St. Charles street car into the Garden District. It’s
only 45 cents for seniors, but the driver told us we could ride for free if we
could squeeze onto the car with all the other tourists. Karen was loving this –
not! The temperature was getting close to 90 degrees, and inside the street car
it was even hotter.
The shady
streets of the Garden District cooled us down a bit as we walked through the
Lafayette Cemetery, where Karen made friends with a black cat that seemed to
live there. Then, we caught the streetcar back to the French Quarter (this time
we got our own seats) and walked over to St. Peter Street to have a late
lunch/early dinner at the Gumbo House.
Tomorrow: National WWII Museum
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