New Orleans and It Comes To an End

Now before we being anything I think we need to have a bit of a pronunciation lesson for all of you northern folks that read my blog. Read this in your head: New Orleans. Now if you are saying it like this: New Orleans, you are wrong. People down here will let you know that. Now if you are from the south or have been in residence for some time you will know the proper way to say it is: New Orluns. And if you really want to sound like a born and bred southerner you will say: Narluns, all one word. So repeat after me: New Orluns, New Orluns, New Orluns. Now we can begin.

The whole reason for us going to New Orleans was to drop Anton's parents and Aunt off for their flight home. But we figured if we were going to be going that far we might as well make a day of it. So after a few hours drive we headed straight into the French Quarter so as not to waste any time.

We wandered somewhat aimlessly, since we really didn't have much of a plan and ended up stopping in this Catholic church:

It was beautiful and peaceful inside. The pope visited here in 1987. His second visit to the United States.

This guy has been keeping vigil until the time he may come again. Must be a hard job.

After following around the older folks for awhile and realizing they were having trouble reading the map, we decided we'd be better off finding our own way. So we went off on our own to see the sights. Again, we still didn't have a destination, but it was still fun to wander.

Here's my cute family. You'll never guess what has the kids so engrossed that they won't look at the camera. A gardener. Yep, right off the side trimming a hedge. Much more interesting than looking at mommy with her silly camera.

Never fear, though, I forced their cooperation.

After our wander we went and got the famous beignets (I think that's what they are called) from the Cafe du Monde. They are square, hole-less doughnuts completely covered in powdered sugar. They were OK, but not worth coming from the world over to eat them, as the cafe likes to claim.

We met back up with Anton's parents then and we all went on a carriage tour of the French Quarter.

We were a bit disappointed because the tour guide was much more interested in telling us about what celebrities he had seen in what restaurant and bar than he was in telling us any history of the Quarter. He also had fun flipping the bird to the cars behind us, right in front of my kids. Impressive. Not the best use of my money ever, I must say, but oh well.

Our next stop was up on the famed levee to see the mighty Mississippi:

You can see in the distance in this one:

the levee that failed and flooded the 9th Ward. It's all patched up and not looking so great still.

Right below the levee was the trolley line and a few came by while we were standing up there. Ella about died of excitement each time. She would yell "A train! A train!" and proceed to run down the levee right towards the track.

I managed to get her to stop before careening onto the tracks each time. But it was so cute to see her so excited.

After a little bit more wandering (Can you tell how well planned this trip was? It was through no fault of mine.) we had some traditional Cajun cuisine for dinner. I ate a lot of jambalaya. That stuff is good.

By that point we were tired of feeding the parking meter so we all piled in the car for a driving tour of the Garden district. There were a lot of large old fancy homes. I would love to go back and spend more time there. I also didn't get to go in any of the above ground cemeteries and I would've really liked to do that. It'll have to wait until next time.

But the time came for our adventure to come to an end. We took Anton's parents and Aunt to their hotel, said our farewells and then made the long trek home.

And thus ends the adventure of the in-laws.