Let's Go Places: New Orleans, Louisiana

 

Friends, my first big trip of 2026 is in the books!  Let me tell you all about New Orleans.

How This Trip Came To Be

I'm on a mission to spend at least one night in every state, specifically in every state capital.  I also have a list of "cool places that I have either never been to or have not been to since grade school".  The target of the Louisiana trip was Baton Rouge, with a lengthy detour to New Orleans.  Why?  Because it met the criteria of being a cool place that I had been to at some point in the grade school years.

I knew that I didn't just want to pop into New Orleans and get back on the road, so that pointed toward this being a longer trip.  I had been talking to Kyria, who has spent a lot of time there, and she recommended a January visit.  The reason is that the weather is good at this time of year, and it's before Mardi Gras gets too crazy.

I came with a list of recommendations from Kyria and my own notes from Google and YouTube.  I flew into New Orleans on Monday, January 12th, settled into the Garden District, and then moved over to Baton Rouge on Sunday, Jan 18th, and came home on Wednesday, Jan 21st.

Weather wise, it was chilly for Nola but warm for me.  The temps got into the 30s at night, but daytime temps were in the 50s and 60s with a ton of sun.  There was a bit of bite to the wind on a few days, but I warmed myself up by looking at the weather at home and gloating.

How I Got There

The best way to get from where I live to Nola is on United via my regional airport.  That meant points instead of cash for a ticket, and being able to depart and arrive at a reasonable time.  The total flight time including a connection in O'Hare was about six hours.

Transportation wise, I knew that I did not want to drive in New Orleans, but that I was going to want a car for part of the stay so that I could see places outside of the city and get to Baton Rouge.  I went back and forth over what day I was going to rent the car, and then I noticed that the price difference between getting it from the get go or getting it later in the week was $100.  Cabs from the airport have a fixed rate of $36, so that would have meant a minimum of $72 plus having to give up chill time for an extra trip to the airport.  That was a lot of work to save very little money!  I splurged and got the car for the entire time and had no regrets.

Let's Rate the Airbnb!

The unit was a one bedroom duplex in the Irish Channel, which is a neighborhood just south of the Garden District.  By "just south" I mean two blocks.

Pros:

• Comfy and quiet
• The neighborhood felt safe and people were friendly
• Lots of street parking and I was able to park right in front of the house
• Convenient to everywhere!  Easy walking to a ton of restaurants, the Garden District, and the streetcar.

• Funky decor (and a well stocked bookcase).

• Sweet little backyard setup

• If you are an Airbnb host who also happens to be an artist and you are wondering if you should display your art prominently in the unit, the answer is yes.

Cons:

• Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me!  If I had paid closer attention to the listing, I would have seen that there was no microwave.  The kitchen was poorly stocked in general.
• If you are an Airbnb host and you own a hunting trophy and are wondering if you should display it in your Airbnb unit, IMO the answer is no.

My final verdict is that I am glad that I didn't read the listing closely enough to see that there was no microwave, because the location really made the stay.  But going forward I will scrutinize all Airbnb listings for microwaves.

Stuff That I Learned!

Mardi Gras is not a day, it is a season

Silly me, I thought that Mardi Gras was the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday.  I mean, I took French in high school, so I knew that Mardi=Tuesday and Gras=fat.  No, no, Mardi Gras is the time period between Epiphany and Ash Wednesday.  

The way that it works is on January 6th, Christmas decorations come down and Mardi Gras decorations go up.  Instead of going from Christmas to the depths of winter and then to lent, New Orleans goes from Christmas to one big long celebration, and then to lent.  I approve!

My favorite Mardi Gras decoration was Mardi Goose.

There is a Difference Between a Balcony and a Gallery

According to more than one tour that I did, folks in New Orleans care a lot about the difference between a balcony and a gallery.

If it has supports that touch the ground, it's a gallery.  If it's just hanging in the air, it's a balcony.  Gallery on the left, balcony on the right.  Get it?

History in Action

One of my favorite things ever is when I learn about a piece of history in one location and then go to what I think is a totally unrelated place and find another chapter of the same story.  I had that experience twice in Nola.

• A taste of Canada and the Maritimes!  You may have heard that New Orleans has a French legacy, and that is thanks to French explorers from Quebec who made their way down the Mississippi and claimed Louisiana for France.  Later on after the Brits settled in Nova Scotia, they sent the Acadians (the descendants of the French settlers) packing, and they had no place to go except down river to New Orleans.  The terms "Creole" and "Cajun" can mean a lot of things, but one meaning is Creole = descendants of the French settlers and Cajun = descendants of the Acadians.
• The War of 1812!  Aka the War that I Learned Nothing About in School, but have enjoyed encountering on my visits to the Erie Islands.   It turns out that the final battle was fought in New Orleans in 1815.  The treaty that ended the war had been signed in late 1814, but there was no social media so no one knew that when a large British troop headed toward New Orleans and was met by a much smaller American troop led by Andrew Jackson.  The British casualties were in the thousands, and the American casualties were in the 10s.  I was so tickled to see a "don't give up the ship" flag in the neighborhood, which is the big legacy from the battles that took place on Erie closer to where I live.

Stuff That I Did in Nola

Walked around in the Garden District (on my own and on a group walking tour)

This is Anne Rice's crib.

The ground is a little bumpy, due to the underlying swamp.

Rode the Street Car

I rode the entire St. Charles line during the course of my stay.  It's ridiculously cheap, easy, and the app is very helpful.

I was a bit less successful with the bus, which operates on the same pass as the streetcars.  It got me close to home from the French Quarter on my first day, but there was a transfer two miles from the Airbnb and the app said that it would be a 15 minute wait for the next bus.  The neighborhood wasn't particularly great, and I figured that I could put a nice dent in the two miles if I started walking, so that's what I did.

Did a Walking Tour of the French Quarter

I did not see any ICE action, but there was a small but noticeable presence of the National Guard in the FQ.  I googled it, and learned that it is because of the Jan 1, 2025 terrorist attack on the FQ, which I had already forgotten about.

Cemetery Tour!

Every time that I see a cemetery on a list of top recommended activities, I always scratch my head a bit.  But when in Rome...I got myself a ticket to St. Louis Cemetery No. 1.

This history of above ground burials in Nola dates back almost to the beginning.  When you're living on swamp land, what goes in the ground doesn't always stay in the ground.  There was an outbreak of yellow fever, which was attributed to mosquitos feasting on the corpses that were popping back up.  The solution was above ground crypts, but the yellow fever outbreak continued.  Another workaround was needed, and it was decided that once a body went into a tomb that it should be left there for a year and one day, which was presumably enough time for the yellow fever nasties to subside.

The problem is that in a family or group crypt, sometimes people die at a more frequent rate than a year and a day, so the walls of the cemeteries had "holding crypts" so that everyone's year and a day waiting periods were met before folks were reunited in their forever crypts.

The next topic of discussion is that the crypts do not contains stacks of coffins.  The bodies basically undergo a slow cremation from the heat of the sun beating down on the tombs, so after a year and a day you have an "ashes to ashes, dust to dust" situation.  Last year's body would get brushed into a communal holding pot, and then the next one would go in.  These tombs hold lots of bodies.  Once a tomb is considered to be full, it gets a special sign to let everyone know that it is closed to future business.

We got to see the big celebrity tomb, which belongs to Nicholas Cage.  He is still with us, but it was something that he bought in his big movie star days.  He ran afoul of the IRS and had to liquidate most of his assets, but fun fact, a person's final resting place cannot be taken from them, so he still owns it.

[I try to avoid taking pictures of other people on my wanderings, but there was never a time when no one was in front of the tomb.  I chose a picture where I don't think that the subject will mind being on the blog.  This is Zelda, who was our tour guide, and she was fantastic.]

This statue lost a hand during the filming of the movie Easy Rider, supposedly from Dennis Hopper climbing on it.  Due to many similar incidents, access to the cemeteries is very tightly controlled.  St. Louis No. 1 is the only cemetery that allows tours, and our group was very closely watched.

Swamp Tour!

10/10, definitely recommend.

It's tough to see, but yes that's an alligator.

This guy and his friends were the stars of the show.  They worked the boats for treats.

I drove on the Causeway Bridge!

I don't have a great photo since I was driving, but I learned that the world's longest bridge is in Nola, so of course I took that on the way home from the swamp tour.  Oh wait, I don't need photos - that's what YouTube is for!

A Very Long Walk at Audubon Park!

A Tour of the Gallier House in the FQ

The kids' easy bake oven.

Plantation Tours

There are a ton of plantation tours in the area, and if I'm being honest, a little goes a long way.  I visited Oak Alley and The Whitney Plantation.

The Whitney Plantation was the winner.  The history is told entirely through the experience of the enslaved people.  Back in the 30s, there was a project to record the oral histories of former slaves.  An artist depicted the story tellers at the age that they would have been during slavery.  These statues are all over the estate, and they are haunting.

Stuff That I Ate in Nola!

Beignets at Cafe Du Monde!  I had vague memories of having them as a young 'un, so a return visit was a must.

Normally I do not advocate donuts for lunch, but a person can only eat so much and if that person also wants to have beignets, then a normal meal is going to have to be pushed aside.  This was an itch that I needed to scratch.  

How were they?  Fine, but I liked things with an inch of powdered sugar on top at lot more when I was a young 'un.  Also worth mentioning, Cafe Du Monde is cash only.  This is one of the few cash only activities that I have encountered on all of my travels.

A shrimp and oyster po'boy at The Channel, which was a neighborhood restaurant.

My best meal was by accident.  There were a ton of Creole tastes that I wanted to try, and on one of my days in the French Quarter, I decided to track down turtle soup for lunch.  Google took me to The Court of Two Sisters.  It was very crowded, and after a long wait I learned that the lunch menu was a buffet.  Score!  I got to have tastes of all of the Nola greatest hits.

I didn't take pictures of my plate, because when I go through a buffet the end result is not photogenic, but the atmosphere was very pleasant.  It was incredibly expensive, but to get all of the random tastes that I was after in one meal, it was worth it.

So how was the turtle soup?  It was fine.  The shrimp etouffee was the winner and everything else was very good as well.

On my final night I had an amazing taco platter at The Rum House, a place in my 'hood.

Alcohol wise, I had a couple of hurricanes over the course of the week, and they went down mighty nicely.

I also got into the Mardi Gras spirit and picked up a tiny King Cake at the grocery store.

One Final Sight from Nola

I snapped this on the way home from dinner one night.  Someone saw me take the picture and playfully yelled out, "Vote for Foxy!  A vote for Foxy is a vote for New Orleans!".

Time to Say Goodbye

All good things must come to an end, and before I knew it the week was over and it was time to go to Baton Rouge.  I found a good selection of boardwalk hikes to visit on the transition between the two cities, and the rest is a story for another day.

Thanks for the good times, New Orleans!  Who's been there?  See you soon to talk about Baton Rouge!