Tourists are returning after Katrina and Gustav

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Day 83- Friday

This is my third day in this great city and I am just about to check out and make my way to Memphis for the weekend. I am pleased to say that there seem to be quite as few tourists (mainly from the US) here at present and it seems to be business as usual for most.. Nevertheless, lots of places are still awaiting restoration and some have closed down.

I think Amtrak must have a death wish. Not only do no US residents know anything about Amtrak passes such as we have enjoyed for $350 for 30 days but Amtrak do not even seem to care about the customers they have. I have mislaid my pass but have email confirmations of my bookings but Amtrak will not honour them. They say I would have to buy a new pass for my last two journeys. The Amtrak manager I spoke to cannot see that this is totally illogical, since airline flights are a much cheaper and quicker substitute. ( They wanted me to pay an additional $260 for a train ride today from NO to Memphis!) Couple that with the fact that they arbitrarily cancelled trains last week between Washington and Savannah and Charleston as well has deleting the service from Jacksonville across to New Orleans. So I feel disappointed and cross.

Anyway I have really enjoyed my time in New Orleans. The weather was warm and sunny for walking all around. I had somehow, in my desire to stay in the French quarter, managed to book myself into the famous Bourbon Street! Luckily, a "nice" hotel....quite reasonable in price and so convenient.
I thought I had better not wander the streets round here alone at night, so chose to eat in the hotel's oyster bar, which opens onto the street. As I sat there everything seemed to be happening in the street outside for me....jazz players, a street procession, break dancers and large numbers of people cruising up and down, cocktails in hand. It seems that drinking laws and customs differ greatly from place to place. In the south you can walk around the streets drinking alcohol as long as it is in a plastic contaianer! Even the lovely hotel where I stayed in Savannah ...I was enjoying a martini in the bar while waiting for my taxi to the airport the other evening. The bellhop came to tell me the cab had arrived so the barman simply transferred my drink to a plastic cup, topping it up as he did so! And the taxi driver didn't even blink.

After touring all around on foot in the morning I tok a bus trip out to an old Creole plantation for the afternoon. This entailed a one hour journey along the Missippi river out through the sugarcane fields.

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