New Orleans

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After an 8 hour journey we arrived in The Big Easy where our first sights were a lot of homeless people under the motorway. Our next host Louis came to collect us in his ridiculously small car and took us to his house. As we were knackered we chilled out for the evening and Louis cooked us some pasta so we went for a walk and bought bread and desert to accompany the meal. It did not take us long until we realised Louis talked, A LOT and enjoyed interrupting you mid sentence to tell you his stories. We listened to Louis for the rest of the evening before going to bed. He told us about the effects of Hurricane Katrina which was actually interesting to hear about it from a New Orleans resident and still, after 5 years it plays a large part in the cities psyche.

The next day Louis went to work so we had the day to ourselves and much needed respite from the constant talking! During breakfast the wind picked up and the rain started – great. Never the less we headed out to explore the city. Mary had found a walking tour of the French Quarter, where we spent most of the day before heading back as the rain was getting too much. Louis was back so the three of us went to the supermarket to buy some ingredients for the dish that Louis wanted to cook for us which included the infamous N.O Shrimp.

After tea Louis showed us some night life in the city centre and we headed to Spotted Cat for some Jazz. The club was not very busy as a combination of the rain and a Big Football game kept the punters at bay. We had a beer and moved on to the next pub where a pianist was playing a much livelier set but unfortunately we only caught literally 2 minutes before he ended, we had a brief chat with him and he was an English guy so we exchanged some brief pleasantries! Next pub was a few young guys playing a mixture of Jazz and Country. Louis left us here and we walked around looking at the nightlife and having a few more drinks. There was a big gay event on at the weekend and so a lot of people were out warming up for the weekend; it was a good night and great to see some Jazz.

The next day bought even more rain and the news was reporting an oncoming storm – ‘Storm Lee’, a huge tropical storm that was to engulf the south coast and New Orleans in the next few days – oh s**t. Luckily we had a bus booked for the next day so our fingers were crossed that we would get out and not be stuck here! A small walk in the park was the only thing we did that afternoon and we spent most of the day planning the rest of our trip. We rented a DVD that evening, 1 to chill and 2 to keep Louis quiet for a few hours ; After the film Louis was getting a little nervous about the storm (probably understandable after Katrina) and repeating himself over and over, so we decided to go to bed.

The next day came and although it had been a stormy night and was very windy morning, thankfully the buses were running. We headed out to Memphis, the rain was coming in hard and the streets were starting to flood – glad to be going and hoping it doesn’t follow us…..

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Photos

Spotted Cat Bar
Really nice chilled Jazz band

Jon Clear
We only caught about 2 minutes of his set

Bourbon Street
It was a bit like Benidorm