Holiday Inn New Orleans-Downtown, La

19/03 - Hello New Orleans! We arrived mid morning so we went into the French Quarters for some lunch. The weather is really nice here, we strolled around for a while before heading back to the hotel. We went on a city tour which was pretty good. We started in the warehouse district & drove through the French Quarters. We drove past Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie´s house! We drove over to the area of town called the Lower Ninth Ward which is the area that was most devastated by Hurricane K...

I have been remiss, as I have been reminded by my reading public, in keeping up on my entries! So this might be a long entry, bear with me! I spent the last week in Dallas with my best friend from college. It truly is amazing to spend time with someone who knows you from the days when your only real goal was to get up on time to make it to class! Our friendship goes back to 1978, and remains a great comfort to me. Craig and his partner Brian (I was best man at their wedding) have two children...

Just got to the hotel not too long ago. The taxi cost $29 from the airport flat + tip of course. We drove through some pretty run down places. I think it's true that in NO outside of downtown, everything is not that nice. The hotel is pretty nice. The receptionist was pretty nice too. We got a room on the 18th floor, because I'm a Priority Club Gold member. Got a couple of free drinks from the bar and we have access to a club here.

So we just got back from French Quarter. At first we were just looking for Walgreens, and then we decided to walk to French Quarter to find a place to eat. French Quarter was fun, we walked on Bourbon Street until Toulouse Street, then we turned back so we can find a place to eat. We were looking at Bourbon House, but then they were really crowded, and then Red Fish Grill, but they were also too crowded. So we went to this tiny place instead called Gulf. In fact it is so small that I couldn't...

Today we woke up pretty late, so we had a late lunch at this corner cafe called Orleans Cafe. The food was pretty nice but the portion was kinda small. Then we walked around the French Quarter and stopped at a candy store called Southern Candy Makers. We bought some praline for gift. Then we went to Jackson Square and took some nice pictures. I wanted to stop by Cafe due Monde, but we didn't. We walked around French Quarter some more and then went to the side of the river. The river was brown...

Tonight we ate at the restaurant in the hotel. It is called Holiday Streetcar restaurant. The foods are pretty good. We got free desserts, so we got a couple of cheesecake. The cheesecakes are not that great though.

So we just finished our swamp tour. It cost $45 per person. $2 off if you have AAA membership. That is if you want them to pick you up and drop you back at your hotel. The tour was pretty fun, especially if you never gone to anything like this. If you have maybe it's not as good. There were just a few alligators and birds, probably not the prime time to go. Still it was a good experience. If you want to go, you might want to bring insects repellent. While you are actually moving on the boat, ...

Just got back to the hotel. Walked around French Quarter some more. We ate dinner at Ralph and Kacoo's Seafood restaurant. We got fried alligators. It was pretty good. The thing is just to get the blacken one, don't get the fried one because the fried one is fishy and not as nice, especially if you eat the fat.

Now we are shopping at The Shops at Canal Place. We walked all the way here. We stopped by Payless to buy some shoes and we stopped by this place that sells college t-shirts for $1, so I bought 2 Oregon t-shirts! So anyway, The Shops at Canal Place is a high class mall with stores such as Saks Fifth Avenue. It's a pretty small mall though. We ate at the food court just because we were really hungry already. We are going to the Riverwalk more next.

So we are at the Riverwalk Mall. The mall is along the side of the Mississippi River. The mall is pretty long. It's pretty cool though, simple, but cool. We are going to leave and look for a place to eat soon.