New Orleans

Rachel and I joined Ammon and Ryan on a business trip to New Orleans last week.  I would not describe the trip as relaxing or uplifting.  Think opposite of a beach vacation.  It was, however:

fun

gross

weird

smelly

yummy

intriguing

fascinating

eye-opening

the one-and-only time I ever plan to visit New Orleans.

We had no idea it was Mardi Gras time.  It was pretty much booze and boobies everywhere we went. Goodness gracious.

The boys were busy every day with their convention, so Rachel and I had some fun together.  The first day, we left the craziness of downtown NOLA for an indoor mall.  We got make-overs at Sephora and window shopped.

This picture is so eerie!  The fog comes off the ocean, making it look like a snowstorm.  We could understand why so many horror movies are filmed in NOLA.

There were absolutely beautiful parts of town.  This St. Louis Cathedral is located in the French Quarter.  It is the oldest operating cathedral in the United States.  The first church on this site was built in 1718; this one in 1789.  At first we thought there had to be older cathedrals back East, but we realized all the oldest churches in the East would be Protestant.

This explains NOLA pretty well.  They had to post a sign outside the church so hecklers and crazies would allow people to feel some peace while touring the cathedral.

These guys.  Some of the calmer craziness in downtown.

For dinner on the 20th (our anniversary), we all went to the famous Emeril's restaurant.  The food was to die for - and it's a good thing because the price was outrageous!

Aren't they the cutest newlyweds of all time?  Ammon has become Ryan's right-hand man at work this year.

 

Bourbon Street.  Not sure what to say about this area of town.  It felt like Vegas without the lights and excitement of Vegas.  Just the smut.  But people-watching was very intriguing!



Beads everywhere!  The town is obsessed with collecting beads.  They even hang from the street signs.

On the 21st, Rachel and I ventured out to tour a plantation.  We were deciding between touring a traditional "Gone with the Wind "plantation of the Old South and this Creole plantation that was built in 1805.  The story seemed more interesting in this plantation, because the tour includes 250 years of history recorded by the family of the last owner, Laura.  The slave cabins were also intact, which was fascinating.

Our tour guide explained that the front doors of the house were not used for entering.  They were left open toward the river, so the tree-lined path could pull winds off the water and cool off the house in the summer.

The houses are all a full story off the ground because flooding happened so regularly.

15 varieties of bananas are grown on the grounds of the Laura Plantation.  I had no idea bananas came in so many colors!

This plaque shows the names and prices of slaves purchased for the home in 1808.  Check out the descriptions of the slaves, such as 20-year-old Smathe, who "is a lunatic" or 18-month old Tantale who "has no redeeming qualities at all."

This "Black Code" was a decree from France that defined the conditions of owning your slaves.  Some of the requirements were:

• Slaves are required to be baptized into the Roman Catholic Church.  Only Catholic marriages would be recognized.
• Children born to slaves would be the property of the slave Master.
• A slave who struck his/her Master or family member would be executed immediately.
• Fugitive slaves who tried to escape had their ear cut off and were branded.  If they tried to escape again, their hamstring would be cut.  The third time they would be executed.
• Masters may "chain and beat" slaves, but may not "torture or mutilate them."  This rule was treated more like a suggestion.

Originally, there were 68 houses in this slave commune, which was built out near the sugar fields.  These structures are the only ones that remain.

The slaves typically slept in hammocks on the porch during the summer months.  It was terribly hot in the wood structures so they didn't want to sleep inside, but they had to sleep off the ground to avoid having giant snakes and rats crawl on them.

We drove by several of the tradition plantations on our way out of town.  They were beautiful, and I could picture characters from many of my favorite books walking the grounds!

The boys had great success in their presentation and left feeling very successful.  It was fun to watch them hard at work, convincing clients to use their merchant processing.

More craziness . . .

Our favorite seafood joint.  Yummo!  We had some D-Lish food on our trip!

Crawfish, anyone?  And the dish on the side is "Cajun Nachos."  They are made of freshly fried potato chips, topped with cheese, crawfish and crab.

The policemen ride the town on horses, and the animals are trained to put a whooping on anyone who acts too unruly.

Parades, parades and more parades.  The streets constantly shut down for the Mardi Gras parades so we weren't able to get to our hotel room if there was a procession on the street.  I took this picture from our window once we finally arrived in our room one night.

On the 22nd, we took a "Ghost Tour."  It sounds a bit strange, but it was actually very interesting!  The walking tour started after dark and went through all of the French Quarter.  We learned more history on this tour than we had learned in all the previous days.

This wine cellar is a full block long.  Nothing in NOLA is underground because of the high water level.  This includes graves, so the cemeteries all have above-ground plots.  Instead of being buried 6-feet under, the dead are buried 6-feet above ground.

Our tour guide told us many strange tales of former New Orleans residents who are believed to haunt the town.  There were times I wanted to roll my eyes, but we loved learning all the historical details.

Ryan thought it was hilarious that I wore a BYU sweatshirt this evening.  There was quite a juxtaposition between my extremely modest outfit and the way most of the women were dressed.

NOLA's version of "Touchdown Jesus."

We toured a hospital where the soldiers were taken when they were injured in the Civil War.  Their wounds were filled with live maggots, in hopes that they would eat the rotten flesh.  If that didn't work, the limb was cut off without anesthetic.  This resulted in the death of hundreds of soldiers, who are said to still roam the halls today.  About 10 years ago, a soldier who served in Iraq and Afghanistan went here to commit suicide, reassured by the fact that other dead soldiers understood his plight.  The old hospital has been turned into a hotel.  I'm not sure I would have liked this tour so much if I was staying in that hotel!

The objects in the case below include "vampire tools."  Before modern-medicine, some people were buried when they were only in a coma-state.  Families were buried in an above-ground tomb that fit three bodies.  When another family member passed away, one of the bodies was pushed to the back of the tomb where it fell down a chute.  Sometimes, the dead bodies were in a different position than they were at the time of burial and there was blood around the body.  This is where the stories of vampires started.

New Orleans stinks.  Literally.  We were told the stench began when Hurricane Katrina hit in August, 2005.  We never drove to the areas of town that have been abandoned since the destruction of Katrina, but Ryan has seen some of the areas on his previous business trips.

One more walk down Bourbon Street on the way back to our hotel the last night.  I was SO DONE with the chaos of New Orleans by this point.  Every building in town has a balcony, just like I had always imagined.

We couldn't leave New Orleans without eating pralines and beignets at this traditional French restaurant.

Bonnie flew out to stay with the kids while we were in Louisiana.  The kids had a great time bonding with her while we were away.  She didn't fly home until the day after we got back, so we were able to spend some time with her.  We are so grateful she was willing to help out!