We returned from our trip. Had a great time. I'd never been to NOLA before and my wife went one time years ago in high school.
We aren't drinkers, so we avoided that scene.
Here's a trip report - feel free to ask questions:
We arrived late on Friday and we checked into the Drury Inn. Nice hotel.
Saturday - we drove ourselves around most of the day, probably a mistake. We should have got a RTA pass. Parking was sometimes hard to find and was expensive.
Ate breakfast at Willa Jeans - good food. I had the fried chicken sandwich and my wife had biscuits and gravy. My wife liked her, particularly the gravy, but the biscuits were more like puff pastry style rather than buttermilk style.
From there, we went to the WW2 museum. We couldn't find their parking lot, it wasn't well marked, so we parked in a public lot around the corner. We spent about 5 hours in the museum and saw a lot, but could have spent much longer. We also did the Beyond All Boundaries movie which was excellent.
We were still full from breakfast, so we drove over to Mardi Gras World which was much more interesting than I expected. It's a bit expensive for what it is, particularly if you also pay for parking. The free shuttle might be a good alternative.
The timing worked out well. We took the Riverfront down to the Riverwalk area. Browsed a few shops, then stopped at the Cafe Dumonde there for beignets. I'm not a big sweets person, so my opinion shouldn't count for much, but I didn't see what the big deal was. To me, they were just okay powdered sugar donuts. My five enjoyed them though and she loved the cafe au lait (I'm not a coffee drinker).
After returning to the hotel, we decided to go to Clesi's for dinner. It seemed like more of a 'locals' place and gave us the opportunity to go out into a neighborhood. We did a quick Google Map street view and didn't see much parking, so we took a Lyft over. The food was fantastic - I think the best of the trip. My wife had the jambalaya and I had the gumbo. We also had the boudin appetizer which was also very good.
The downside of going away from the tourist areas is that it took about 30 minutes to get a Lyft/Uber back to the city.
We had booked pool time (they only let 20 people use the pool at the same time) so we went up to use the hot tub. There was an annoying family that joined us in the hot tub - a mother, two 'adult' daughters, and a son. We know the daughters were 'adults' because we listed to about 30 minutes of them all arguing about how they are adults and that they can do what they want and that they weren't really drunk - except that all of the women were. They also said they were gong to ride the trolley about 40 times.
Eventually they left and a nice family joined us in the hot tub for the rest of the hour.
Sunday - we discovered that the hotel walls were very thin when we heard our neighbor arguing with someone over who paid for which round of drinks.
We did the free breakfast at the hotel (it was okay) and changed our getting around tactics and decided to buy RTA passes. We each downloaded the app, downloaded 1-day passes, and headed to catch the St Charles line to the Garden District.
The RTA app is pretty bad and we ended up hopping on the trolley in the wrong direction. The good news was that we were only 2 or 3 stops from the end of the line, so we just stayed on and eventually headed in the right direction.
We walked around the Garden District for a few hours looking at the houses. Nice walk and we had beautiful weather. There was a lot of street work in the area, so you had to watch where you were going. Unfortunately, the Lafayette #1 cemetery was closed.
We hopped back on the St Charles trolley and took it to where we could switch to the Riverfront line.
We trolley'd down to the French Market and grabbed something small to eat at a shop there. I got 1/4 muffaletta and my wife got a hummus plate. Both were very good. While sitting there, we decided to book a haunted tour that evening.
We headed back to the hotel for a bit, then took a Lyft to the French Quarter. We walked around for an hour or so, then stopped into Cafe Pontalba to grab some quick snacks before out haunted tour. My wife got crab cakes and I got cajun spring rolls. Both were very good.
We had a few minutes before our tour with Haunted History Tours. the tour was okay. We had a group of 11 which felt like a good size. The guide said they normally have up to 30 per group - that would be way too big.
After the tour, we went to the Gumbo Shop for dinner. We waited for about 30 minutes to get in. I had the etoufee and my wife had grilled chicken. The etoufee was okay, not the best I've ever had. It did have a lot of crayfish in it, but didn't taste like much. It had clearly been microwaved, too. It had that dull look on the top and spoonfuls from one side of the bowl were warm and from the other side were steaming hot. The chicken breast was much better.
Monday - walked to Streetcar Cafe for breakfast. My wife got the biscuits and gravy and liked the biscuits better than Willa Jeans (but said Willa Jeans gravy was better). I had an omelette and it was good.
It was cooler and windy this morning, so we decided to go to the aquarium. We bought day passes for RTA and headed that way. The aquarium was nice, but far smaller than we expected. We took our time and were through in less than 90 minutes. We also decided to buy passes for the Creole Queen Historic Cruise later that afternoon.
My wife wanted to head to the original Cafe Dumonde, so we hopped back on the trolley. It was one of our longest waits for the trolley and the arrival time kept changing on the app. Overall, the RTA app was confusing and much less helpful than it should have been. For this ride, the wait started at 22 minutes and counted down until it got to 2 minutes, then shot back up to 14. It started counting down, then went back up to 20, then down to 4, then up to 18.
A couple that had been waiting longer than we had started to walk away. They got about 10 feet when the trolley came around the bend.
We also noticed that none of the screens on the trolleys were working that day. The previous day, we were able to see what stops were coming up, but not this day. That made it a bit more challenging.
We were using the app for our tickets and I think we only successfully scanned them 3 times between the two of us. In most of our rides, the scanners weren't working. Sometimes the driver would ask to see the app, other times they'd just waive you on with barely a glance.
At Cafe Dumonde, the front line was super long, so we chose to go to the back to the 'to go' line. We saw a lot in the 'to go' line go in and get tables anyway. I'd guess we waited about 25 minutes. We were going to take them up to the Riverwalk but it was so windy, we figured the powdered sugar would pose a bigger issue than normal. We found a bench behind the shops and ate there.
We headed back to the trolley and had another long wait. We were cutting it very close for the cruise. The trolleys were a good way to get around, but if you are on a schedule, allow yourself at least 30 minutes longer than you think you should.
We did a fast walk from the trolley stop to the dock and saw a short line to get on the cruise. We hopped in line, they asked if we wanted our picture, we went to the temperature check, then heard someone else in line say they needed to exchange their emailed receipt for paper tickets. We asked a worker and they said we had to do the exchange. Over at the ticket booth, there was a long line to do so. They said not to worry, they wouldn't leave until everyone was on.
We exchanged and boarded and there were no seats left on the top deck - none that weren't marked with 'do not use' for social distancing... and even half of those were being used. We decided to take one of the 'do not use' benches. Wasn't ideal, not proud of it, but being outside made us feel a little better about the choice. It was very windy, too.
The cruise was nice. The speaker they had was really good - he was a great story teller. We enjoyed hearing the history of New Orleans, the talk at the battlefield, and the Katrina story on the return trip.
After some shopping, we were ready for dinner and went to Mother's for some po boys. We both got the roast beef and they were good.
Back at the hotel we were in our room and my wife wanted a Coke so I headed out and towards CVS that was a few blocks away. I'd guess it was 9:30 or so and the streets were pretty empty. I ended up finding Rouse's and stopped in there instead. I passed a few women out walking their dogs, so it seemed like it's generally a safe area.
Our last morning, we checked out and went to Toast for breakfast. We went to the Fairgrounds location as it was on our way out. I think they quoted a 30 minute wait, but it was less than 10. We each got a savory crepe and they were both good... and large.
We had a great time and did most everything we wanted to do. There were a few things that required reservations but were booked - Sazerac tour, Old New Orleans Rum tour, and the Pharmacy Museum were the main ones.
My very amateur tips based on our 3 days there:
- Use public transportation - the app isn't great, the times aren't reliable, but it's cheap and less stressful than driving and looking for parking
- If you need to be somewhere at a specific time, either allow a lot of extra time and take the trolley or use Uber/Lyft or drive
- We didn't feel unsafe anywhere we went, but like any major city, be aware of your surroundings
- Parking, food, and admission is expensive - the high sales tax adds to it
- A lot of things seemed to be closed on Mondays
