So, instead of the homey feast and watching the Macy’s Parade (although we have no uncles to share Thanksgiving with), we opted for a long road trip to New Orleans. From where we are, you can split the 12 hour drive into two half days.
Here are some random thoughts that hopefully paint a picture of this unforgettable trip ...
We started the trip on November 22nd - a year to the date of my dad’s last breath on this earth. I figured he would have wholeheartedly approved of a good time with good food and even better music to celebrate his life. Our first stop was a fast food place for lunch where, in memory of dad, we paid for the meal of the people behind us in line. I know dad would have loved a meaty, burgery meal complete with a frosty dessert.
The 22nd of November was the Wednesday before Thanksgiving this year - and as you can imagine we were on the road with some other millions of people trying to get to that turkey dinner, or who knows, maybe, like us, trying to just get away. The maps lied. They said 5 hours and a half to Atlanta (our stop for the first night). But it took a bit over 9 hours to get to our hotel. We were stiff, tired, and hungry. We got to New Orleans the following day, Thanksgiving Thursday, after having our Thanksgiving lunch at a Cracker Barrel in Mobile, AL - the only place in three different states that we found open.
New Orleans is a melting pot of all things strange, unique, weird, amazing, smelly, delicious, diverse, and so, so much more ... The first time I went there, in 2004, I told people when I got back that my eyeballs were literally in pain, strained from seeing so much ... too much ... of everything ... I used to call it “the Disney World for adults” until I saw Las Vegas, and then, I changed my mind. Nowadays, after my second visit, I would call it “the adults’ Disney World with a rich and beautiful history” (which is what’s missing in Vegas).
The past creeps into everything you see and experience in this grand old city. The buildings and cobblestone streets speak of the past, the filth and decrepitude brought over by hundreds of years of humidity speaks of the past, the historic markers speak of a rich history, of carnage and tragedy, of death and also of victory. The past is very much part of the present today in New Orleans - it was never replaced but dragged into the light of today, kicking and screaming. The gas-fueled lamps burning day and night at every street corner are reminders of this past.
The eerie beauty of New Orleans at night
New Orleans plays tricks on everything you think you know about the order of the world. Everything you know about propriety and “rules” has its own set of measures and limits in New Orleans. Objectifying women in the windows of bars while belting out indecent and abusive words as you pretend you’re spanking them? Maybe two year old toddler playing the drums in the middle of the street at 11PM on Thanksgiving night and collecting tips? A sassy, belligerent waitress named Spaghetti? They are all commonplace in New Orleans.
Street gas lamps burning in the middle of the day
I have never been more confused about the gender of most people in one place like I was during this trip. Although in The South and people here get and allow freely the “yes, ma’am”-s and “no, sir”-s on a regular basis, I never dared say these words to anyone there, because I was just not sure. Not that it would be important, of course, except for how I frame my responses.
One of the things people come to New Orleans for is the food. Whether you eat a po boy in the street or a fancy seafood stew at an exclusive restaurant booked months in advance, you’ll be in for a treat! What I have learned is that you cannot go wrong in these parts, as everyone knows how to cook with flavor. It’s in their blood. Food is always fresh, cooked from scratch and cooked with a love you can taste. You just know that these many layers of flavor, this much depth does not come from a bag of Sysco frozen potatoes.
The fin wings appetizer at GW Fins took the absolute “best meal” prize on this trip for me. Someone out there read my mind and knew I was coming when they invented these goodies. I have been saying for years that yes, fish, too, have wings that are totally edible and delicious, and that is exactly what they were. And some lookers to boot!
The fin wings at GW Fins
Not sure if it was the cold weather (and it was cold! 55F degrees daily or less and raining the whole time we were there), or what, but the streets were not flooded with music, like I remembered them ... There was the occasional cover band here or there, a blues musician in one restaurant, a couple of rap performers (with the women dancing half-naked in the windows), a jazz band at our hotel, and that was about that ... When I first went to New Orleans, almost 20 years ago, zydeco was flowing freely from every street corner; street performers were overstepping each other’s spaces for an enchanted cocktail of sounds and rhythm. Nothing like it this time ... I want to believe that this was the dark, wet, at times freezing weather that was to blame and it’s not a change in this musical city’s DNA, because this would be a shame.
I have a friend who says New Orleans smells like vomit. And he is not exaggerating. It smells like sewage after a carnage. Just putrid and breathtakingly, nauseatingly stenchy. The reeking smell of pot flowing from every establishment or hitting you in the face from every fifth person you meet is not helping one bit.
It’s a city revolving around good times, partying, and loving life to the fullest. Everyone there comes on an escaping mission from their routine, from their everyday boredom to test the boundaries and embrace excessiveness. There are no boundaries, it seems, and no regrets ... These belong to another world, out there, left at home ... The world one escapes from and dreams about during their daily existence ...
The tourists as well as the wait staff, cleaning people, tour guides, boat captains - everyone are in this mutual silent agreement to show or give a good time to all, regardless of what it costs or how strange the request might be ... It’s a bon vivant's paradise.
Like with so many other places I have been to on vacation (cruises, New York, Hawaii), the amount of great time spent in these places is directly proportional to the amount of guilt I feel towards the people providing these priceless escapes. Everyone, in every restaurant we entered, every souvenir shop, every tourist attraction we experienced was so incredibly nice and patient, so gracious with the pettiest and crankiest of people, worked so incredibly hard from the wee hours of the morning until well into the night (restaurants here close at 6AM. How is that for a city that never sleeps?), and never seemed to be cranky. They looked, at times, tired, but their sweet smiles and calm demeanor never faded. You can tell they are working their fingers to the bone and not for a lot of cash, either.
In fact, there were a couple of times when I thought I saw a waitress doubling up duties as a palm reader in front of St. Louis Cathedral one day. And there were a couple of street dancers that I thought I had seen waiting on tables in a fried food joint. It’s a hard job, entertaining in a city such as this, and it looks like not for much of a reward, either, which makes one who partakes in these well-spent experiences feel guilty and the experience somewhat bitter-sweet.
New Orleans is very much a city of contrasts. The beauty and originality of art right next door to the squalor of the street; the peaceful, lazy roll of the Mississippi river, right next to the hustle and bustle of the French Quarter, engulfed in constant motion and noise. The rich and the poor sitting next to each other at the same communal table sharing beignets on the patio of Cafe du Monde.
There are some joints in town where class distinctions pretty much disappear. But there are others where class differences are clearly delineated. For example, one night, we had failed to get reservations for dinner (and it was close to impossible over this Thanksgiving weekend to get into any place for dinner without one). So we ended up in a somewhat high-end establishment (mysteriously called Mr. B’s Bistro). Not every restaurant we go to has its own wiki page, but this one does (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._B%27s_Bistro - and I still don’t know who Mr. B. is). They were the first restaurant we walked in that agreed to take us in without a reservation, but ... they immediately could tell we were some sort of a different kind of riff-raff, at the opposite end of their black-tie customers sitting in the quiet, peaceful dining room. So they stuck us in the darkest corner, way in the back of the restaurant, where very clearly all the people clad in jeans and rain coats (it was pouring out and late in the evening) were supposed to sit.
In the dark corner and outside the kitchen and all, the seafood gumbo at Mr. B's Bistro was outstanding
Our tables were covered with a crisp white table cloth just like the black-tie people’s tables were, but the tables were closer together and the space was visibly crammed. The food was equally delicious, I am sure, but we did feel like we maybe were not worth being shown off in the front dining room, since they stuck us in the corner like they was ashamed of us, to paraphrase Delmar O’Donnell from “O’ brother, Where Art Thou?”...
To say just one more word about the folks of New Orleans’s (and Louisiana’s, in general). It is a city that speaks, breathes, sings, and swings American black culture. Through everything they do, and with everything they offer, from the Creole twang to the bayou cuisine, from every beat of music, be it jazz, blues, zydeco, or blues, this city reminds you of this rich, substantial, beautiful culture with deep, gnarly, interesting, beautiful roots in these parts ... Its merits to establishing Louisiana and what New Orleans is today are sacrosanct. I love learning about black culture always, but I adore this city for it because these folks seem truly proud and feel truly celebrated here - as they should. To be able to take in this rich culture without so much as a passport stamp is a privilege.
New Orleans is also intrinsically French. Everywhere you turn is a reminder of something or other French. Louisiana is named after its founder King, Louis XIV of France. The massive Catholic cathedral in the French Quarter (arguably the most famously recognizable part of New Orleans everywhere in the world) is St. Louis Cathedral (which has a very funky schedule, however, so we were not able to visit its interior). Fleurs des lis everywhere. And I mean, everywhere ... French street names (Napoleon Avenue, Orleans, Iberville, Dauphine, and of course Bourbon) ... European (French?) old architecture with houses divided by only a small gap, maybe a 5-foot person’s-waist-worth; cobblestone pavers ... Sensuality at every corner ... A gourmand’s paradise ... Decadence and a laissez faire attitude surround and drown you in pleasure and delight ...
Street sign and old paving on Bourbon Street, in the heart of the French Quarter
St. Louis Cathedral
Many people come to New Orleans to look for ghosts. The city touts itself as the most haunted city in America and for good reasons - I’ll leave it up to you to google this. The stories are chilling. They built walls between the houses here with necks of broken bottles sticking out poured into the concrete, to prevent ghosts from moving from one home to another, they say - true story!
Broken glass wall between two houses in The French Quarter
We stayed at a remodeled Courtyard Hotel in the French Quarter and my husband said it’s probably not haunted because it’s newer. But there is nothing truly new in the French Quarter. Everything remodeled is housed in an old building. We were having this conversation while waiting for our table to be available at The Court of Two Sisters. The bartender, a lovely, chatty, young lady (I think, but not 100% sure) heard us chatting and she asked if we’re looking for ghosts and I thought she was doubting their existence for a minute, so I said “I told my husband that old hotels and old houses always have ghosts - I know because that’s where I saw them myself!” To which she said nonchalantly while wiping glass sweat off the bar: “Well, in Nawlins, you don’t need to be in a house to meet them. Here, they just walk down the street witchya”.
The haunting charm of the interior Court of the Two Sisters
We got out of the city for one day, to visit the Oak Alley sugar cane plantation and experience the Mississippi swamps for the first time in our lives. I will only say this about Oak Alley because otherwise it would need its own blog: history and live oaks. Definitely a must-see!
I have read stories and seen movies about life on the Mississippi and life in these swamps where so much of the shrimps and crawdads (and some of my personal favorite foods) of America are coming from. I have always wanted to be up close to these people, the people of the water, who have such a unique sense of orientation for one, and who develop such amazing survival skills on a land always shifting, always moving, always different ... We drove to Marrerro, LA (a small community that does not believe in left turns; here, if you want to go anywhere that’s on your left, you have to make a U-turn) and took a boat through the Jean Lafitte (can it be more French?) Preserve.
I checked our altitude frequently on this trip and at any given time, we were anywhere between 0 and 50 feet above sea-level. So, it made me wonder: since at the very highest point you can only be only at 50 ft altitude and since the maximum allowed speed limit is 55 mph, even on the highways, outside of the city (and rare at that), should they call their roads lowways instead of highways?!
In the preserve, the wild life and vegetation did not disappoint, but equal in richness and uniqueness was our captain, Jason: a mix between a Southern Louisiana bayou native with some Boston Rob mixed in. Hilarious as all get out, delivering everything with a dryness and non-pretentious-ness that only made it that much more funny:
‘Every time you heah an alligatoh eats or mauls a ‘uman, that’s a newspapeh stohry, and not a hreal stohry … The’s mohe to that stohry that you ain’t bein’ told. I grew up ‘ere with the alligatohs. Kids swim heah, they jet ski heah, feed them with marshmallows heah - ain’t no alligatoh eatin’ a kid every day! The’s moh to that stohry they ain’t telling ya!”
The alligators of Jean Lafitte Preserve
The boat we boarded in search of alligators, turtles, owls and other water fowl was like a Noah’s Ark of nationalities. You could literally find pretty much every race of human on that boat.
We were all in search of the same things: beauty, nature, history - this very diverse group of people on an obscure swamp in this small corner of the world, all chasing the same things in life. Our skin, our language, our different prayers to our different Gods did not take away anything from our common humanity. In contrast, as we were waiting for our captain to arrive, I was skimming the news on my phone - they were all speaking of the casualties and the carnages of war around the world (Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan ...), and as I looked around me, I was contemplating at the wrongfulness of it all, at the superfluousness of it all, at the meaninglessness of it all ... Why can we not see that we are more alike than we are different? Why can we not agree that at the end of the day, we all want the same things? We are moved by the same things, we are saddened by the same things, we all want a roof over our family’s head, a meal on the table, and the same corners of the world to escape to in search of beauty. This boat was my proof! Our common shared experience of almost two hours, when we all took pictures of the same things and wooed and aahed at the same things was my proof!
Our very close-quarters and beautifully packed swamp boat
It was cold the whole time we were there. Cold and wet - true November weather. But we walked everywhere every waking hour and we saw so much that our eyes hurt. We stopped for snacks (like hot pepper-jelly fried shrimp and strawberry mojitos and gin cocktails) when we got tired, and we moved right along ... We had the best time and I would not have spent my Thanksgiving any other way. You know you’re in a great place and with good company when you had the best time in a long while in absolutely crap weather! Our cups and thanks runneth over ...
Les bons temps were surely well-spent!
More beauty in the Mississippi Delta. How did Jason know where to find all these creatures, especially a still owl in the middle of the day, unmoved and serene among the Spanish moss, will remain a mystery to me ...
