N'awlins

I spent a long weekend in New Orleans with my college roomie Laura.  Sans husband.  Sans baby.  It was glorious!  (Am I allowed to say that? Yes, yes, I think I am!)

I got there on Friday night, well, more like Saturday morning...It was 12:00 by the time we actually landed.  After getting a tad lost, Laura picked me up and it was like 2 1/2 years had never passed.  We took the long way to our hotel and didn't get in until about 2:00 (got lost on the way there, only to find out it was the wrong hotel, lost service on Laura's cell phone before we could find our confirmation, plugged it in, realized we were at the wrong hotel, finally made it!) We chatted until about 3!

On Saturday, we took awhile to get up and get going, but it didn't matter, because we were going to go to the Jazz Festival all day so it didn't really matter when we got there.  It was so much fun.  Music, food, dancing, food, dessert, music, more food.  If you know me and Laura, you know what we were REALLY there for!

Crawfish beignets, oyster round and crawfish sack....

Um, the most delicious bread pudding in the world.  White chocolate.  'Nuf said!

That night we checked into a hotel in the Garden District so we could be closer to the action.  Had some cheesecake that night and called it good!

We slept in again on Sunday, took some time to get ready for the day, and attempted to walk to our car parked 2-3 blocks away.  But, it was POURING!! As Laura so eloquently puts it: TORRENTIAL DOWNPOUR.  About sums it up.  Awesome.

We parked at a mall, bought an umbrella to validate for parking then started walking.  We finally got to BREAKFAST at 1:30 p.m!!!  Our schedule was so crazy! We walked around the French Quarter, French market, had some beignets at Cafe du Monde and then decided to get away from the rain so we went shopping at the mall.  Typical.  Go to New Orleans to see the city and go shopping!  But, I got some cute things at Anthropologie, so I'm not complaining!

That night we had some divine pizza, rented a movie, and stayed in.  It was still raining, and we were a little sick of trying to stay dry.

The next morning we had to get up a bit earlier than before (8:30, gasp!) so we could go out to breakfast (if you ever go to New Orleans, you HAVE to go to Surrey's.  The BEST breakfast I've ever had!), and drive about an hour to our swamp tour.  After deciding we just wanted to take my camera and some cash for a tip, we put our purses in the trunk and shut the door.  Oops.  Keys were in Laura's purse still.  We were minutes away from our tour, and we didn't want to miss it, so we called a locksmith really fast and told them to be there when we got done with the tour.  We tried to forget about it and enjoy ourselves.  It wasn't too hard because the tour was AWESOME!

Most delicious french toast I ever had.  And, I didn't even get the bananas foster like Laura did.  Stuffed with banana cream cheese and served with foster sauce.  Yum!

I felt like I was in that movie Princess and the Frog (I really should see it again, but I remember not really liking it.) floating down the bayou.  It was beautiful.  We saw wild boars (who ever knew that boars lived in the swamps of Louisiana?) who were so excited to get some marshmallows that they were literally jumping onto the boat!  And, of course we saw some gators!  Several, in fact.  They were in a pretty lazy mood, so they didn't really do much, but it was still sweet to see them in their natural environment.  There is something so creepy about an animal that blends in so well that you can only see its eyes and then can disappear in an instant.  Freaked me out.

Seriously so beautiful, right?

Did you know wild boars could swim?

After the tour, the guy was there to let us into our car, and it didn't cost us an arm and a leg, so all was well.  We drove back to the city so we could eat some delicious fried chicken at the famous Willie Mae's and then get all prettied up to go back to the French Quarter.

That night we went to Preservation Hall and listened to the beautiful jazz music where jazz music began, ate some more beignets (of course) and walked down Bourbon street.  We went into a couple of bars that had live music, but what are a bunch of married mormon girls really supposed to do on Bourbon street?  So we left around 11, which was fine by me since we had to get up the next morning at 6 so I could catch my plane.

Yum...Cafe du Monde!

And, that was that.  It was a fantastic trip filled with lots of fun and laughter.  I miss my friend and roomie so much so it was so nice to see her.  Let's not go another 2 1/2 years without seeing each other, k Laura!