Location: New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

I woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed, despite a very short sleep. The hostel room we’re sharing with a few people doesn’t exactly scream ‘sleep in’ but regardless… there’s a brand new city to see! Get me out there! Buckle up people, we were efficient today.

We dove right in, overcast skies threatening rain and making the humid air feel even thicker than yesterday. Last night I was exhausted and it was dark so I didn’t really get a great look at the buildings. But this morning, with fresh eyes in the daylight? Wow. Colourful townhouses with brick and stucco exteriors and high arched windows lined every single street. The second story of almost all of them have a long cast iron balcony overlooking the road, often lined with big bunches of happy flowers or plants. It was tough to get a photo that would do them justice, given the cars lining the streets that often blocked off half the view and the tight angles. That didn’t stop me from cheerfully pointing to all of them anyway.

The lower half of many of the buildings boasted cafés, art shops, restaurants and most notably Pauline’s favourite: antique stores. We explored of a handful on our way towards Café Du Monde, a massive outdoor café with just two things on the menu: coffee and fresh hot beignets (ben–yays). Given that they are churning out what must be thousands of these things in a day they actually had us through the two-block-long line-up in a flash. Thank god because I was starving and excited. Soft stretchy dough fried and coated in an absolutely ridiculous amount of powdered sugar sure sounds like my ideal breakfast. I really can’t overstate the amount of powdered sugar though. Listen. I’m not regularly the most graceful human but I can eat correctly most of the time. There was so much sugar that when I went to take my first bite I inhaled and coated my entire throat in half the dry powder and then violently coughed the other half right off my donut and into the air, onto the table and my pants.

Smooth.

Donuts literally and figuratively inhaled, we meandered over to Jackson Square: a park surrounded by artists, fortune tellers and tarot card readers with a big bronze statue of Andrew Jackson in the middle. The west side of the square was completely taken over by a large grey three spired basilica which was flanked by Pirate Alley. I was all in for a kitschy pirate themed street but to my surprise there was essentially one small old bar (open at 10 am for those early birds I guess) that pirates historically used to frequent. There was however a bookstore nearby that was pure magic. Floor to ceiling stacks of vintage books leaning precariously and propped up by other stacks of books made walls that could dangerously topple over at any second. Shelves? Ha! Never heard of them. Pauline found a book called The Valley of the Green Glass Door and was all set to buy it when she was informed that it wasn’t for sale and was actually part of a quest that led players to this bookstore! Of all the books in the entire shop of course Pauline would find that one.

I later looked it up and the whole idea of the quest is based on the principle that “the power of the unseen cannot be transmitted through explanation, and that to fully understand magic, one must embark upon an initiatory journey of direct experiences.”

Tell me that doesn’t feel like kismet.

We walked along the Mississippi River, chatting and pointing out more beautiful houses, occasionally ducking into stores and eventually sitting down for some Oysters and Crawfish at Deany’s.

Okay so crawfish was something I was very excited to try and it turns out I really had no idea why at all. They’re basically tiny dirty little boiled lobsters and in order to eat them you have to twist the head off, suck the juice out of the head, pinch the legs apart and yank out a piece of meat that’s like the size of a nickel. I twisted and pinched an entire pound of these things before really getting the hang of it and while actually pretty delicious I’m not sure I could be convinced to do it again seeing as everyone calls them ‘skittering bugs.’

We toured through the Cemetery Number 1 (yes that’s the actual name), learning all about how above ground tombs are basically just slowly cremating people inside that get literally swept to the back of the tomb after a year or so, which makes space for a new person to join the party when the time comes. This one single modestly sized cemetery of white tombs held an estimated 50,000 people. FIFTY THOUSAND. It took us all of 20 minutes to walk the entire thing! Can you imagine how many traditional graveyards it would take to bury 50,000 people?! This is space efficiency at its finest!

We decided to book a ghost tour, which taught us all about the dark and sordid history of the city. It turns out that ‘Voodoo’ as we all know it from Hollywood is not actually a thing… it’s a religion, and a pretty normal one at that. One of their most important gods is Papa Legba, who is the intermediary between the living and the spirit world. I think I liked Papa Legba cause who doesn’t want a nice old dude with a cane and a dog to help you out at the afterlife? Thats way better than the grim reaper!

Voodoo is matriarchal, with a ‘Voodoo Queen’ at its head that basically helps everyone out through healing practices called ‘root work’. Even the Voodoo doll was originally a way for families who couldn’t read or write to keep track of their medical history. Not to like… hex your enemies. Mom’s got a headache? Pin the white root to the head of her doll so we remember she was prescribed this. While not scary, the tour was informative about Voodoo, vampires, murders and the history of slavery in the city.

I was getting sore at this point (turns out the 30 year old back of a desk worker is not nearly as nimble and capable as the 27 year old back of a desk worker) so we stopped into Napoleon’s for dinner. Jambalaya, a spicy rice dish with onions, peppers, sausage and shrimp really hit the spot while we chatted about our day and mapped out how to get to our our final stop for the evening: the Spotted Cat Music Club. I’ve been wanting to see live jazz all day, and even though buskers all over did a wonderful job adding to the atmosphere of the city, nothing quite compared to hearing it live in a little club stuffed to the brim with clapping dancing people.

While amazing, after an hour or so we were losing energy fast and had a long walk home. That didn’t stop us from exploring a late night art market where Pauline must have bought 6 art prints at least! Colourful prints of alligators, Louis Armstrong and more tucked safely away in her tote, we walked home and collapsed into bed.

I’ve missed days like this.

Sav

P.S. Wish my back luck tomorrow – it will be a miracle if I can climb out of my bunk bed in the morning.