This blog post will probably be a big disappointment to anyone who is curious about New Orleans culture, architecture, food, or music because for some reason it didn't dawn on me while we were here to visit any of that. I read reviews before we left home that said the French Quarter was not a kid-friendly place, even when it wasn't Mardi Gras, so I had just left it at that and hadn't considered the idea any further. We probably missed out on exploring many parts of this hugely historical area, but we did see other types of things.
Our first stop in New Orleans was the National World War II Museum. We have done quite a bit of WWII stuff on this trip, so the kids are pretty familiar with the story now and recognized many of the key players. This museum was huge, a massive three stories tall with another building across the street where they showed movies. They had WWII veterans on site as volunteer docents and it was really neat to be able to ask them questions about things we saw in the museum. The building also had an old-fashioned soda-fountain style restaurant out front and as we walked through I noticed that all of the people in the restaurant were at least 75. They were laughing and telling stories and talking with their friends and I took a moment to imagine them visiting the same type of place 50 or 60 years ago with their friends. It was a very cute crowd.
In case you're wondering why the National World War II Museum is in New Orleans, one of the exhibits in the front room explains why.
One of the key tools in the war was this Landing, Craft, Vehicle, Personnel (or LCVP), also known as the Higgins boat. This boat was designed by Andrew Higgins to make 'amphibious landings' based on boats they'd used here in the swamps and marshes of Louisiana. All 20,000 of the boats were made here in New Orleans by Higgins' company. These boats were considered crucial to the success of World War II as they allowed men and equipment to be offloaded anywhere along the shore instead of at the ports and docks, which were heavily guarded. President Eisenhower said "Andrew Higgins ... is the man who won the war for us. ... If Higgins had not designed and built those LCVPs, we never could have landed over an open beach. The whole strategy of the war would have been different."
This museum dealt much more with the actions of the war, following a timeline of the events as they unfolded. They had many movies showing planned movement and attacks, and had big light-up maps on the walls showing the enemy advancement over time. One of the coolest displays to me was the 'dumped-out' pack of a soldier in WWII with all of the contents labeled.
Carrier-pigeon trailer
German Flak gun
amphibious vehicle
This museum was very well put-together and heavily detailed. We walked through some of it pretty quickly because the girls were tired and hungry.
After lunch I considered going to a swamp walk that had a nature center and a small hike because I thought the girls would love to catch some frogs and see some bugs. But at the word 'swamp' C said "No way." She was convinced that if you walked anywhere near water that a crocodile would jump out and eat you. So we thought of something else to do instead.
The thing I wanted to be sure to do before we left New Orleans was to take a boat ride on the Mississippi. It's actually a little tougher to find a boat tour than you might think and when I finally found one, it was $70/person and took 2 hours. I figured there must be a better way, so with a little digging I found out that the bus system out here runs a free ferry service across the river in a few different spots and there was one really close to us. I drove towards the boat a little sheepishly wondering if I could really just drive on and ride across, but sure enough we took a free boat ride on the Mississippi, and Lulu got to ride, too!
Lulu on the ferry
a giant ship that passed us
this is the bridge we crossed back on. it's much higher than it looks!!
the Natchez (the boat we would have ridden on)
across the Mississippi looking back to where we just were
Once we were on the other side of the Mississippi, we took some time to drive around and look at the neighborhoods (ok, so we were a little lost. but it still counts, right?) Several of the houses and buildings here are in shambles or are abandoned. I don't know how many of them are leftover from Katrina, but many of the old brick buildings by the museum looked like they were crumbling and here in this neighborhood several houses had the roofs caved in, had boarded up windows, or were missing doors or other structural pieces.
By the time we made it to that giant bridge in the picture above, we were just in time to hit the early evening traffic in New Orleans. Some of the smaller bridges are drawbridges, but the more heavily-traveled ones go so high across the water that they begin their ascent miles and miles from the water. I could see the bridge when we got off the ferry, but it took me a long time to drive to the place where it touched the ground and I could actually get on it.
Once the traffic cleared, our drive across Louisiana was a breeze so I was able to enjoy the scenery of the area. One thing I didn't enjoy were all the armadillos on the side of the road out here. There was no doubt now that these were armadillos, and there were so many of them! I'm not sure if they don't see well or if they are just too slow to avoid the cars but someone should build a tiny fence to keep those poor guys off the road! We actually did see an alligator on the side of the road that had been hit by a car, too. I won't share the photo here, but that was certainly something we don't see back home.
As we drove further across Louisiana, I began to see a ridiculous amount of billboards advertising Boudin and Cracklins. Apparently every single restaurant and butcher shop in the area had the 'best' ones. I expected to be horrified when I found out what they were, but they're actually nothing more than sausage and pork rinds. Not my first choice of snack, but not stomach-churning either.
As the evening rolled on, I noticed an increased amount of people pulled over on the side of the road. Some were on the ground in handcuffs, some sitting on the backs of their cars waiting for something (or someone), and several standing by while police searched and/or emptied the contents of their cars all over the side of the road. I chuckled to myself at the thought of an officer having to try to unpack this car, opening the back and having everything fall on him, or worse yet - what he might find in here. Eww. (Actually, it's not that bad. We've been cleaning it every day. :)
By the time we got to our hotel it was so humid. The heat wasn't too bad, but it was so muggy that when I stepped out of the car, my glasses fogged up immediately. The windows of the cars in the parking lot where steamed and wet and although not a drop of rain fell out of the sky, everything was soaked. I tried to open the doors as little as possible, afraid that the things in the car might mold if they got too wet. Ah, Louisiana, how do you do it?
That's too bad about New Orleans. Things must have changed a lot since I was last there. I would not have hesitated at all to take the kids to the French quarter. It's just dripping history in a little tiny section of big, downtown-type city. I loved it. I didn't go there at night, but in the daytime, it was very nice. We did go to Cafe du Monde and have beignets. I'm surprised at the riverboat prices too! Wow! Larry and I did a dinner cruise on the Natchez with a live Dixieland band and it was no where near $70. What a shame. By the way, I can NOT believe 92% humidity! Yikes!
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