Sitting on Bourbon Street

It was a long drive yesterday from Louisville to New Orleans.  Mississippi was probably the worst.  There was a whole lot of green and not much else.  I needed gas for about half an hour, but exits can be few and far between and not all of them have a gas station.  In the northeast, we're used to every exit having five gas stations.  Not the case down here.  Once I crossed the Louisiana state line, there were businesses everywhere.

Entering New Orleans was something special.  I was coming in on Rt 10.  It was sunset and you see in front of you where the road raises to start becoming a bridge.  You go up the hill and suddenly you're on this bridge that is straight as an arrow, has no end in sight, the clouds in front of you are purple with this blue-ish haze, and out your passenger-side mirror, the sun is setting and glistening off of this huge body of water.  I couldn't believe how long the bridge was.  It must have been over five miles.  It just kept going with this perfect scene surrounding you the entire time.

I got to my hotel (a block off Boubon Street), took a quick shower, and started to walk the greatest party I've ever been to.  It's not like this was a special occation.  Bourbon Street comes alive every night of the year!  It's like this living thing.  Every bar has a live band playing.  People stand on Bourbon Street encouraging you to enter their bar instead of the 1000 other options you have.  You can get a drink in the bars, or most places have "drive through windows" where you can get a cheap beer and continue along your merry way.

I hadn't eaten since lunch, but all I had was a bowl of Seafood Gumbo at one of the quieter estabilshments I could find.  I sat at the bar with a couple from New Jersey.  The husband was a middle school principal and the wife was an elementary school teacher.  She gave me two of her baked oysters.  Yum!

After sleeping in until 10:00 this morning, I stumbled down to the restaurant in the lobby of my hotel for my first ever plate of shrimp and grits.  Perfect way to start out the day.  I'm off to explore the French Quarter-daylight version.