New Orleans: ghosts and gardens

With our short three-day itinerary in New Orleans, we stuck to the basics.  So, after getting off the train and taking the streetcar plus a short walk, we settled into our Airbnb apartment in the French Quarter:

Oasis

Complete with rats in the courtyard, we found it utterly charming, especially since we have pet rats (but I'm sure it gets old having them around your garden).  We woke the next morning ready to try and beat the June heat by taking a cemetery tour in the morning, and doing a self-guided tour of the garden district in the afternoon.



Booking a Save Our Cemeteries tour was a great option.  Not only do you get a knowledgeable tour guide, you also contribute back to the place where you and a bunch of other people are tromping around.  Both Jeff and I loved the cemetery tour.  I learned how so many family members are put into one smallish tomb - by decomposing in the swampy heat down to nothing, until the next family member, er, shows up.  I really had no idea that's how it worked.


Also surprising was the number of German immigrants who came to New Orleans.  Lafayette Cemetery No. 1 was full of Johanns, Gustavs and Elisabets.  And then there were the families who all succumbed to one illness or another all within days or weeks of one another.  We learned about the history, architecture and cultural practices of the city all through the cemetery as example.

Grabbing an awesome muffaletta sandwich at a nearby market (I learned I love these sandwiches while in New Orleans) and cooling off with a cream soda and lovely air conditioning, we then walked a few blocks over to the garden district.  I had printed out a self-guided tour - there are several on the internet, and we followed the directions and took in the mansions, other lovely homes, and intricate wrought iron fences:

 
In retrospect, I think a guided tour would have been better, but this way we did it on our own timetable, which was nice.  We ended at The Commander's Palace, where a friendly valet insisted I take a look around and ask for a menu to review.  As I took my oh-so-sweaty self inside, I realized this was a really, really nice restaurant and made it a short look around.  Visiting such a high-end place was not part of our trip this time - we had not brought the clothing that was required, but I would definitely like to try it out on a return trip.



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