wow! I am actually almost a little bit disappointed now that I bailed on Los Angeles...

http://laist.com/2011/07/20/bicycle_anti-harassment_ordinance_passes.php

can't sleep, too excited to see san francisco tomorrow!

just checked out of the ambassador. going to mother's for breakfast and to get a po'boy to go. then we're going to cafe du monde for iced cafe au laits and beignets for the last time (until I come back, of course)...

first day in new orleans with tolerable weather.

today is day 5, took long enough!

new orleans

so, wow. I've only been here a little more than 24 hours and it already feels like a week.

natalie and I cruised into new orleans on thursday evening about 9pm and checked into the hotel. the third of our three musketeers troupe wouldn't be arriving at the airport until the following morning. so natalie and I decided to unpack and then explore locally by foot.

without getting a map and just relying on gps to ensure we don't get lost, we wander. circled are walked. backtracking, so much it hurts. we decide to go ahead and check out canal even thought the first two blocks had been incredibly lame. we're looking for *anything* that is open where we could sit down, have a drink, and hopefully listen to some live music. one block, nothing, next block, nothing. on this goes until we are about to turn around. then, like a beacon, we hear the universal sounds of "party". we look to the right and there is an alley closed of to vehicle traffic by police barricade. there are bars and clubs full of people. there is more live music than we know how to choose between. it seemed never ending as we peered through the crowd.

this was, of course, bourbon street.

we spent about two hours walking the length and taking pictures. what a fantastic way to ring in this leg of the trip!

we sleep about four hours and then get up to go pick up our friend from the airport. she's a waitress in Orlando and had gotten on a plane after having just gotten off of work. we expected she'd want to sleep for a bit, we'd all sleep, then get up and go have lunch or something.

ohhhhhh no. she's talking about this and that she wants to do and how she's too tired to sleep. natalie and I look at each other like, "can we do this on 4 hours sleep?" we obviously decided we could.

we walked from our hotel to cafe du monde which was about a mile and a half. stopped at Jackson park on the way. had beignets and frozen cafe au lait. jeez, how seriously delicious is a frozen cafe au lait??? *very good*

we came upon the aquarium and their deal. for $40 you get admission to the aquarium, the insectarium, the Audubon zoo, and one of their IMAX features. so we all bought a pass and went into the aquarium.

three hours (!!) later we finally emerge from the aquarium and have lunch near the hotel. our friend's new boss gave her the number for someone who works out here, and she learned that this friend was working tonight and really encouraged us to come by. we took our disco naps, I hit the gym for a bit, and we got ready to go "uptown".

we definitely wanted to take public transportation. it's cheaper and more fun. unfortunately, some people who clearly worked for the city had no idea that the line I'd looked up was still in existence. we spent way more time than necessary figuring out whether this train existed! never doubt an iphone!

the st. charles streetcar is super cool. figuratively, of course. with the 90 degree weather with the humidty, the windows are down and we are hanging our heads out the windows every possible minute when there wasn't a pole approaching and threatening to decapitate us.

after backtracking a little bit, we found the place where the friend of the friend worked. very cool place. old, local vibe. and an excellent live band.

it's definitely bed time now.
all I can think about is san francisco and the perfection I've left behind. would it be so terrible to skip right over los angeles and just go back to the bay area? I dunnnno...

cute brick wall !