Day 4 -- New Orleans

We got a late start heading out on the town this morning, due in large part to the fact that our nine-year-old son had cracked the code on the hotel room safe. Keith tried to fetch his wallet and discovered not only that Charlie had changed the passcode, but also that Charlie had forgotten what he changed it to. The kid offered up a few possibilities, but they weren't right; and then the keypad locked up for 15 minutes. Charlie spent the time thinking up more possible combinations, but the next four didn't work, either.

We had to call hotel security. On the plus side, the security response is darn quick here at the Hyatt French Quarter. On the down side, we discovered that even a security guard with a master code has to wait 15 minutes before unlocking the keypad. So the guy copped a squat right down in the middle of our floor and we were obligated to entertain him for ten whole minutes. On the plus side, he was a friendly gentleman, and he offered some tips on things to do in the city.

With Keith's wallet finally freed, we headed out. As we crossed Bourbon Street, we got caught up in a group of eight or ten young twenty-somethings hauling three giant coolers -- with open beers nestled in the lids' built-in cup-colders. "But, it's 9:30 in the morning," I marveled out loud. "It's a party!" they responded enthusiastically. I'm not sure if they were starting the party or wrapping it up,  but that's pretty much our Bourbon Street experience in a nutshell.

Breakfast was at Cafe du Monde on Jackson Square, which was not as crowded as it was yesterday. We ordered beignets, coffee and juice -- actually, the only things on the menu -- and the hot, square doughnuts were delivered to our table a few minutes later under mountains of powered sugar.



From there, we crossed Jackson Square and ducked into St. Louis Cathedral (it had been closed yesterday for mass), and then we explored to the Audobon Aquarium of the Americas and took in an IMAX film, "Hurricane on the Bayou."



A few friends have asked if we're going to tour the Ninth Ward during our time in New Orleans, or if we'll have a chance to see any of the destruction from Katrina. Certainly, it's an important part of this city's story, and we'd like the kids to understand the scope of the disaster. But at the same time, we don't want to gawk. I tried to politely inquire about this at a tourism office, and the clerk basically said that there's not much to see anymore, anyway. The IMAX film, I hope, gave the kids some idea of the power of a hurricane as well as the devastation left in Katrina's wake.

Our aquarium tickets also got us admission to the Audobon Insectarium a few blocks away, so we checked that out, too, and then we walked a few more blocks to the head of the St. Charles Avenue streetcar line and took the trolley toward uptown, past the Garden District and its beautiful old homes and lush front yards. Then, at the end of the line, we headed back. A cool feature that we discovered: The seatbacks flip from one side of the seat to the other. The driver flips them at the end of the line, before the trolley heads back downtown. That way, the seats are always facing foward, no matter which direction the streetcar is headed. (In the picture below, Charlie had flipped his seat the "wrong" direction.)






Dinner was at the Royal House Restaurant and Oyster Bar, at a lovely second-floor table next to the balcony. I ordered the BLTO. The "O" stands for, "Oh my goodness, there are fried oysters on my BLT." The order was placed in the name of research, as part of my neverending quest for the perfect BLT (see 2012 blog entry, "Day 5"). It was fine. Different. Good, but not the greatest BLT ever.



The evening closed with a show at the venerable Preservation Hall on St. Peter Street, near Bourbon. The building dates from 1803, and since 1961 it has been an all-ages venue with nightly acts featuring some of the best jazz musicians in the country. The actual room isn't much larger than a two-and-a-half-car garage. We packed in with about 150 of our closest friends. There are a few rows of benches, and room to sit on the floor right in front of the musicians. But behind the seats, it's standing room only, and that's where we were for the 45-minute set. But what fantastic music, vibrant and bold. Truly, these seven guys -- on piano, banjo, clarinet, horn, trombone, upright bass and drums -- are supreme. I worried about the kids having to stand through the set. And admittedly my own feet were growing weary. But it was all worth it when, during a bass solo, as the guy was going to town on his instrument, I looked back at Natalie, our own budding bass player, and saw her bright, beaming face.