Mardi Gras in New Orleans, LA 2020 RV Trip, restaurants, travel tips and parade reviews!

Lisa

Hi. Welcome back to RView where we talk about life traveling real estate. And today we’re on the road in New Orleans and we just finished a week long visit here.

We wrapped up Mardi Gras last night with fat Tuesday. So in our last episode, I just did a little short one with my daughter, and we did get you a little preview of our New Orleans and about our trip down here.

So today I just wanted to kind of wrap things up, tell you about the things we found that we loved and the things that we didn’t love so much and just kind of tell you about our trip and how it spent so far. And I’m here with my husband, George.

So, we’ve got a lot to talk about today. Super excited to tell you about some great things that we found in New Orleans. And once our daughter left on Sunday, we will. So let’s just start with Sunday. We went before they left. We decided to go to brunch, and we started at this place called the Ruby Slipper. It was fortunately I got on the yelp wait list before we got there. There was, like, an hour long wait to get into this place, but it was well worth it.

George:
Even the hour long wait would have been worth it.

Lisa:
Yeah, So good. And we went to the one that was, I think it’s called uptown, and we’ll put all this all the links to the restaurants of the things that we talked about in the show notes for you. But we went to the Ruby slipper. They had outdoor yard games. What’s it called? Jenga and Connect four

George:
Cornhole. They just had all kinds of stuff for kids to play while they’re waiting and for adults to play. And they also had a little makeshift bar set up outside, which is very nice also. They had Bloody Mary’s, Margaritas. Yeah, it was very nice,

Lisa:
I would say, one of the best bloody Marys I’ve had in a really long time. It was like the perfect amount of not too spicy, delicious, and I love that. They put pickled green beans in there. Bloody Mary’s down here.

George:

The little things just made it so special. I’ll say right now, the servers here are fantastic at their jobs. Every restaurant we went to we were just amazed at how friendly, courteous, excellent. Excellent.

Lisa:
Yeah, you would think that with all the people that are here, they would get sort of jaded, you know, and tired of people, but really, really friendly people. So we had a great server there we had it will put some pictures on our Instagram, also at RView podcast.

But they had a stuffed French toast that they I guess the flavor changes all the time, and the flavor was king cake. And so King cake is what they sell everywhere in New Orleans for Mardi Gras as with the little baby inside. But the flavor, the traditional flavors, is like a cream cheese with cinnamon and then, like the sugar Sprinkles on the top. So this had like a cinnamon cream cheese stuffing between the French toes, and then it had green, yellow and purple Sprinkles on the top that was delicious.

So that we get the kids off on the road and we chilled out for the afternoon because we were exhausted from just all the walking. That is one thing that I will say I probably put 20,000 steps because I have a watch that Brexit like every day, walking around and see how things are getting.

George:
Bring good walking shoes. Yes, you will do some walking, especially if you go up and down Bourbon Street, Mardi Gras and everything’s around the French Quarter. Some things you I mean, you just have to walk. And it’s part of the experience in the fun.

Lisa:
And you definitely want closed toed comfortable shoes no matter where. If you’re gonna be coming to Mardi Gras, that should be the staple. Like basically, make your outfits around your tennis shoes because you have to have comfortable shoes.

George:
ladies, do not wear open toed shoes on Bourbon Street.

Lisa:
You just get nasty and even like your regular shoes will get sort of too sturdy from all the people on stuff that’s there if you see on Bourbon Street for a while.

George:
So let’s talk about Bourbon Street. Since we’re on that subject, we enjoyed it. It was a blast that there’s so many people. Everybody was really cool. We saw one incident where police came in grabbed, two guys took him away. But besides that for being here for a week, I don’t remember seeing anything.

Lisa:
I mean, I don’t even know what you could possibly have done. Three Thank you out because, I mean, it’s pretty much a free for all out there. And there’s crazy, just every kind of person. And I think that’s one of the things we love about New Orleans, that we’ve come to find its everything for bridge people, too. Poor people toe white people, black people, purple people, green people.

George:
And everybody just getting along and having a blast.

Lisa:
Yes, one of the uber driver said to me, she said, People in the city, they just like to do But they want to do, I guess, you know, and that’s and it’s the truth, like they just they’re here and everyone’s just having a great time.

That was really cool about Bourbon Street. I think what we’re talking about that is a good time to talk about. We rented a balcony two nights on Saturday night and on Fat Tuesday at the Bourbon Cowboy.

George:
I will let a link to the Bourbon Cowboy, and the link will contain me how to rent the balcony, Which is to me, in my opinion, so worth it. So worth it for the price of renting the balcony. And of course, it’s a bunch of people up there, but you get an open bar and we did it from five PM to midnight on both nights.

Lisa:
It was $200 a person, which might seem like a lot. But if you consider six hours of open bar plus food.

George:
Then you’re on the balcony and you have a bathroom, which is that alone is almost worth 200.

Lisa:
Oh, right. Like I’m just too old to be like dredging through Bourbon Street for hours on an at night time. And I much rather enjoy the scenery from the balcony.

They did a really great job. They have about 100 people up there at time, I guess, for a party and they rotate you sort of. They’re like, OK, we need to rotate out the balcony so they make it really fair for everyone to kind of make sure that people don’t just certainly willing to stay out there and hog up the balcony in a little time.

George:
You’re paying to be out on the balcony. So they want to make sure you have balcony time on what at least I figured, were there from six to midnight. What they do is they have basically three different groups. They have one group that rents the balcony from one. I think it’s like 5 to 8 and then another group that ransom from nine to midnight.

But like our tickets for for 6 p.m. To midnight. So when the group leaves at eight the first group, we then have the balcony for an hour to ourselves. Whoever has the sixth of midnight tickets, if that makes any sense.

So we kind of just sat back, let the people that we’re gonna be leaving have their time. And then when they left, we jumped on the balcony, and then it was just It was a great rotation, and they did a great job with that.

Lisa:
Oh, this is a tip. This is a tip. We always have to like log our beads down to the thing. And I hated that.

George:
Don’t do that.

Lisa:
Yeah. Now we found a guy.

George:
The link to Bourbon cowboy will also have that gentleman’s information. I believe If not, I’ll find his business card. order online. Order all the beads you want. He’s got great prices and they will deliver them to Bourbon Cowboy, so when you get there, there’s a box or case or three cases or 10 cases and they’ll have your name and you just grab them as you go and you’re good to go. Last year we lugged a bunch of beads that we bought herself from the campsite to Bourbon Cowboy. Let me tell you, that’s not fun.

Lisa:
Those D bags get super heavy. I mean, I would say they probably away like 30 ounce each. So when you’re like five cases, that’s a lot to carry. You know, 20 blocks to get somewhere. And it was just really roar that inconvenient and prices were good.

George:
Speaking of prices, we said we were gonna talk about this, considering that it’s Mardi Gras, everybody’s on Bourbon Street and they’ve got a captive audience. They could really galled you on the prices of alcohol and food and everything else. I don’t know. I think the prices are really good.

Lisa:
You literally got. It’s literally called a huge ass beer

George:
I’ll post a picture of 72 ounces of beer for 20 bucks, which that Yeah, that that might be a little bit

Lisa:
Ee figured out that’s like 10 beers. Beers over 20 fives is like $2 a beer. But I feel like even food prices were very reasonable. So I mean a cocktail. I guess the cocktail like, but they were a big cocktail, like a hurricane might be $12. There’s a lot of alcohol in it. Probably had three shots in there.

George:
Yeah, they definitely do not play around with the alcohol here. They more than willing to give it to you. Beer prices were very legit. Alcohol prices were legit. I really have no complaint when it comes to that. I got they could really galled you because your captive audience they gotta be competitive.

Lisa:
Right, kind of just sort of skipping around. But that was on Sunday. We did the Ruby slipper, and then so Sunday night, we also found a really great restaurant. George and I love to go to a bunch of different restaurants and just have a little bit of something at each place.

And so a lot of times like Woman Home in Charleston will just get dropped off somewhere and have them and just kind of walk down the street and go restaurant to restaurant now, but your and get something to eat. So we did that kind of here in New Orleans. I did some research online, subsume places that were kind of close to us. My feet were killing me on Sunday night from all the walking we done.

So we went the first place we went to was called The Jewel of the South. This is like little place off Rambert Street again will put the link of the show notes and really cool atmosphere, just like this little courtyard out back and a little bar. And we didn’t have reservations. So we just kind of walked in, sat at the bar and said, Hey, what’s the best thing on your menu? And it’s all small plates, so we just tried a few different things like a scotching was really good. Scott J.

George:
All their stuff is really good, But wait a part of our rule with this little game that we play is we go in and we will ask the bartender or whoever. What the best thing on the menu is in their opinion, and no matter what they come up with, we have to eat it, right? So then we always say whatever they recommend one drink, and then we move on and we’ll continue doing that until we’re full or drunk. Whichever comes first.

We have gone to so many places, and we’ve tried stuff that we really would have never ordered, and it really enjoyed it. So next time you guys were out in town and you want to try something different, go do that. You’ll enjoy it cause I’m telling you, they’ll come up with stuff that you really would never order off the menu.

Lisa:
Yeah, so we started the jeweler South, had a little tapas there, and then we walked about two blocks down to this place called Palm, implying.

It was so much better than a jeweler. South, in my opinion. Really cute little place also didn’t have a reservation, but they had kitchen seating, so there was a like a kitchen counters what they called it, and I loved it because you got to watch the shops, make all the food and see everything go out. So we got to see everything.

George:
everything that they put out. We were like we got to try that. So so many things.

Lisa:
Yeah, So we asked the server like we normally do. What’s your favorite thing on money? She says. Boater beans were like, What water being really not butter.

We have to get out because I said so And I said, All right, well, I also want to try the Brussels sprouts because they sounded really delicious. I wish I had the venue in front of me to describe it. So we were the butter butter beans in the Brussels sprouts to start. And let me tell you, I could have, like, lick the bowl literally

George:
of the butter bean both of both of them. But the butter beans. This is a perfect example of total surprise. We would I would I know I would have never ordered butter beans, but she that’s what she said, was the best, and I ordered it, and I do not regret it. If it wasn’t for embarrassment, I would have literally licked that plate thing.

Lisa:
had some kind of positive mixing. Oh, some sort of sauce of slaw and the Brussels sprouts. What was really different about them is they had this, like Honey’s or Raja with peanuts like chopped peanuts. But they were fried Brussels sprouts. I’m sure they were not healthy when you think vegetable, neither one of these wrong the healthy side. But they were so good. No. And if you’re a vegetarian like that’s a great dress great restaurant. And then we split it of the fish dinner, which was also delicious. But we have like a craw-fish risotto underneath. It was really delicious the butter beans in the Brussels sprouts for good enough to go back again the next day.

George:
on both of those restaurants, I’ll add, The bartenders were fantastic. The drinks were so good. I had an old fashioned at both, and they were both spot on.

Lisa:
Yeah, they definitely have really good bartenders. Just just drink market So it everywhere. So that was really say much, but I never had a like craft cocktail. They were just amazing. So that was on Sunday night, and then Monday,

Goerge:
We just chilled out pretty much the whole day.

Lisa:
Yeah, we were so tired.

George:
There was Are down day. We Whenever we travel, we like to have one down day just kind of recharge the batteries, get some laundry. Yeah. Way did some housekeeping around the RV. I got some stuff fixed. I got the electricity back up and running.

Lisa:
That when you wanted to see the praise, that’s what we went to the grades. So Monday night we went to the parades on Canal Street, and we talked to you before about Friday night. What? We went with Lauren and shot her phone pick pocketed. This time we got a spot we got there about an hour early, and we had a spot right in the very, very front.

We met a guy that was there, a local, and he talked to us for a while and he was kind enough to let the short person I am stand in front of him and I had a great spot right on the rail. so talking about the parades that we saw on Monday, we saw the crew of Proteus and the crew of Orpheus. Proteus was the 1st 1 It was a smaller. It wasn’t really small, but it was smaller than Orpheus.

It had 20 floats in it. The membership is only 230 male riders. That’s really interesting. The history of the floats used to just be Only men that were on these. They call him Cruz, right? The crews are in charge of the whole parade, and it’s like a difficult thing to get into. So, for example, the crew of Proteus was founded in 1882 and it’s a second oldest crew and carnival history. There, floats still used the original chassis. He’s from the 18 eighties, and the organization is named after Proteus, which is an old man of the sea in Greek mythology.

And so, like if you see all their floats, they’re all the ones that look like oceans, and you’re like water giant seashells and stuff like that.

George:
Everything’s ocean based, and it is. It’s pretty interesting that you said that now because I really noticed when I was watching the parade that floats are new and modern and beautiful, but you can see underneath that it’s literally the old wooden wheels on from I don’t know.

Lisa:
Carriage started in the 1880s and then says here, like many of the traditional cruise, the King of Proteus has never revealed to public. His float is a giant sea show, And then over the years they’ve Cruz Rose have included 60 inch Red and white pearl beaded necklaces, plastic tridents and Polly store medallions.

So the big the big difference in these parades is the stuff that they throw out, and people get all excited about certain specific things. And if you ever want to get, like, good stuff, you got to be about where the little kids are because they always get all the great like little toys and stuff like that

George:
or parade tip number 9000. If you want to hit the jackpot, stand near the end of the parade because if it’s not off the float by the end of the parade, you’re stuck with it. So they throw. I mean, they were not just beads at you. They will throw the whole bag of beads at you and everything they have it just comes flying off.

Lisa:
Yeah. So another thing I thought about is, especially when we were walking so far, is like, next year, I’m gonna buy some, like, cheap $10 chairs that, you know, those bag chairs or whatever, Gary, um, down there with me and then just leave them there because I don’t want to have to carry him around all night long, and we usually go to Bourbon Street or whatever.

After I thought that was a key. And then there was a lady when we were on the phones, she had this. It’s like a long pole that’s like a trash picker. Like, uh, like, I guess people used to fix up off the ground with a long pole. It’s Let’s got, like, a little you know, it’s a crabber forever. So the beat that fall, like outside of the rail, she could grab those with her little grabbers that we were using those that was right.

George:
And some people had big fishing nets. They were just out there with the pope and catch, although beads, you know, everybody’s waiting for the bead to fall and all sudden, this met its match.

Lisa:
Yeah, So we also saw the crew of Orpheus that night, and I love that one. It was founded in 1993 and the crew of Orpheus takes his name from Zeus and kill I appease musically inclined son. The founding members include Harry Connick Jr and his father, Harry Connick Sr. Former New Orleans district attorney. With their first parade in 1994 the crew of 700 members established itself as a super crew. They were the first super critical of both male and female writers.

So I love that they have both men and women on their floats, and it’s pretty cool, like they all have costumes or masks and stuff, but their crews are floats are also like beautiful. And Lauren Alaina from American Idol was on there

George:
and Harry Connick Jr

Lisa:
and Harry Connick Jr Yeah, I have pictures of him on posters in the shown out. So their crews throw light up Orpheus medallion bees, three different types of doubloons and four foot long stuffed dragons. Yeah,

George:
the blooms are one of the things that people I want badly So when they throw man, people scatter.

Lisa:
Yeah, it says notable floats included Dolly Trolly, the horse drawn bus that was used in the opening of Hello Dolly! With Barbra Streisand. There’s also the Smoking Mary, a six unit float that looks like a steam locomotive, and everyone loves the three unit 139 foot Orpheus, 11th on float, the first carnival float to use extensive fiber optic lighting.

George:
So sad note. This year. The floats that were supposed to be attached and continues were not allowed to do that, because earlier in the week, somebody fell off of one of the floats that was attached and unfortunately, were run over and killed. So they made the rest of the parade or the rest of the days disconnected and run separately.

Lisa:
Yeah, because the driver from couldn’t see all the way back there, And that crew has 1500 male female writers and 38 floats. So we’ll post pictures of that. But it was really beautiful. So we canceled our dinner plans, which I was kind of glad that we did because, well oh, we had stopped when we were walking on the way to the Braves. I completely forgot about Mahoney’s.

I just said, Let’s just stop him for a drink and get like some chicken fingers. You know, Just like a little something to tide is over because we have dinner reservations. So we went into this place called Mahoney’s. It was jackpot. Yeah. So we got these. What were they called? Some kind of fries that were smothered in like a pull pour in some kind of gravy. And that was good. And then I was like, Literally, I don’t want that much. I just want to get something, you know, because we’re not gonna eat for, like, 4.5 more hours.

George:
We just got something to hold us over. So we got some chicken fingers

Lisa:
And they were, like, the best chicken fingers I ever had. I don’t know why they were so good. It was breading or something.

George:
It was just really good. And there, honey mustard, that’s it was incredible.

Lisa:
And so then we see this kid and he’s eating these things. I’m like, What is that? Dernier fries. Well, couldn’t not get the binary fries then after that and they were incredible. My daughter told you that she felt like been years. Tasted like funnel cakes, and this instant they kind of were like funnel cakes because they just did him like strings, like Long French fries, almost like French fries. And then they’re covered in powdered sugar and served with like a warm chocolate sauce on

George:
A homemade chocolate dipping sauce.

Lisa:
Everything they make up, only Jesus who made the bartender they’re going was really good. That had a really good craft cocktails. I don’t even remember the name of the thing. I had made it for me and I had to read the menu. There was just so many options, but they’re known for ball boys, and we wanted to go back there. We just we just ran out of time. We could have just eaten our way.

George:
We went back the night we went back, that they were already closed.

Lisa:
Yeah, it was already too late,

George:
But awesome food, great drinks, fantastic service.

Lisa:
Yes, that’s why Well, that’s why we can’t star general reservations because we weren’t that hungry. So I tried to come home early. That and I think we were just, like, really good, because we’re saving ourselves up for fat Tuesday that we met like our neighbors at the RV resort that night which said, Oh, hey. Well, you know, we’re gonna grab one more cocktail and next. You know, we just had such a great conversation with them.

Very interesting. Yeah, really nice farm. Yeah, he was a refer a fireman and owns a medical clinics in Florida. And we just ended up talking to, like, 3:30 in the morning. So we’re like, Why are we staying up so late? But we part of what we love about our being is the people that you meet Just really great. Interesting, nice people.

George:
All walks of life. Yeah, just everybody has the same mentality because you’re doing the same thing. Not everybody can sit in a small little tiny house and drive around the country and enjoy it. Yeah, so we always kind of meet like minded people, but there’s it’s so diverse and so interesting. And that is definitely one of the things that we love about our being.

Lisa:
Yeah, Yeah, for sure. Then we did fat Tuesday, which we did. The whole Belk. Anything pretty much slept all day preparing ourselves for fat Tuesday because we do not want to make the mistake of not being ready and making it till midnight.

George:
Well, one of us doesn’t know how to pace ourselves so way it decided to sleep in Be good rest eat good so that we could enjoy the whole balcony experience and stay up till midnight so we can see the closing of the street. We’ll talk about that in a minute. But Fat Tuesday was excellent again. Burn bourbon, cowboy balcony. Great service. The staff There was fantastic. Big shot out to Sharon. She she was my contact and she just made sure that

Lisa:
everything was really good.

George:
Bridget was also awesome.

Lisa:
Yeah, we enjoy fat use a and threw away all over these. One thing I loved about Bourbon Cowboy to is again We just met the most interesting people. There’s people from California. There’s people from Texas. There was a guy from the Dominican Republic. There were, or New York people, somebody from Saginaw, Michigan. I couldn’t believe it from my own old hometown was there, so we met just all kinds of people.

Everybody was super nice and no, no incidents. There was really, really good time made. New friends friend him on Facebook and a lot of other people just traveled and enjoy traveling. So yes, midnight on statues. A everything supposed to shut down.

They call it the cleanse. And the bartender was telling me that they just basically clear the streets at the police. All the police come through. They say it’s like all the state troopers of everybody that’s come into town to manage Marta girl. Then kind of is like, escorted out.

And they just go all the way down Bourbon Street with all their police cars and their horses. Any I swear to God, when I was here 20 years ago, they have the street sweepers come behind them. But there was no street.

George:
Yeah, that is that They didn’t do that because I had heard about that 1,000,000 times. It was kind of I wanted to see it experience that, but they call it closing on the street. But a minute assumes the police pass. The party started a gun, but for me, it was really cool because I was a mounted police officer for three years and watching the horses come by, it’s, you know, to me, it was pretty cool.

Lisa:
Yeah, yeah, so that I was That was That was a really good night. who we So we walked home. So there’s things we love, things we don’t love about New Orleans. And we found some things that we don’t love. Like one of my daughter getting pick pocketed.

Then So we’re on our way back to our RV resort, and we know that the RV resort is in a little bit of, ah, sketchy area like like 2 to 3 blocks surrounding the RV resort. You probably shouldn’t walk there alone at night, and we knew that. But with Mardi Gras, I mean, the ubers were so backed up, it was super hard. So we decided, you know, I was gonna walk home. It’s fine. There’s a lot of people out. I was like 12 30.

George:
But that part and we kind of realized this now part of our I guess, false sense of security for another term is that when you leave Bourbon Street, you leave with a crowd. You know your people are everybody’s walking in different directions, says you’re walking home, were walking with the crowd, and when you get to the next block, a few people break off and then the next block, a few more people break off.

Well, by the time we got to the main strip, which is a block away from the RV resort, then it’s just Lisa and I. And that’s the shadiest part of the walk. So we’re walking back to the RV Resort where? On that block now. And what we can see the resort and go ahead, tell me.

Lisa:
Well, then we see the blue lights were like, Oh, my gosh, that’s right in front of our resort. And then George is like, Oh, look, there’s yellow crime scene tape. We’re like, Oh, gosh, great. What’s that? And the cops are going Turn around, turn around. And I was like, What?

That we’re going to the RV resort, like, literally right there, like stop so that please come walking over to us or like you’re walking on the crime scene and we look down there like there’s blood right there on the ground were like Okay, wait, that girl, this video.

And then I’m thinking to myself, your at a crime scene in front of the place that we need to go and you want us to go walking all the way. We almost had to go walk all the way around a city block to get to our door like we literally had to go,

George:
which was just feet away from us.

Lisa:
Yeah, looks like three blocks because it was, like, down the block to get back up over like a big, giant square. So far So they were like, what? We’re just gonna take you in our in our in our car. So they literally drove us around the block and dropped us off.

And apparently somebody had been stabbed right there, so that was a little bit scary and kind of an eye opener. And it’s one of those things when you’re traveling, you always you know, I’m always preaching to the kids. You need to be aware of your surroundings, and you need to know that you’re in a strange place, and then we just I think we just sort of we got a little bit complacent, like I just was there so many people.

George:
yes and no. And here’s why I say that Lisa can attest to this. The old cop it means is still in me. I can’t sit in a restaurant unless I’m facing the door. I can’t sit with my back to the door there started. Um, I always catch things, and she’s like, How did you see that? Because, I don’t know. It’s just occupational hazard. I guess. I’m always vigilant of everything going around around me.

I cannot honestly tell you that for this whole week I never felt unsafe or sketchy I felt very safe. I felt very comfortable walking everywhere. With that we walked. But yes, it is a little That’s what they keep telling us. And obviously, yes, that guy got stabbed right in front of our RV resort. So the bottom line is, just use your head. You know, be aware of your surroundings. If something doesn’t feel right, don’t do it around. Getting over whatever.

Lisa:
Yeah, the police said, you know, definitely just mover out of this area, he said, You’re so you’re totally safe inside the resort and there is a 24 hour security guard I’ve never felt unsafe inside of here. There’s these, like, really big, hard barbwire things. The whole place is surrounded by a wall and security cameras and gates and stuff like that. I mean, so I feel safe in here.

George:
Oh, yeah, absolutely. They do a great job of, you know, that there’s a security guard at the gate all night. The gates always closed. Yeah, So I have no issues with the RV resort. It’s just it is what it is. You’re in a city and you’re in the middle of the city.

Lisa:
Yeah. So let’s talk about the RV resort really quick. We love the location of it. It’s got a great little pool on a hot tub. It was really too cold this time to use it. Since our our hot water heater isn’t working on RV right now, we use the bathrooms every single time for showers.

There was really nice and clean like they were, like individual, whole entire bathroom to go in so we could go in. George and I could go in together and get ready and save a little bit of time.

George:
So we’re not hogging up.

Lisa:
Yes, So that was nice. We didn’t even use the workout facilities or anything, but those are all available here to laundry facilities. It was all really nice, but I mean, it’s loud.

We have a white noise maker and we sleep right through. But there’s sirens, especially during Mardi Gras like 24 7 I swear, and you can hear the music going and the people partying in the streets like it’s. It was weird, almost like a ghost town this morning when we finally got up because everything was gone. So I think experiencing New Orleans when it’s not murder grow would be completely different. Different?

George:
Yeah, carries to come back another time when

Lisa:
it’s not Mardi Gras

George:
body grow just passing through

Lisa:
well today, since we could finally get around, we actually got a chance that we went toe uptown and they call it uptown into the Garden District area. And we took a trolley car. That was kind of cool experience,

George:
really quiet, really enjoyed that.

Lisa:
I was $3 for all day riding the trolley. And so keep cable car

George:
No, no, it’s a trolley cable cars San Francisco, but it’s on cable. No, that’s a trolley. It’s electric. Cable car is actually pulled by a cable.

Lisa
There you go you’re learning for the day. The other useless fact. So we went on the trolley and we got to see all the mansions and posting pictures of and being real in real estate. I just love looking at the architecture and the different buildings in the landscaping. And then we went to two lane. We went to the university and we walked through there.

George:
Beautiful campus. Gorgeous campus. Yeah, kudos to 2 to lane knows on and we only walked like 1/4 of it. That is a massive campus.

Lisa:
Yeah. I was really big

George:
I was curious that I wanted to see the stadium. We didn’t even get close to it.

Lisa:
Yes, and it was, like, very grand. Everything was very kind of reminded me like Harbor University, Michigan. I’ve been to those campuses with the big old buildings and big open green space in the middle is really, really nice. Yeah, I went

George:
to Harvard. E think it was on a Saturday?

Lisa:
So that was fun it And then we had another great restaurant. I’m getting really, really good at Google stalking restaurants. And we went to this place called The Red Dog Diner. And I tell you what that is another place that we could have gone back, like 100 times. Their menu is so diverse.

George:
If you are in New Orleans, go to the Red Dog Diner. You will not be disappointed.

Lisa:
Oh, yeah. I mean, I had this. What was the name of my sandwich? Uh, I don’t know. What a ham and finish. I didn’t take a picture of the menu, but what it busted in the show notes. But definitely the Red Dog Diner was great. And they have, uh, like a little bit. Outdoor seating was a little chillier today, so we sat inside.

George:
It’s a quaint little part of New Orleans that we have never been to. And I really enjoyed it. I would I think we could have spent a little more time going to all the shops and walking around.

Lisa:
There were so many restaurants in those, like, three blocks that were that would be a great place to do the stop in just one bite at each place because there was a lot of different options and all of them looked really good. But even ah, Rupert, our driver said that we did great with the Red Dog Diner.

So anything else you could think of was wrap it up, I guess things that we loved about New Orleans, who loved the diversity of all the people that I think is my very first thing that I loved is just like I just felt like there wasn’t like, people that were racist or there, you know, I was just like

George:
it didn’t feel racist.

Lisa:
It was just such a mix of everybody. Everybody was together, you know. I love that. And there wasn’t a bunch of politics and crap. There was those Jesus, people which are malaria’s. The other, like standing up there preaching the word of the Lord on Bourbon Street, trying todo centers like, kind of like free free speech at its best right there.

George:
Everybody’s got their mission.

Lisa:
Yeah, so we love the atmosphere of just music from different place, a different place and shopping and stopping in all these little shops and the different restaurants.

George:
every everywhere you walk in, they make you feel welcome. And you don’t feel like a local like if you walked any any little bar that you walk into. It’s almost like they know you love that.

Lisa:
Yeah, there’s a lot of things to do that way. Didn’t even make it to the casino way have never done any of the tours. Paddleboats Way rode the trolley cars today But there’s museums and all this kind of stuff. We haven’t done any of those things.

Which could be like a completely different trip. I love the architecture’s. It’s interesting my daughters, that it’s like New York City, met Charleston and had a baby, and that’s what New Orleans is like. And it does really feel that way. There’s a lot of similar architecture and feeling like, almost like the little single homes and the oak trees and the Spanish moss. But then there’s a big, like

George:
holdings and high rises. Yeah, like a mix. There’s a couple blocks down town that I grew up in New York. I used to go into the city all the time, so there’s a couple of blocks where you turn, and also you instantly get a New York City feel, So that was pretty cool. That was a good call on Lawrence part.

Lisa:
Yeah, we I love the location of the RV Resort like we love that we can bring RV here and be close. There’s a million hotels to stay at an Airbnbs. Everybody has their own thing, but I really love We could just kind of bring all of our stuff and is a great like stopover place. And if you’re traveling across 10

George:
yes, if your driving across and the location is fantastic, I’m talking from the driver’s point of view. You’re right off the highway, it’s a couple turns and you’re in the RV resort. The streets are very narrow, but if you have ah, we have a GPS that is dedicated to an RV. So you put in all your specifics of your RV, and it’ll guide you in the best route possible. So it kind of routed us a little bit out of the way, but it made it super easy.

But it was really three or four turns off the highway and we’re here. And tomorrow when we leave, it will be. I think it’s too turns and we’re on the highway. Were gone. Great location.

Lisa:
Yeah, yeah, we love the food and drink prices are very reasonable. And we had a lot of great restaurant experiences,

George:
more so this time than last time.

Lisa:
Way just kind of tried more places because

George:
we had more time.

Lisa:
Yeah, we’re here for a whole week earlier for a weekend things we don’t love the pickpocket thing that really sucked. George’s friend said he had message Georgian and seen that our daughter had gotten her phone stolen.

And he said his daughter got her phone stolen. They called the police. They said, in a matter of 30 minutes, Ah, 100 people had reported their phones have been taken, so I mean, it was definitely a thing.

George:
And from what? My what? The police had told my buddy’s daughter was, that they’re not necessarily pick pocketing you for your phone’s. Yes, they’ll sell your phones, do whatever, but they will hack, um, and look for your personal information.

So be very, very careful when you’re down here. And if you do get your phones, though, and be very aware of your debit card credit card. If you have that information on your phone, just keep an eye on it and make sure that they don’t hack you.

Lisa:
way. Have we bought this? Because when we went to Rome, it was the same with the pick markets and people like that. I mean, it’s every big city.

You have to be alert and have we have a special travel bag that has anti pick-pocketing things that have like extra latches on them and stuff like that, so definitely recommend investing in those. Also, my husband ware a belt. It’s like a waste band

George:
It’s like a way span,

Lisa:
like a waistband that goes underneath your clothes and your phone in your wallet.

George:
I can fit my phone, my wallet. I could put a bunch of stuff under there, and there’s no way they can get to it without me. You know, like I’m getting molested.

Lisa:
Yeah, because it’s like a belt on the inside. And then I wore my fanny pack and loved that we don’t like. It’s very difficult to get around during murder gras because of all the trade roads being closed. And right now there’s this, like hotel that was a hard

George:
The hard rock Collapsed

Lisa:
Collapsed and is closed on part of Canal Street, right? Yeah, Canal Street. And I mean, that was just like a whole nother story, that crazy building that class that house Caro’s at. So we don’t love that like today, getting around with one million times easier since Mardi Gras ended. And so I think I don’t regular day. It will be perfectly easy. And to get around

George:
with uber ride, for example, the uber ride that we took today from our location took us five minutes. The other day. We did the same exact uber ride, and it probably took us. It took me 30 to 40 minutes to get five minutes away to give you a perspective.

Lisa:
Yeah. So also during Mardi Gras, like, I tried to get some reservations at some really like higher end go to restaurants, and that was also difficult.

Geroge:
There’s so many people here. So if you don’t think in advance and book in advance, you know, every restaurant was available If you wanted to eat dinner at nine o’clock, that’s too late for us. I guess part of it is our fault. We should have made reservations as soon as we got here. But that’s okay.

Lisa:
You’re probably before we came, actually, But then what? We like to go with flows Way did plenty fine with places that we found super happy. And then by last one, 24/7 there are sirens going, especially during the praise, because they clear the routes with the with the sirens. And I’m like, Oh, my God, these sirens all day going on and on,

George:
siren, you know, with the number of people that are here, there’s always gonna be something going on, but the sirens are always going. The RV resort is right by the highways. A lot of times they’ll take the highway to cut across town. And we’re unfortunately right underneath.

Lisa:
Yeah, so I mean, if we didn’t have that white noise maker, I probably like, really exhausted say that So overall, it’s been a great trip. We talked about it today, whether or not we would come back next year or we’re not. Is this a do over?

And we did it last year and we did it this year, and we feel like we seem we’ve came with clean reconquered. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you don’t really even, I think we underestimate the amount of stamina that it takes to really. You walk around all day and drink all day and party all day and just sightseeing all of that. But it’s

George:
all worth it. And it was a lot of fun, but we’ve done it two years in a row, and there’s so many other things to see and do. We will be back. But not next year.

Maybe take a little break, we’ll find something else to do. Otherwise we’ll lose. Your listeners will be talking about the same thing,

Lisa:
so that’s it will wrap it up, and we’ll put all of these places that we went in. The show notes. Check it out. If you have any questions, feel free to contact Center Instagram at Rview podcast or Rview from the Road is George’s Instagram or you can give me at [email protected] and our next stop is Disney Yes!

George:
The pottery to Disney!

Lisa:
before we go to pot fast in Orlando, we’re gonna hit Disney for a few days because we didn’t want to drive all the way back up. So we will fill you in on.

Geroge:
So stay tuned for Disney!

Lisa:
of adult trip to Disney next. Have a great week, guys. thanks guys!