Even in the rain New Orleans finds a way to occupy your time. Mass in the oldest cathedral in the United States. A ferry ride across the mighty Mississippi for a Muffaletta and beers on the other side, in Algiers. Aimless tramping through the raindrops around the French Quarter and through the old Market into the Marigny. Pounding through the rain again towards the first organ concert in the old Cathedral since Hurricane Katrina and stopping along the way at the “first skyscraper,” the cornstalk fence, the haunted house and the Lafitte’s blacksmith shop – again for a beer. Finding an old Uneeda Biscuit ad painted on the side of a building still legible after all these years. Wondering where that calliope music was coming from in the lower Quarter and trying to place the tune finally grinning when I figured out they were playing “Singing in the Rain.”
I never did figure out where it was coming from.
I could spend a week between Baton Rouge and New Orleans giving myself much more time to explore the less salacious – and often more beautiful – parts of town. I think so long as I avoid Bourbon Street, I’ll be OK. There’s plenty to see and do and experience but it does take a certain frame of mind to approach it on its own terms.