Last Full Day...

...In the "City That Care Forgot"! I am so sad that we will be leaving tomorrow. This is the most perfect city. Perhaps I would feel differently if I lived here? But, I don't think so. As it is, we only visit for a few days at a time. It never seems long enough to do and experience all that I want to do and experience. If JJ didn't have to get back to school I would seriously be thinking about changing our flight and seeing if we could stay a few more days. (Cindy makes a frowy face! Spoiled Princess 'til the end!)Richard and I got up early this morning to go on a Cemetery Tour. We went with the same group that did the Haunted Tour we took on Sunday night. What an experience. We toured the St. Louis Cemetery #1. It is a Catholic Cemetery and we learned about burial practices and heard more history of the city on our walking tour.


We got to see where Ernest Morial is buried. He was the first New Orleans Mayor of color. Right next to him is the grave of Marie Laveau. She was the "Voodoo Queen". She lived from 1801 - 1881, according to our tour guide, Renee.

This row in the cemetery has been restored to look as it did 100's of years ago. The St. Louis #1 Cemetary has been in existence since the late 1700's.

Because this was, and is, a Catholic Cemetery - the Protestant's had to be buried in a different area... Protestants to the back of the bus, as it were. Us Lutheran's aren't too sure how we feel about this! ha ha ha...

Here is a collage of just a few of the sites on our tour. Two of these graves date back to the late 1700's and early 1800's. Amazing that they are so well preserved. There is wonderful society, which our tour guide belongs to, called Save Our Cemeteries. Click HERE to find out more about them.

After our walking tour, we were hungry! John had stayed back at the hotel - so we came back to get him and walked down to Decatur St. to eat at one of our favorite New Orleans restaurants - The Crescent City Brewhouse. Richard and Cindy enjoyed a tall cold glass of Red Stallion beer and we ate probably the most healthy meal we've eaten since arriving in NOLA.

Richard had the SHRIMP SALAD. That was seared jumbo gulf shrimp, tossed with basil cream pesto, served with baby greens, tomatoes, crispy bacon, sweet onions and peanut vinaigrette.

Cindy enjoyed the GRILLED TUNA SALAD. It contained the freshest ahi tuna seared rare, tossed with mixed greens, tomatoes, red onion confit, cucumbers and avocados. Served with a creamy wasabi buttermilk dressing.

John had the BREWHOUSE RIBS which were served with a Ceasar Salad. They were so tender the meat was falling off the bone. (Picture turned out blurry, so it's not included here)

After lunch we walked to St. Louis Cathedral and lit a candle for Cindy's Mom, Sylvia. She died 22 years ago today. Although she never visited New Orleans, we are pretty sure she would have LOVED it here.

On our walk back to the hotel we stopped at the New Orleans Collection on Rue Royal. They have an amazing collection of original New Orleans photographs from the mid 1858 - 1861. Quite breathtaking.

Tonight we are eating at Bayona, which is Susan Spicer's restaurant. She is a famous chef here in N'awlins. After that we are meeting our new friend Christine from GumboYaYaBaby at Cafe Du Monde. She and Cindy met through blogging, and she was a great source of information to help us plan a fantastic trip to NOLA.

We saw that blogger is going to be down @ 8pm tonight Pacific Time, so wanted to post this now. If the opportunity presents itself, we will post again later tonight with our dinner and dessert photos!

Let the Good Times Roll!