USA – the EAST

October 22

My last day in New Orleans when I spent the morning walking through a small section of the flood zone, the flood zone being basically everywhere north and north-east of the traditional tourist area by the river.

I’m so glad I did it but not because I have such happy news to report. I’m thinking it’s a story to tell with statistics. I’m leaving my opinions mostly out of this because I can’t think of how to express them cogently anyway, and I don’t even have statistics to share.

The picture on the left is from 2005, of the neighborhood I walked around. The pictures on the right are of the Ninth Ward where I did not walk, the bottom is from 2006 and the top is from 2010.

photos from the Sacrament Bee

Standing in the center of an intersection looking down the four streets.

There were no people on the streets except for the very occasional clutch of men hanging around, basically, and most of them were drinking beer.

I stayed primarily on the once commercial streets and just looked down into the residential blocks.

These are what some of the livable homes look like.

Looking out from under the freeway.

A decorated underpass.

For a mile or two around it was all like this. Abandoned and ruined commercial and residential buildings, empty lots, the occasional home patched up and painted.

I can’t imagine what would be required, how it could happen, to bring this community back to life. And not that all of New Orleans was in such fabulous shape before the floods.

I can’t imagine I think because of my own lack of imagination but I hope someone else can! I will add my thought that rebuilding a city below sea level strikes me as obviously imprudent. So then what?

Then I walked back to the Quarter for a most scrumptious New Orleans late lunch of roast pork, cheesy grits, and cole slaw, before heading out to the airport.

Fare thee well New Orleans!

Many of these wonderful old trees survived.

October 21

Here’s another map so you can be reminded of the Katrina floods.

Today I walked from the French Quarter west, following the river through the Quarter, the Warehouse & Arts district, and through the Garden district heading into Uptown. All of these neighborhoods stayed dry. I’m going to try to make it to a flooded area in the morning before catching my late afternoon flight back to Florida.

Here are more places in the neighborhood. These look newly refreshed and are all for sale. There are a Lot of places in the French Quarter for sale.

More. Check out the way they do those stoops.

This is the outside of the place where I’m staying in the 1300 block of Burgundy Street. The first time I said I was staying on BURgundy Street the person I was talking to looked confused and then said, oh yeah, BurGUNdy Street.

I was on a trolley today talking to the driver to see where I should get off and about one thing and another. ‘You’re not from around here, are you?’ asks the driver. ‘Right, I’m not from around here’ I reply. ‘But how do you know’ says he, ‘to say BurGUNdy?’. It’s like how you say Burgundy Street is a code, for being from ‘around here’ and being from ‘somewhere else’.

There are tons of rainbow flags around the Quarter (and I didn’t see one anywhere else) not yet rivaling the Castro or West Hollywood but still there’s a very present gay community.

And as many rainbow flags and as many American flags, there are twice as many New Orleans Saints flags. This town LOOOVES them some Saints.

Aww, kitty in the window. Kitty kitty, aww.

I had Such a walk today.

An old classic near Lafayette Square with a new linoleum floor. I haven’t got any pictures yet of the great little hexagon tile floors I remember so fondly because I’m just not seeing them.

A snap from the Warehouse & Arts district.

I didn’t go into any of the Galleries and Museums, I was on a mission to Walk and see how far I could get.

Two symbolic icons of New Orleans. Ol’ Satchmo and the George Rodrigue Blue Dog images.

Traveling through the Garden district, and remembering that it was not flooded, still there are many buildings in such bad shape I can’t imagine any chance for their repair.

I’m sure there are some serious zoning rules for the historic areas – like the size of a phone book, when a phone book was the size of a phone book. Kids today, they don’t know about a real phone book.

This is a good example of a more typical home in the Garden district.

Lafayette Cemetery, a must visit on the tourist trail.

I just checked on the map – after walking more than 5 miles I took the trolley half way home and then I walked the rest of the way and then I put my feet up!

October 19 and 20 2010

I tend to be disoriented when thinking about New Orleans. I’ve always got her sitting on the Gulf when actually that big body of water you see in all the tourist maps is to the north and it’s Lake Pontchartrain, a place we can all pronounce now since Katrina hit.

The commerce is mostly run on the Mississippi river which ends in the Gulf of Mexico many miles away.

On October 17th the power cord to my computer shorted out. oh NO, you Know I’m not going to be able to last very happily without my computer.

So when I arrived in New Orleans instead of going into town I took a taxi to the nearest Best Buy, paid a not-so-small fortune to get a power cord, and then took the bus…

The trolley started at a huge cemetery part of town. All the graves are above ground and all the monuments are huge to go with the whole theme of huge.

It was hot though, with the sun overhead so I didn’t roam around inside the cemeteries. I did have to take this picture. Odd Fellow’s Rest. Sounds like a fine place to be.

…to the trolley that goes into the French Quarter where my Couch Surfing host lives.

I like to mess around with public transportation when the timing works out, which in this case was not too bad and the sightseeing along the way was interesting.

My host lives behind that open door. What FUN! I’ll get a picture from the street as soon as I remember.

I went out for a neighborhood dinner just two blocks from the apartment. The meal was delicious, no surprise there. The restaurant was called Ports of Call, there was a big fish tank, they had fish on the wall, and on the menu – three burgers, three steaks, all with baked potato, and that’s it for choices. You could choose to get cheese or mushrooms on your meat or your potato.

Their most popular beverage was a Monsoon. Like a Hurricane they said, only better. People were coming through the whole time I was there ordering a Monsoon or two or three To Go. That’s right, in New Orleans you can order your booze To Go and drinking on the street is entirely legal.

I’m not a big night time wanderer especially in areas that aren’t busy. So I didn’t wander, I just walked to dinner. Here are some pictures from that short stroll.

It’s the next morning now. Meet my host Dennis and another guest who was there last night too. We all went together for breakfast. They both contributed very entertaining stories and ideas to a lively conversation and a grand time was had by all.

Hello!

One of the one thousand shots around the French Quarter.

Music. Everywhere.

Everywhere.

As noted by many: The Cathedral-Basilica of St. Louis King of France is the oldest Catholic cathedral in continual use in the United States.

It was oddly bright inside for a cathedral and then I realized it’s all painted white and there are many clear glass windows surrounding the balcony.

See the statue of the horseman. It’s Andrew Jackson centered in its place in Jackson Square. The inscription reads “The Union Must And Shall Be Preserved”. Not what I expected to read!

I walked on through the tourist stops in this area including Jackson Square and the French Market. I also walked by the casino, the River Walk, the aquarium, and plenty more. Oh man did I enjoy my late lunch of a cup of gumbo, an oyster po’boy, and a perfect draft beer.

This is the last authentic steamboat that tours the Mississippi (they say). It’s a two hour ride so you don’t get far but maybe on a hot day it’s a good way to catch a breeze.

Public Art, not always to everyone’s taste.

The x-rated section of Bourbon Street, an historic and well-attended part of the French Quarter, and honestly, it’s just not so great.

OK! I’m (pretty much) caught up with pictures having fallen behind when I couldn’t use the computer. Because of my over-the-top phone I could still get email, check the weather, find things. Excellent!