Wednesday 12th October

Today we walked along five blocks to Louis Armstrong park where we sat and had an iced coffee whilst a rucksack full of laundry was being washed and dried. It is very hot but pleasant if you can find some shade. We then returned to Babana Courtyard and went to a local shop for a Po-Boy sandwich for lunch. These take their name from the sandwiches some philanthropists handed out to strikers on the railroad stike - 'Here's another poor boy'. We had been told that they were very good from this shop and there were! A hot French loaf with salad and loads of deep fried, battered prawns - delicious and undoubtedly very fattening! It was quite an experience as the shop was rather like a very busy Chinese take away and everyone was hanging around waiting for their food - all locals and no Americans or tourists. 

We just had time to consume our po-boy before our lift came to take us on a small boat swamp trip. We had a 35 minute drive east from the centre of New Orleans across one of the longest bridges in the world (23 miles) to Honey Island Swamp. It was very interesting seeing the differences between canal, river, bayou and slips as well as the wildlife; alligators, wild hog, golden orb spider, various egrets, kingfishers and herons. The Spanish Moss hanging on the trees sometimes gave the place an other worldly feeling. We had nearly 2 hours on the boat before returning in the minibus.

We then decided to walk down Bourbon Street, which at our end was very quiet and residential before becoming noisy, glitzy and full of tourists. We decided to eat up on a balcony so we could see the world go by, including a half naked woman with a parasol offering pictures for tips! We then ended up at the only place on Bourbon St that appeared to be playing jazz as opposed to cover bands and pop. We went to Maison Bourbon who had an excellent band playing traditional jazz standards; they were all really good musicians and the place was only half full!

Thursday 13th October

Having had a lateish night last night we decided to get a 3 dollar day pass for the trams and went down to the ferry across the murky waters of the Misissippi to Algiers Point which has some nice old buildings built after a catastrophic fire in 1895 which destroyed much of New Orleans. We went on several trams and stopped for some lunch near the French Market before returning home. We are going out to Loius Armstrong park shortly as rumour has it that there is music there this evening!