One part travel blog. One part nerdy history lesson.

Day: December 30, 2021

Day 7 – Jazz Museum, Voodoo Museum and lots of Covid closures

Today we headed out in search of coffee because the free coffee in the lobby is terrible and weak…and the espresso machine for the pay shop inside the hotel was broken… so along our walk back to the French Quarter we found a PJs coffee. I got a cold brew, Kegan got his normal espresso and Norah got a frozen hot chocolate which was straight syrup lol. So… she had energy for walking around to say the least ha.

We walked through the French Market.. tons of shops and vendors. Lots of food it looked like would be available around lunchtime.
Our first stop for the day was the New Orleans Jazz Museum at the Old US Mint
The US Mint was built in 1835. It was seized by the confederates during the Civil War and the building was used to mint confederate money. When it was recovered by federal troops in 1862, they hung the man in charge- William Mumford. It stopped being used as a mint in 1909, then it was a prison, then a Coast Guard headquarters… now… a museum.
They had a few neat artifacts from the building as a mint on display
This 1868 coin press was built in Philadelphia, used to mint circulating and proof coins in San Francisco until 1974, now on display in New Orleans. It’s travelled to all the mints except Denver lol
The other half of the first floor was dedicated to Jazz music.
They had a photo gallery from Rick Olivier of various New Orleans musicians. I like this one of Art Neville showing him as a Trekkie. Apparently he was a huge fan of Star Trek…and this one below of Mannie Fresh, a rapper from New Orleans who rapped with Hot Boys, Lil Wayne, Juvenile, Big Tymers.. and also did some solo stuff.

Upstairs was an exhibit on Louis Prima, a Jazz and big band leader from the Tremé neighborhood of New Orleans.

I have a few more vinyl records to find in my searching
They also had these old cutouts of the Preservation Hall Band Members

Preservation Hall is a jazz institution of New Orleans. It was started in the 1960s by Allen and Sandra Jaffe- it was truly the first integrated black and white music venue in the south during segregation. Sandra Jaffe was even arrested once for violating segregation laws… They were from Philadelphia… but were on a grand adventure to find a place to settle, then went as far as Mexico City experiencing other culture and cities… but when they got to New Orleans, they fell in love with the culture and beauty and decided this was the spot for them. They rented the small space from a man who was letting some Jazz musicians play there in the evening, most of whom were elderly musicians from the Jazz era… and Allen Jaffe formalized the venue as Preservation Hall to preserve the jazz legacy and educate the next generation on the genre.

Allen Jaffe died in the 1987, but Sandra Jaffe just died Monday Dec 27th…

Their son Ben Jaffe runs the Hall now and plays Sousaphone in the jazz band. They travel and educate on New Orleans Jazz around the world and they hold shows at the Hall most days. If you want to learn more about this band and venue, I highly recommend a documentary called A Tuba to Cuba. Great film.

There was a tradition post-Katrina of a created festival called “ChazFest” in someone’s backyard… and the museum had tons of photos of present day musicians in the area taking photos in front of a wallpaper backdrop. They did this for 5 years, so there was quite the collection of candid photos in a gallery. They also had the wallpaper from one year on the wall, so you could take your own portrait. Of course, Norah was all about that.
The original cornet from the Colored Waif’s Home where Louis Armstrong learned to play music as a young boy.
This was a piano from Fats Domino’s house. His house was flooded in Katrina and the piano was completely destroyed with mold, mildew, water damage, etc. A restoration project that took apart every piece of the piano and cleaned, fixed, reassembled and even re-lacquered the piano to preserve what they could.

There was an amazing painting gallery by James Michapoulos of famous New Orleans musicians

After leaving the museum, we headed north into the Faubourg Marigny neighborhood.

This tree caught all of our attention. The roots had taken over the entire square that was available. I’ve never seen anything like that.
There is a marker for the site of the slave pen that existed here prior to the end of the Civil War. If you’ve ever seen the movie 12 Years A Slave, it was based on the true story of a free black man, Solomon Northup, who was sold into slavery and spent 12 years fighting for freedom.

Now it was time for lunch. I found a Dim Sum restaurant open for lunch online… so that was our destination.

Except…they were closed today… lol

So… on we went, looking for something else that looked good and was open at 11am ish for lunch. We ended up killing some time looking through some various shops along the street.

We eventually stumbled on a restaurant that said they opened at 11:30… and it looked like from Google that they had some dim sum type appetizers.. so we decided to wait. 11:30 came and it was still dark. Darn. 11:35, still standing on the sidewalk, hoping they were just a little late to the game… I’m writing a work email and trying to find another restaurant and the lights pop on and the hostess gets dropped off out front. Just running a bit behind. Woohoo!

The food was EXCELLENT. Highly recommend. We just ordered a bunch of small plates for all 3 of us and shared.

After lunch, our walking continued, on towards the LaLaurie Mansion. If you’ve ever seen the season of American Horror Story on New Orleans and Voodoo, then you are familiar with Madame LaLaurie and her physician husband, who kept slaves in their attic and tortured them to within an inch of their lives. Some eyewitness accounts said their eyes were gouged out, skin flayed open…and other way worse things I won’t write here in case someone reading is squeamish. A true house of horrors. A fire broke out and when the firemen discovered the slaves in the attic, the rage of the town turned on the lady, and 4,000 townspeople rioted and destroyed her house, but she fled with her driver… never to be heard of again. Some say she went to Paris… the world may never know.

The Beauregard-Keyes Mansion and gardens, owned by Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard- the general who ordered the first shots fired of the Civil War at Ft. Sumpter, South Carolina in 1861.
Across the street is the oldest building in the city, built in 1734- the Old Ursuline Convent.

We had a 2pm Escape Game room booked- this time Prison Break. We started the room separated in 2 different cells, and we had to work together to unlock our cells, then escape the common area outside of the cells, then navigate the boiler room to find the secret hatch to the wardens office, then clear 3-4 puzzles to eventually escape.

We did it! With only like 13 minutes left. We really didn’t think we were going to make it. ha We got stuck for a long while on one puzzle that we had right… but it was so poorly written, in such a dark room, it took us a good 10-15 minutes to finally get it solved. Then we crawled through a tunnel to the last room and we both went…oh no… there’s more. We’re never going to make it. ha But…in the end we did. and got this fantastic picture of Norah acting afterward. ha

Next, I wanted to check out the Pharmacy Museum… thought that would be a cool museum to walk through, so we hoofed it that direction, but when we arrived….

You guessed it, Covid. lol They are closed, likely due to staffing issues related to Covid.
Next we were supposed to see a show at Preservation Hall, but they are closed for Covid as well. I assume even if not for Covid, they would have been closed for the funeral of Sandra Jaffe anyway. Next time, Preservation Hall.
With our afternoon greatly opening up, we wandered towards the Voodoo Museum. It was such a tiny little place- total tourist scam. ha but The lady was nice- gave Norah a free little travel monopoly game… but I’m fairly certain she stole $2 of our change knowingly… I’m not fighting anyone over $2. lol and I’m sure thats what people like that count on.
Lastly, the last sight marked on my map was Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop- now a very popular bar on Bourbon Street. Its one of the oldest surviving structures in New Orleans- built around 1770. Supposedly once owned by the pirate Jean Lafitte.
Around the corner, there was a lady set up on a quiet side street with a deck of tarot. Norah had mentioned finding the gypsy lady in Jackson Square on our way back to the hotel if she was still there… so this quiet side street lady seemed like a better choice. And turns out she did palm readings which Norah was super excited about. This lady was very good… everything she said was spot on to our lives and Norah’s life. Now, of course, its all a little vague…. but this lady had me questioning my sanity a bit. ha Keeping in mind, she doesn’t have a clue who we are and we’ve not said hardly anything around her- she says Norah is incredibly smart, she will get her business acumen from her mother…she will have an inheritance to make her comfortable, she has female teachers, she lost a female family member in the past- the “matriarch” she says- which is what I always say about Kegan’s Grandma Sharon- she was the matriarch glue that held everything together. Then she said “you’ll be a baby until you die”..which is exactly what I always say to Norah. “You’ll always be my baby, even when you’re 40, you’re still my baby.” Now again, generic I’m sure… lots of parents say that…but her phrasing was just like things we often say. She also told Norah most girls wont be able to handle her spirit and to prepare for that…and she told her to always tell her parents things she dreams so we can help decipher the meanings. She rattled off a bunch of other stuff…but in the end I was like DANG, this lady is good at this. lol
Our next stop was the Caricature guy in the square. For two days, every time we pass there is a line for drawings and I always have told her “later…” but this was “later” ha it was likely the last time we’d be by here….so we waited.
Norah made friends with a 14 year old from Texas and they showed each other their cats back home. lol
His airbrush machine was broken, so he could only do black and white today…. but that’s OK. Norah was thrilled. ha

We walked back to the hotel and put on the 3rd Matrix movie- Matrix Revolutions while we waited for our 8:45pm dinner reservations at Saba. About halfway through we notice this:

Poor thing couldn’t hack it and needed a power nap for an hour before dinner. (giant arm bruise from running into the bathroom door knob on Christmas Eve. lol)

When it was time, we grabbed an Uber way out to the Garden District to the restaurant. Its just a pretty drive all the way out there with million dollar homes all along the street for miles and miles. The housing density here is so crazy. every house is 4 feet from the next one.

Norah asked the waitress if they had any mock-tails. ha Turns out they had 3. She chose the Pineapple Shrub…then proceeded to drink one drink of it because it was too herby. *eyeroll*
We ordered a Blue Crab Hummus and a roasted beet spread as starters and we were so hungry, I forgot to photograph it.
I had the short ribs on couscous
Kegan had the market fish which was a Spotted Trout on creamy grits.
Norah had a pita pizza from the kid’s menu. For dessert she chose the dark chocolate sorbet with mint. It was so rich…. so good.
Kegan had the Pecan baklava
I had a milk custard with a satsuma/rose/orchid gel on top. It was so light and fabulous. It was a perfect end to a very good meal.

Overall, we had SUCH high expectations after Shaya…. that I was fully expecting more “wow”… and everything really was great. Objectively- perfectly cooked, great flavors… but I still preferred Shaya better. Their menu was more robust, the portions a little larger, the price a bit lower… but both are great, great restaurants.

We caught an Uber back downtown and finished up our Matrix movie before bed. Now Norah is fully prepared to watch the new Matrix Resurrection film for our New Year’s Eve in-room party evening 🙂

Tomorrow, we’ll head out east of the city to Chalmette to the battlefield of the Battle of New Orleans and see the Lower 9th ward and some other east end points of interest.

Day 6 – Jackson Square, Cabildo, Presbytère and more French Quarter

Today started out by trekking it across downtown to the other side of the French Quarter. We were headed towards Jackson Square… and I knew there was the original Cafe Du Monde across the street at the French Market…so I thought if nothing really opens until 9, if we get there around 8:30 or so… we shouldn’t have too much of a wait.

HA. Nope. The line stretched all the way down the block. Then we found out there was another line on the other side of the building for take away… and it was just as long. ha Craziness. BUT… its Cafe Du Monde. You have to get coffee and beignets once if you’re in New Orleans, right? So we waited.

Coffee itself came to North America via New Orleans in the mid-1700s. It was grown in some French West Indies colonies in the 1720s, and French settlers brought coffee with them as they settled the Mississippi river area. During the Civil War, coffee was scarce, and people started grinding up chicory roots- the root of the lettuce Endive into the brew to give it more flavor and body and an almost chocolate quality to the coffee.

Cafe Du Monde has been open 7 days a week, 24 hours a day at this location at the French Market since 1862. The French Market location itself stretches back prior to European settlers in New Orleans, the Choctaw Indians used to use this high dirt natural levee at the bend of the Mississippi to trade goods with the river traffic. Then French settlers used this area to trade and sell produce and dairy and then in 1718, the city of New Orleans was officially founded here.

Ended up taking us about 45 minutes to order and get our food…The Beignets were very good. Basically a doughy funnel cake. I wore black. ha Not a good combo with all the powdered sugar… and the wind was blowing in so strong from some incoming rain that I was getting other people’s powder sugar on me. ha The coffee…. meh… I’m so picky about my coffee and it has to be oily and strong… no acidity. A dark French Roast is my thing. The Cafe Au Lait was weak… Kegan said the same about his black coffee. The do have a no chicory French Roast coffee that if I end up by another cafe again, I’ll try that instead. I’m sure objectively, its great to most people. Just wasn’t my thing. However, Norah’s hot chocolate was spectacular. ha I’d order that again.

This Cafe Du Monde sat directly across the street from the prettiest and most famous plaza in New Orleans- Jackson Square.

Historically, it is significant because it was the Place d’Armes- or the weapons place- the center of the city. It is also the site of the signing of the Louisiana Purchase. The Spanish built the St. Louis church in the background in the late 1700s and the building to its left, The Cabildo in 1795. After General Andrew Jackson won the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, the square was renamed in his honor as the savior of New Orleans. The equestrian statue went in in the 1850s.

We were first headed to the Cabildo, the actual building where the Louisiana Purchase was signed. Today it is part of the Louisiana State Museum and houses various historical items on display.

There was a great display of historic Jazz items.

Tuba Fats’ Sousaphone
Vintage tableware from the Roosevelt Hotel from 1950. The Roosevelt, where we stayed earlier this week, used to host various big bands in the ballrooms and has always hosted fancy dinners
This was so interesting! Antoine’s, that we ate at last night- and had the Oyster’s Rockefeller- used to issue a postcard with each order of Oysters Rockefeller! How neat! If they were at 1.2 million orders by the 1946…image how many orders they are up to now!
There was an entire room dedicated to historic photographs of George Francois Mugnier
I loved this image of the French Market showing the old French butchers. We’ve walked along these same arched openings at the French Market…so I loved seeing this old photo of how it used to be.
Looks like Mardi Gras has always been the same zoo it is today 🙂

They had lots of items, paintings and artifacts from the Battle of New Orleans- more on that in a couple days when we visit the Chalmette Battlefield

Swords recovered from the battlefield
A painting of Andrew Jackson
A British plan of attack against the Americans. This was a drafted plan for their final attack that ultimately failed.
This giant oil painting of The Battle of New Orleans was about 16 feet across and 10 feet tall. Absolutely massive.
A coronation painting of Napoleon Bonaparte (Emperor Napoleon I) made by Gérard in 1805.
Napoleon’s death mask
Next we headed across the square to an identical building on the other side of the church- The Presbytère. They had an exhibit dedicated to the causes, effects and science of Hurricane Katrina. Basically tying in global warming, hurricane science, inadequate FEMA and local disaster preparedness, levee design and maintenance issues and the issue of people not following instruction of evacuation. It demonstrated that there was no one single cause for the disaster, but human components exacerbating a natural disaster.
These spray-painted crosses because a familiar sign in New Orleans after the floods. The top number was the Date/Time the rescue team left the structure, the left side the Rescue Team that checked the structure, the right side- the hazards in the structure, the bottom- the # of live and dead victims and pets found in the structure.
A fitting shirt asking the government to focus on domestic works projects like levees that the Army Corp of Engineers never finished in 20 years… before fighting wars on the other side of the world.

There was so much more about Katrina in the exhibit, but I feel like everyone focuses so much on Hurricane Katrina as all they know about New Orleans…anything I’d write or photograph here has already been said or filmed so much better in any of the 100 documentaries on Katrina. My favorite was When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in 4 Acts by Spike Lee. It is on HBO Max. It was filmed in 2006 just after while clean up and resettlement was still going on. Still FEMA trailers lining every street and the culture of New Orleans still missing. It was powerful to watch. He even did a follow up documentary called If God is Willing and Da Creek Don’t Rise- revisiting the areas 5 years later.

The next exhibit was far more festive: The history of Mardi Gras.

After leaving The Presbytère, we took a walk down Pirate’s Alley, an alleyway with legend that famous pirate Jean Lafitte or his brother Pierre used to arranged meetings here. No actual evidence of this being true- but its hard to believe a pirate would be making back alley deals, literally in the alley outside the The Cabildo which held the prison at the time… but maybe its one of those hide in plain sight things.

William Faulkner rented a space in the alley in 1925 and wrote his first novel here.
St Anthony’s Gardens attached to St Louis cathedral.
A view down pirate’s alley
Jackson Square has a long history of tarot readings, palm readings and other rituals in the square- so only fitting Norah would get a tarot card reading from someone there. The vendor asked I not put her in the photos but that I could photograph the table.
The reader said Norah showed very “strong” cards for such a young girl. That she was going through a period of change… that she needed to trust herself, trust her abilities, don’t self-doubt so much… (pretty much what any preteen needs to hear, right?) I’m not sure what anything in Tarot “means”… but I did take a photo of the cards in case anyone has a Tarot background and cares to interpret Norah’s future 🙂

We continued walking along the waterfront on a walkway called the Moonwalk- named after Mayor Moon Landrieu that commissioned it to be built.

Instrument Men Fountain along the way
The Joan of Arc statue in the street median.
Well, this was our lunch destination. The Central Grocery – the birthplace and home of the Muffuletta sandwich. So that was disappointing. Their website said they were looking for a temporary location while their building had repairs done from Hurricane Ida in September…. but it looks like they never found that venue. Oh well, next trip.
Our next destination was Esoteric Occult Goods, an oddities shop…but it, too, was closed. I could only look through the door.
We did stop into Voodoo Authentica to see some voodoo related items.
We stopped by the Jean Lafitte National Park and were able to get a National Park stamp for Norah’s book while we visited. It had a lot of history of the Mississippi Delta region and the swamplands around New Orleans.
I didn’t know John James Audubon basically got his start as a wildlife artist drawing and painting birds from the Louisiana swamplands for his Birds of America series.

By now, we were really hungry… and a couple places we stopped all had 2 hour waits… so we walked back towards our hotel hoping to find something with decent reviews without a wait. We found Mr Ed’s Seafood House…and only a 10-15 minute wait. I really wanted raw oysters. When in NOLA, right? Can’t get them this fresh and good at home… We also decided we’d try Charbroiled oysters for the first time. I think it was a mistake to order them here…they were totally burnt and overdone.. but the fried seafood hit the spot and Norah’s kid’s shrimp basket was stellar too. We kept stealing shrimp from her plate and calling it shrimp tax lol.

Our next stop was The Escape Game to play their Heist room. Our game guide Eric the previous night booked us this private room for very cheap the following day… I was happy about it not costing and arm and a leg. lol

Of course we ESCAPED! We recovered a stolen Monet from the egotistical museum curator before he returned from a staff meeting and saved the day. These escape rooms really are the highlight of Norah’s life right now. Its amazing to watch her go through and solve some of the riddles that I’m sure adults struggle with. ha And I’d be lying if I said Kegan and I didn’t enjoy them, too… its a brain workout… but its a great sense of accomplishment to “beat” the game. We really do work well together… and usually its a good mix of all 3 of us figuring out various parts to win.

As we walked back, it started sprinkling on us… and just as we reached the last hotel intersection- it was pouring rain like this…. couldn’t have timed it better!

We hung out in the room for a couple hours and watched the 2nd Matrix movie- Matrix Reloaded. Norah was just as into #2 as #1.

We last minute booked another escape room at Escape My Room- our favorite place so far (the one with our game guide Laszlo). He was supposed to be off tonight, but when we walked into the Private investigators office, awaiting who would greet us this time- we heard a familiar voice- our man Laszlo had traded shifts and was there again! It was a great surprise. I’m sure all of the guides there are great… but we’re basically old friends at this point…ha

The room we booked for tonight was very different.. and we weren’t sure how we would like it… it was called Smuggler’s Den and it was only a 45 minute room instead of an hour…and….like 30 minutes of it happens in the PITCH BLACK DARK.

In the end, we escaped with 13 minutes to spare! Pretty good on a 45 minute room… we had some great teamwork…and Kegan really knocked this one out of the park. I don’t think I would have made it out on my own. Blindly feeling your way around a room for clues and items was totally different that the normal cerebral puzzles and visual clues, but Kegan was very methodical, sweeping the room around the perimeter and putting some texture items together way before I did. Norah was on “11” for the whole thing. I think the dark really freaked her out for a while. Every bump or nudge and she was like WHAT WAS THAT?? WHO’S THERE?? hahaha It was a little funny. She finally settled in about halfway through. She was so amped she was talking at extreme volume afterward. haha

Later after a walk back to the hotel, we ordered delivery Shake Shack from the shop down the street. It was so close, a guy literally walked it down to the hotel for us. haha No fancy dinner for us tonight- just good ole cheeseburgers and fries.

Tomorrow we’ll explore more of the French Quarter for the last day… and hit another Escape room….and dinner is a followup to Shaya- a booking at Saba, the newest restaurant in New Orleans by Chef Shaya. Since Shaya was one of our favorite meals EVER, we’re excited about that one and we don’t even know what is on the menu. ha