Trip to New Orleans
Yesterday Keegan, his friend Ashton and I went to New Orleans. To me New Orleans was the city of Hurricanes, .. cocktailwise ;) but I did manage to shoot a few pictures before the Hurricanes kicked into effect.
It started out with an impressive view on the swamps which surround the city. Unfortunately, there I had to take the pictures out of the car, as the overpass (locals call it spillway) didn't allow for stopping.
As the New Orleans skyline appeared at the horizon and I was thinking how I should ban it on a Photo, Keegon told me to wait until we passed a building which was blocking the view on the Super Dome. So I did and was rewarded with this amazing view on the city.
We left the car at a parking garage at the Mississippi river. We parked on the 5th level, which offered a good view on the city.
We walked through the French Quarter, the historic city center. Luckily the French Quarter survived almost undamaged from Katrina. Most of the French Quarter's architecture has been unchanged since the French and Spanish rule.
Our first stop was the Pat O'Brien's piano bar, where I learned that three Hurricanes are enough to get me a good buzz :) Several piano players played that night, often two of them together, as the bar has two pianos. Their impressively large repertoire was great enough that almost any request by the cheering audience could be fulfilled. Another specialty is that you get to keep the large Hurricane glasses if you don't return them at the bar. I took two of my glasses to bring home, one of them even survived the night.
After we left Pat O'Brien's, we went to the Antoine's restaurant, supposedly the oldest family-run restaurant in the US. Lucky us though, they don't have a dress code anymore :) Antoine's was awesome. The food, the ambiance and our waitor Jason. He had just got back from Iraq was the funniest waitor I ever had. He even gave us a tour through the restaurant afterwards, showing us all the different rooms and told us some about their history and which famous people ate there. Antoine's wasn't as lucky as the remaining French Quarter during Katrina. They lost their 25000 bottle wine cellar and the top story and some bottom story rooms were damaged and are still being rebuild.
(you can click on the pictures or here to find more)
It started out with an impressive view on the swamps which surround the city. Unfortunately, there I had to take the pictures out of the car, as the overpass (locals call it spillway) didn't allow for stopping.
As the New Orleans skyline appeared at the horizon and I was thinking how I should ban it on a Photo, Keegon told me to wait until we passed a building which was blocking the view on the Super Dome. So I did and was rewarded with this amazing view on the city.
We left the car at a parking garage at the Mississippi river. We parked on the 5th level, which offered a good view on the city.
We walked through the French Quarter, the historic city center. Luckily the French Quarter survived almost undamaged from Katrina. Most of the French Quarter's architecture has been unchanged since the French and Spanish rule.
Our first stop was the Pat O'Brien's piano bar, where I learned that three Hurricanes are enough to get me a good buzz :) Several piano players played that night, often two of them together, as the bar has two pianos. Their impressively large repertoire was great enough that almost any request by the cheering audience could be fulfilled. Another specialty is that you get to keep the large Hurricane glasses if you don't return them at the bar. I took two of my glasses to bring home, one of them even survived the night.
After we left Pat O'Brien's, we went to the Antoine's restaurant, supposedly the oldest family-run restaurant in the US. Lucky us though, they don't have a dress code anymore :) Antoine's was awesome. The food, the ambiance and our waitor Jason. He had just got back from Iraq was the funniest waitor I ever had. He even gave us a tour through the restaurant afterwards, showing us all the different rooms and told us some about their history and which famous people ate there. Antoine's wasn't as lucky as the remaining French Quarter during Katrina. They lost their 25000 bottle wine cellar and the top story and some bottom story rooms were damaged and are still being rebuild.
(you can click on the pictures or here to find more)