Day 16 - New Orleans / Bayou Airboat

Wednesday, June 21, 2023
Posted from: French Quarter RV Resort, New Orleans, LA
Miles driven: 50
Total trip miles: 3061

Today looks like another hot one. We are headed south of town to go on an airboat ride. 

Bridges on the way out of town.

We have never been on an airboat, so we thought this would be interesting to try. Outside of the city felt cooler and there was a nice breeze. 



There were LOTs of alligators! Likely because they feed them marshmallows and hotdogs.



Here is another airboat headed our direction. 



The area was actually very beautiful. It was like scenes in The Princess and the Frog. Matt pulled up the area on Google Maps and it actually had a marker for the location of the Princess and the Frog filming. So we may be seeing this area again when the film comes out.





Interesting story: Hurricane Ida hit this place very hard two years ago. They are still trying to recover. Some areas never got power back. Schools are still closed. They just got a small grocery store in the past few weeks. A lot of the green you see in the picture below wasn’t there before he storm. It broke lose and now the area looks completely different than it did before. 

It was very loud. The ear protection was definitely needed. It was also windy, so hats on backwards boys!

These power lines broke in the hurricane and were never repaired. The lines are still hanging off the towers. It is unlikely they will ever be repaired. 



The boat was overturned during the hurricane. 



Our little dragon fly buddy.



An albino alligator at the airboat place. It was kind of sad to see him here. 



As a result of hurricane Ida, houses are being put up on stilts. It costs $200,000 to lift a house on average, so some are lifted while their neighbors are not.



When we got back to the camper, Matt and Grace walked two blocks to tour the St. Louis Cemetery 1. 

It was very hot and there was no airflow in the enclosed cemetery. Here they are standing on front of Nicholas Cage’s monument he pre built for himself. 

It’s very interesting to hear about how people are buried within these vaults. I’ll spare you the details, but if interested, you should look it up.

The most famous tomb here belongs to the Voodoo Queen. 

Once they returned from the cemetery, we all walked around the French Quarter for a while. 

Jackson Square. It was late enough that most of the artists were gone for the day. 





More music.

Lots of masks.

I ate at this restaurant the last time I was in town in 2019. It is like a hidden treasure. You walk down an alley to an open courtyard. I wish I had remembered this place before now. No one was hungry when we walked by. 

We went home and enjoyed one more swim before we leave tomorrow for Hot Springs, AK.