Shiny and I went to New Orleans this weekend (left Friday morning, came back Sunday afternoon). It was freakin' awesome. We both totally dug it. There'll be pictures/video following soon.

We woke up at 5:30am on Friday, hopped into the car and drove there... it was an 8 hour road trip. Bleh...driving 8 hours sucks. Still, we got there around 3pm, then went down to the French quarter to see what was up. We ended up walking all over the place, including Canal St and Bourbon St. It's insane how large that area is and how much crap there is to do.

We ended up finding a little restaurant on the top floor of a 2 story building right off of Bourbon St... we weren't expecting much but it ended up having food and service that rivaled the best restaurants we've eaten at.

http://www.ruebourbon.com/jeanlafittesbistro/

We pretty much went to the hotel after that and slept. The next day we went back to the French quarter and checked out the aquarium.
http://www.auduboninstitute.org/site/Pa ... y_Aquarium

We ate at an ok restaurant, then wandered around a crappy mall for awhile. Eventually we ended up take a 2 hour steamship ride up and down the Mississippi.
http://www.steamboatnatchez.com/

That was cool, too. Then that evening we headed to the Voodoo music festival to see Nine Inch Nails.
http://www.thetenthritual.com/

Parking blew ass... basically there was no parking, you had to find a place on the street to park. Still, we went, which is ostensibly the whole reason we went down there in the first place.

Finally on Sunday we woke up in the morning, had breakfast and drove home. And I played Far Cry 2 for the rest of the day. Anyway, we've got some piccies and vids that I'll be posting once Shiny and I get around to unloading them from our phones.

And those better not be pictures and videos of Far Cry 2

so, some pics and stuff as promised

and some more

the vids were about unimpressive so I'll leave them off. Shiny may have some more pics to post.

Hey, I was in New Orleans a couple of weekends ago!
Sounds like you had just an amazing time as I did.
The French Quarter is beautiful, the buildings are fantastic, even if a lot of them are understandably rundown and in need of repairs.

Did you hit up 'Cafe Du Monde' at all? It's the little french coffee place near the river. They have the BEST french donut thingies. Fantastic!
The cemetery photos are beautiful (in a creepy way... especially since some tour lady advised us to coincide a trip to the cemetery with a tour group... so we wouldn't get mugged .... we decided to leave it for next time).

Jambalaya!! Mmmmmm good. Personally loved me some Gumbo too.

So you guys hit Bourbon St at night right? It's a crazy crazy, fantastic place. Hehehe. If you don't mind, Imma gonna add a few of my pics from my weekend there.

You guys ain't keen on posting images of yourselves. Alright, suga was brave enough and so I won't bitch about her apparently drinking a beer.

By the way, when I travel home by train, it takes 10-15 hours just because of a up-to-2hrs hold on the borderline and all the collisions that come after that. Comparing that with an equal car ride that takes 4-5 hours plus a max 20min hold on the borderline, you might give up the idea of complaining about an 8hr car ride.

Just become a EU citizen and go live in Slovenia or Hungary or summit Gfree, no more border shit.

Great pics, and what's more important it sounds like you all had a blast in NO. Is Bourbon St. the same street as in Sting's song?

New Orleans actually looks very European from your pics, in an old-world colonial kind of style with wooden buildings. Especially the graveyard is totally French...Paris is littered with showy graves like that.



Food...i love food. I love fish, above all. So I'm jealous. Wtf is jumbalaya though? Apart from a soup in Seinfeld

Damn you and your beignets Suga...I could use one right now! Think I'll head down to the baker's during lunch time and pick some up. Did you visit with a pack of Aussies or American pals, anyway?

You would not believe how many people have asked me that! It's crazy. Anyway, no, I'd never even heard of it until all these people asked me. I plan on hitting that up next time. And going to Jackson square, and taking a plantation tour, and a tour of the swamp, etc etc.

Anyway, it's totally awesome, everyone should go if they get a chance. :p I don't know if you knew, Ox, but New Orleans is heavily French-influenced... everything from the architecture to the language to the street names.

And yea, we went down to Bourbon street on Friday night. Didn't really do much, though... we wandered around and ate, but didn't actually do any bar hopping or anything. Next time we will. I don't know for a fact, but I'm pretty sure that Sting song is about the same Bourbon st. It's the party street, world renowned.

BTW, my car has no cruise control, so driving for 8 hours is pretty rough. My right leg kinda fell asleep holding that gas pedal down. I have driven 10 hours to El Paso before, but that doesn't make 8 hours to New Orleans suck any less. :p

Never! I don't want EU. I hate EU. I hope to see this Frankenstein finally fall apart one day - which is inevitable. Btw, Hungary... don't get me started on that, since we've already got Hugarian extremists in Vojvodina. They're supposed to oppress the Serbian police at the right moment and hold them long enough till the NATO convoys come to resolve citizen war by announcing Vojvodina's independence - actually its belonging to Hungary rather than to Serbia. You can imagine I want to kick any Hungarian that comes in my sight, maybe excluding yourself.


Alright, that sucks. I suppose you can build it in. If I was you, I'd do it on my own. I'd put it together, build it in, make it fail safe and pay the parts no more than $100 in total.

That aint no beer. That's a Hand Grenade! New Orleans strongest drink, with a secret recipe and everything! </salespitch> Personally it WAS yummy, but didn't feel like it had much of a kick.


A couple of Aussie gals from Sydney. (Hence the aussie beads in the photo... there was a 3 for 2 special on em)

Definitely check out Cafe Du Monde, not only for the yummy beignets, but the coffee was the best I've had in a long while too!

*has no idea what Aussie beads are* I didn't even notice them in the pic! Yeah I know, men and spotting clothing...not exactly a winning combination.

@ Satis: well, I kinda figured it was French-influenced with names like mardi gras and there being beignets and Orleans being an actual place in France and all. But do they speak French there? Or are there just a lot of French-ish words sneaking into the local dialect?

@ Gfree: perhaps, but they said the same thing about the US when they first started and they're still together, if economically bankrupt. Regardless, I like not having to be some low-born customs officer's bitch everytime I pass the border...I can hop the train to London, Paris or Amsterdam right this afternoon and walk around there in 2 hours' time without having to worry about border stuff. Tell me that ain't sweet.

You could even visit me without stopping once.

Would I have to go through Sweden and Finland for that? Or are both Lithuania and Latvia members already? I know Latvia is but I'm not sure about Lithuania....

Shame on you Ox, all three the Baltic states are members now. Although you probably have to go around Kaliningrad, so perhaps going by boat for a bit is faster. EU for the win by the way, Gfree, cut back on that ultranationalist propaganda a bit, it's nonsense.

I think you didn't quite get the story. Whether they pick on me or not, they will hold the train, cause there are just about more than 100 other people to pick on. I myself am not that interesting, since I'm a student. Hey, the inventory of Bulgaria yet. I remember once they didn't let a Japanese or Chinese guy (fuck me if I could differ) for his pass was entirely on his mother tongue (no Latin letters).

Once an Indian professor come to my coupe to bore me about some sort of symposium he was going to have in Sofia (he apparently heard I'm a student so he thought he found another victim). He smelled ugly, but I didn't find a polite reason to kick him out, until he (accidentally?) freed some of his stomach gasses. "That's it, you're going out." (pushing out the old man) "And don't stand by my door, got it?."

How it is called btw in English? Freeing stomach gasses, yes.