Katie and I decided that a pilgrimage to our beloved New Orleans was in order. We recruited participants and Erin and Emily made the cut. Two sets of sisters set off for a girls weekend in NOLA. We weren't expecting to part the red sea with our car but that's exactly what we did when Utah and Alabama fans flooded the streets on their way to the Sugarbowl. Katie felt as though she was car surfing. Despite many closed roads, we navigated our way to our Bourbon St four star hotel!
We reserved a room at the Royal Sonesta. We had requested two double beds but when we arrived, they had none left. Hmmm. I asked the receptionist if she could look around for the secret stashed away rooms to be sure, and she said they could upgrade us to a club level overflow room that's 1.5 times the size of normal rooms and includes a pull out couch, free breakfast, happy hour, etc. I'm thinking perfect! Not so much. The room was a shoebox and consisted of ONLY a pull out couch made up as a bed (not a bed plus couch as I had envisioned). No way would this even be standing room let alone sleeping room for the four of us. I went back to the desk to work some magic, insisted we at least got our reserved room type which could be either a king bed or two double beds. As luck would have it, we got the very 'last' room in the hotel which was a king bed. Yippee. I requested a rollaway. Oh, have I forgotten to mention our sneaky maneuver of claiming only 2 guests because each extra guest per night incurred an astronomical fee? So yes, we need a king bed + rollaway for TWO people. They accomodated my request. It's a good thing we all have a sense of humor as you can see with all four of us stacked in bed in the above photo.
The hotel was beautiful, which was somewhat surprising as it's located directly on the filthy but well-loved Bourbon St. Here's Katie and me in the entrance-way still dec'd out for Christmas.
The two sets of sisters had to take a quick pic below 'The Court of the Two Sisters' sign. Here we have me, Katie, Emily, and Erin ready for a night on the town.
We started with Cajun bloody mary's, crawfish etouffee, shrimp creole, red beans & rice, jambalya, our latest discovery of the hot roast beef po' boy (best of all), and the memorable bread pudding at The Gumbo Shop on St Peters.
From there, we headed up the street to Pat O'Brians piano bar for hurricanes.
The pianists kept bringing up a crowd from Norway that had travelled the farthest to be there. I tried to tell them I'd come from Australia (twice as far!) but I don't think they heard me.
We worked our way along Bourbon St, stopping at the balcony of the Krazy Korner.
Ta da! Our fabulous hotel right in the middle of all the action. We took advantage of our prime location, stopping there for a bathroom break between bars.
Part of the bonus of our trip to New Orleans was getting to catch up with some old friends of mine. Michelle and I worked together in Biloxi following Hurricane Katrina. She's since moved to New Orleans, but is currently working another disaster in Iowa. She was back in NOLA just for New Years so the timing was perfect for us to catch up. She came out and made the rounds with us.
We walked about a mile from Bourbon St to the Marigny, a more local hot spot, where we saw this street band drawing quite a crowd.
Katie especially liked the music at Ray's Boom Boom Room but the place was as dead as it looks... so we headed back to the action on Bourbon St.
It was one of the first nights we'd seen where many of the bars were charging a cover. The place was hopping with all the Sugarbowl fans crowding the streets.
Erin joined in the line dancing taking over the streets.
Katie, Emily, and Erin in the midst of the crowds - sucking down those hand grenades. Not Katie though - this trooper declared an intention to not drink at all during 2009. Having survived New Orleans, I would consider that a likely feat.
