Days 345-6 in N'Awlins

Day 345
      New Orleans is the city with many names, such as N'Awlins, Nawlins, Nola and The Big Easy... It is also a city where "what happens in Nawlins stays in Nawlins" not that I would know anything about that.
     We left Lucky Us here at this very scenic dock on the canal along side the park (picture at right). The shuttle bus departed from the marina (and RV park) at 10:00 or more precisely at 10:07 am. We got to the edge of the French Quarter about 20 minutes later. We had about an hour to walk around before the first movie started so we drifted toward the riverfront. We were last here in May 2013 on our way to start the Great Loop. Thus it was with mixed blessing that we looked out at the river knowing that in two days we would be crossing the river again, but this time we might not be back by boat for a while.

    We got to the Theaters at Canal Place, which is attached to the Westin Hotel on the edge of the French Quarter. We did visit several stores, but we (fortunately for me) only looked in the windows at several other stores, such as Tiffany's. "Fury" started at 11:30 am, and we had time to order our meal before the previews began. They have 7 theaters, with all over-size reclining chairs, and the Admiral can be seen seeming to enjoy sitting in luxury in the picture at the left. Everything is done with a dinner theater concept, including shared tables that rotate out. I had a rather bland Margarita pizza, but the lunch did not matter since, of course, we also ordered popcorn for "dessert" with the movie. The movie was action packed and very bloody.  After the movie, our original plan had been to wander around the French Quarter for a while, and the we would go to another movie later.

     We headed for Café du Monde for beignets and coffee to discuss our plan. Surely, no visit to New Orleans can be complete without stopping at Café du Monde even if it is in the middle of the afternoon. And there must be a technique to eating beignets without getting covered in powdered sugar, but if there is a proper way to eat them, I have yet to discover it. It seems that after walking a couple of miles that we were losing interest in another movie and arriving back late on the last shuttle. So, we decided to walk through several of the market areas and in general work our way back to catch the 4:00 pm shuttle.
      After relaxing for a bit back on board Lucky Us, we rallied enough to go to the hot tub too sooth our tired "walking" muscles. The soothing part was great, but we were both so relaxed enough that I do not know how the Admiral could muster up the energy to make dinner after we got back to the boat. I have mentioned before how nice it is to be back in the Central Time Zone where the nightly news comes on at 10:00 pm. That is true, but tonight was definitely another night that I did not see the nightly news no matter what time it might have started...

Day 346

      Finally, we actually had a low key day! I would hesitate to say restful, but it was pretty restful since I even got a nap. We went to the marina restaurant (and bar) for lunch. The marina has two channels for boats. This one seems to be for much smaller transients. The multipurpose store, office, restaurant, laundry, etc. is all in the big building at the head of this channel. The hot tub is at ground level to the left of the main building. The two story buildings are pre-fabricated complexes that consist of two lower units with an upper unit that spans the deck between the lower units.

      Two guys started all of this after hurricane Katrina in 2005, and they have steadily added more permanent units as well as additional dock and RV spaces. They even have some two story floating units. The pool deck is on the upper level of the club house, and we had not checked it out before today... Good thing because we would have been disappointed because they were only now refilling it after some repairs.

   We spent the afternoon doing the "usual" paper work, blogging and of course, napping.  And the Admiral rode her bike to the grocery store for a quick shopping spree. 

      This is a view from the stern of Lucky Us looking along the shore toward some of the waterfront 2-story units  and waterfront parking spots for large (bus like) RVs. In spite of all of the water around (and in) New Orleans, there is not a lot of waterfront living here. Many hones that boarder Lake Pontchartrain, for example, have a partial view of the lake over a high levee system. The city and actually the whole Mississippi delta is slowly sinking due to compaction of the very young sediments at the surface, and reportedly, there are parts of the city that are over 20 feet below sea level. Thus, this kind of waterfront view is pretty rare. Mind you that it is the waterfront view of a fairly commercial channel (not shown).

     Tomorrow we will be moving on westward, but our last day in town ended with a beautiful sky at sunset. A lovely ending to what is always a too short visit to Nawlins.