After an adventuresome yet tiring weekend, I am back! Getting up for work was hard this morning but someone has got to do it! Little sleep provided for a long afternoon in the car yesterday but I made it home in one piece. I am so glad I was there for Elizabeth’s 21st. Once again, if you are reading this: I hope you had a great birthday Eliz! Thank You so much for my invite. New Orleans is always fun and never disappoints. As soon as I upload pictures on my computer, I will share a few. Until then… here are some highlights along with a play-by-play from the weekend.
We arrived in NOLA around 7:30 p.m. on Friday night. We checked into our room at The Hotel de la Monnaie and started getting ready for dinner. If you are familiar with the NO area, the place we were staying was literally one block away from the French Market – right on the corner of Esplanade. It was very convenient and quaint. It had a very “New Orleans feel.”
We met up with Elizabeth’s cousin, Erin, for dinner at Rock N’ Sake. The sushi was to die for delicious. Seriously, super fresh and they had a large choice of unique rolls as well as other entrée options. If you are ever in the New Orleans area and looking for some sushi, this is your place. I got the LSU Roll (which is similar to my dad's favorite, Houston Roll) and a spicy tuna roll that came with a super spicy soy with it. It was hot! but good. The portions were very generous. I ordered two rolls because I was not sure how big they would be, but the LSU roll was huge! I loved the atmosphere. I am used to eating at very traditional sushi places. Ya know, Japanese Decor, fountain, music straight from the homeland, etc. This was a very young and urban vibe. Hip music, mod décor and dim lighting accented by unique jellyfish lights hanging from the ceiling.
After dinner we hit up Bourbon. This is where it all goes downhill. Okay, totally kidding but it was a crazy night. Everything from dancing on stage, taking shots, wanting to sing karaoke (but the line was too long), throwing beads from balconies to Elizabeth gathering 21 birthday kisses. Of course we got hand grenades, too! We hit up a lot of places but mainly stayed at The Cat’s Meow. Anyone been there before? Its super fun and I would highly suggest it! We finally made it in around 3 a.m. and I burnt a bag of popcorn causing the birthday girl to go into meltdown mode. Seriously some of the funniest stuff I have EVER seen. She was screaming about getting kicked out, trying to get rid of the smoke by running water in the sink and tossing water at the fire alarm. Yep, that’ll do it. It provided nice laughter.
We woke up on Saturday, got ready (with much delay due to lack of hot water) and headed to lunch at Magnolia Grill. We wanted to eat at Camelia Grill, but could not make it that far. We were ravenous at this point so we just settled. It was good, poor service though. Right across from the French Market so it did not take long to get there and get seated. We shopped and browsed… I got Lexie some little dog treats from a gourmet dog bakery. It was so cute in there! We walked through The Market, The Quarter, all down Royal Street and back down Bourbon before we decided to head in for a nap before we went to dinner that night.
We met up with Erin again for dinner at a little authentic Mexican place right across from The Market, again. It was called El Gato Negro (the black cat for those non-spanish speakers). It was kind of a long wait for a Mexican restaurant, but worth it. I had a chicken burrito and it was awesome and huge – could not finish it. We also got some home-made (at our table side) guacamole … yum yum! It was slower service but the only real complaint here was how we had to pay for the extra chips and salsa we got, first round on them… then you had to pay. WHO DOES THAT? TOURIST TRAP! Still, a great dinner!
After dinner we headed out for Bourbon Street round 2. We were a little tired at this point but held up until about 1:30 when we decided to call it a night. Again, we frequented many bars… started off on the Balcony at Krazy Korner and then went back to The Cat’s Meow but Saturday night was so crowded on Bourbon. After we got to our room we ordered a pizza and then passed out!
After waking up Sunday morning, we packed our bags and checked out then we headed to Café Du Monde for some beignet action. Sweet, powdered sugar goodness – they were delish. You can’t go to New Orleans without stopping there. It's just wrong. We strolled back through the Market, browsing and window shopping then made it back to the car and headed home.
I wish I could tell all the funny moments from the weekend but there are far too many and most you would just have to be there. Inside jokes galore…. Stories that some would probably like to remain unsaid…. But don’t worry, no one got picked up by the police and taken to the OPP. I did however cuss out this jerk Ohio State fan (sorry, not very lady-like but he was rude as all get out to me.) I think that is about as rambunctious as I got, except for yelling “Roll Tide” a lot.
There’s my weekend in a nutshell. So much fun but I was HAPPY to be home and see my Aunt and my furbaby!
xoxo
