This was about our 6th trip to NO and our first post Katrina visit. We were looking forward to warm weather, good food and music. Thanks to all for the answers to my questions.

We arrived on Friday afternoon to temps hovering around 40 degrees and took a taxi to our hotel in the French Quarter, the W. Taxi fare was about $30. We hustled out to grab a muffuletta from Central Grocery only to be disappointed – they had run out of bread. Walked a couple doors down to Franks which we had read about. Muffalato was okay, but we thought not up to the standards of CG. The meats were good, but the bread was not to our liking. Nice servers and warm atmosphere though. Afterwards we wandered around Decatur St…I was looking for Southern Candies and my first praline. We finally stumbled upon it and I was not disappointed –Delicious! We bought a few for snacking and then wandered back in the direction of our hotel. On the way we ducked into Napoleons for drinks-really love the cozy inside. That night we had reservations at Herbsaint http://www.herbsaint.com/
and we walked over. Had about a 30 minute or so wait in the crowded bar area. Finally we got escorted to our seats and enjoyed a really nice meal. Outstanding service. We decided to take a chance and see if we could find some good music on Bourbon St….big mistake. Nothing that we cared to listen to and the usual crowd of folks partying a bit too much, so we headed in for the night.

Saturday was a nice toasty 50 degrees. We commented to the staff at the hotel desk, what a beautiful day, to be greeted by the comment, “U all must be from the North!” We are and we were happy having left weather in the teens to come to NO. We decided to have breakfast at Central Grocery since they would be closed for the remaining 2 days we’d be in NO. Great muff! We walked over to the St. Charles streetcar; an easy 10 minutes or so stroll and hopped on the Streetcar at Napoleon St. Our plan was to walk around Magazine St. and then do a self guided walking tour in the Garden District. We enjoyed browsing all the independent shops on Magazine St and chatting up the residents. Stopped for some absolutely fabulous gelato at La Divina Gelateria http://www.ladivinagelateria.com/. We continued our walk down Magazine St and cut over into the heart of Garden District. We followed on of the walking tours in Frommers and it was a great overview of some of the great architecture and history of the buildings. After about an hour, we headed to the streetcar stop and hopped on one. Within 5 minutes, BAM as Emeril likes to say, the Streetcar hit a car trying to turn in front of it. So everyone bailed out and we walked the 2 miles back to the French quarter. We checked out a bunch of the galleries on Royal St.

After all that walking I decided to try the massage place a couple doors down from the W Hotel.,,,my feet never felt so good. By the time we left on Monday I think we spent more money on massages on various parts of our body then any other thing we did in NO.

That night we had a dinner reservations at Brigsten’s www.brigtsens.com. They had told us to allow 45 minutes to get there by streetcar; we allowed over an hour and got there just in time for the 8:00 reservations. Brigsten’s which has been around for almost 25 years and somehow we had never eaten there—I’m glad we finally ate there. Gracious service and a very good meal. We took a taxi ($18) back to Frenchmen St. Once again we struck out with the music. First couple of places were sold out- we could return for the 12:00 show. We walked into several places, heard a song or 2 and then they would break. So after wandering up and down the street we decided once again to call it a night without hearing much music. We walked back to The W.

Sunday morning was another beautiful sunny and warm day. We took a cab to Elizabeth’s since we had received mixed information as to whether it was walkable- it is and we walked back. Breakfast was heavenly. The praline bacon was well worth the trip. We had a very short wait, but shortly after we were seated, we heard them telling customers upwards of 45 waits. Glad we didn’t have that. It was a pleasant walk back to the French Quarter on Royal St. We went into a bunch of stores and galleries. We just happened to pass another Divinia Gelateria, so I figured gelato was a fitting end to a delicious breakfast. We then went over to the Arts District and checked out the contemporary museum which we didn’t’ love. However the Ogden Museum of Southern Art http://www.ogdenmuseum.org/ was a delightful surprise. We really liked it.

We were planning to go to the Fais Do Do at 5:30 at Tipitina’s http://www.tipitinas.com/default.asp. Once again we hopped on the Streetcar and road it out to Napoleon St again. We had some time to kill so we stopped in Maes Bar on the corner of Magazine and Napoleon Streets and watched the last quarter of the playoff game, AZ/ Philadelphia - fun! Tiptinas was a real treat at last music! For some reason we were starving and we left after about an hour and went to Upperline’s http://www.upperline.com/ for dinner (we were lucky, they had a cancellation and said if we got there by 6:30 they could fit us in.) What a nice little place – filled with art and other artifacts and the owner is a delight to chat with. Again, a very nice meal and glad we gave it a try. We headed back to Tipitina’s and stayed there until it ended at 9—very fun way to spend an early evening. We decided to take a taxi back to the FQ since we never could determine how frequently the streetcars ran in the evening. We spent the rest of the evening strolling around the FQ.

On our last morning we walked over to Petunias www.petuniasrestaurant.com for breakfast. Had read very mixed reviews on both the food and indifferent service. We experienced very good food and very nice service. After a yummy breakfast we walked around the FQ some more, picked up a muff from Maspero’s for the flight and then went to the airport for our flight back to freezing DC.

Thanks for the good details about your trip.

Yestravel--- thanks for posting your report; I'm bookmarking it for my trip in April (Jazz Fest).

I also want to invite you to post your restaurant experiences in our N.O. destination guide. For instance, as a member you can add your review of Brigsten's appears here:
http://www.fodors.com/world/north-am...iew-37575.html

Thanks again for the report.

Thanks Katie , I always forget about that, I have some Nola stuff I could update as well.

Thanks yestravel

Lots of great ideas in here for my next trip to Nawlins!

DANIEL

Thanks, all! I've never been in NO at JazzFest, but heard it's great --no problem finding music then I bet. Katie, thanks for the reminder on the restaurant reviews, I never think about doing them on Fodors.

Hi yestravel -

Thanks for the report. Sounds like you had a great time.

Upperline is one of my favorite restaurants. I'm glad you enjoyed it.