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Our recent trip to NO

My husband and I recently spent a week in NO. Our 1/2 day Tour by Isabelle to Laura and Oak Alley was very enjoyable. Our guide at Laura was Jenny and she was excellant. Laura is not nearly as grand as Oak Alley but I thought more interesting, although Oak Alley should not be missed. Our driver was great too, lots of interesting stories and well worth the $63. We enjoyed Laura so much that we took the city and cemetary tour that follows the family's history in NO. Sandra was our guide, also very good. We stayed 4 nights at Cotton Exchange and 3 nights at Best Western Landmark Inn. I'm a light sleeper and found both places noisy. The breakfast at Cotton Exchange is basically donuts and coffee and they ran out of both a lot. No fruit or muffins. Not much selection of anything but what to you want for nothing I guess. It turned out we were there for the SEC basketball weekend and St. Patricks Day. Lots of partiers. I'm sure Mardi Gras would be over the top for me. The 360 bar on the top of the World Trade Centre was a nice place for a quiet drink at night and offered great views of the river and city. The casino was OK. Took lots of streetcar rides and especially enjoyed the ride into the Garden District. We had lunch at the Camilla Grill which is at the end of the line. It reminds me of an old Woolworths lunch counter and the staff are very friendly - great food. We took a walking tour, the free one from the National Parks. Go early for tickets. You can only get them the morning of the tour and they give out 25 and that's it. We were there 30 mins before hand and were about #10 & 11. The tour was good with a historical slant, not too many antedotes mostly just facts but very interesting. Central Groceries Muffalettas are not to be missed. Even my husband who hates olives loved them (there's olive salad spread on the top). Port of Call, Acmes, Deanies we really liked. Great pizza at Mama Rosas. Clover Leafs eggs tasted like the grease on the grill was bad but it was worth the price of the breakfast to watch the antics. One of the guys that works there is a hoot. Gumbo shop our food was only lukewarm and Cafe Maspero for all the line ups was a bit disappointing. I would suggest going for meals early. You don't wait in line so long that way. We enjoyed an outside drink at Pat O'bryans. After your drink, cut through the courtyard and go in the back door to the restaurant avoiding the line up for the restaurant. All legal we were told. We were surprised at the amount of garbage hanging around Bourbon St. The have garbage pickup 7 days a week. My two biggest pieces of advice. Don't be in a hurry, no one is, and bring good walking shoes. Socks and runners would be my suggestion. We didn't rent a car and although I would have liked to look around the city more there was lots to do without one and bringing one into the quarter would be nuts. The streets are narrow and lots of trucks making deliveries. Check out the prices at the French Market, there are some deals there but it seems to depend on the time of week. I thought things were more expensive on the weekend. Have fun!

Thanks for the report. We also went on the tours of Laura and Oak Alley and I agree that Laura was more interesting than Oak Alley, but I thought the trees alone make Oak Alley worth the trip. Incredible! I wanted to take the city tour that follows the Laura plantation family, but we didn't have time. I did buy the book of memoirs which was a great read.

djjohn, We are leaving on Monday for New Orleans and I have a few questions for you. We are taking the city tour by Tours by Isabellle and I am trying to figure out how to talk my husband into taking the 1/2 day Tour. He is willing to take the Grey Line 4 hr tour to Oak Alley but he thinks one plantation is all he can handle.... Any ideas on how I can talk him into it since you just visited there??? What about transportation were the vans roomy enough that you were comfortable for the hour or so ride to the plantations??? Did you purchase a 1 day or 3 day pass for the streetcars and if so where did you find them?? Lastly we are thinking of going to the Camilia Grill, do you remember what stop to get off at??? Thanks so much for any help you can give me:) Elaine

I can answer some of your questions. We took a plantation tour with Spinato Tours which is very similar to Tours by Isabelle. The van was very comfortable and had plenty of room. It was a standard full-size Chevy van with bench seating. If your husband is particularly tall and worried about leg room, he will have more than enough room if he sits up front or in the back on the right hand side so he can stretch his legs out in the aisle. Our guide was very entertaining and told us all kinds of things about the area so the drive seemed to go by very quickly. Our tour was about 4 hours long and we went to Laura and Oak Alley, so it was the same length as the Greyline tour you are talking about. One selling point for the 2 plantation tour is that the plantations are VERY different. Oak Alley is the stereotypical big house with the columns. Laura is a Creole plantation, very colorful, and the tour talks a lot about the family and creole life in general. The tour at Laura also talks a good deal about the slaves rather than just glossing over them. When we originally planned to take a plantation tour, I was a little skeptical because I wasn't interested in a Gone With the Wind type of tour where we pretend life in the antibellum south was wonderful. The tour at Laura plantation was about as far from Gone With the Wind as you can get - LOL. Another option, I think both Tours by Isabelle and Spinato Tours offer it, it a plantation tour combined with a riverboat tour. You leave NO in a van, drive out to I think its San Francisco plantation, have a tour, and then return to the FQ on the riverboat. This sounds like a lot of fun to me because that's how people used to get into NO from the plantations anyway. We also got the 3 day RTA passes and there were totally worth it. We bought ours at the same place they sell the tickets for the riverboat rides, it was on the riverbank close riverfront park. I also remember seeing signs for them at several souvenier shops and convinience stores in the FQ.

Djjohn - you had Jenny, too?!?! Isn't she just the greatest? I really felt more like I was visiting her home with her wealth of knowledge and her great sense of humor! ezmark - Oak Alley is something to see. The oak trees lining the drive to the front of the planation is not something to be missed. The grounds are beautifully kept and the "big house" is wonderfully restored. Key word: restored. When you visit Laura and you visit Oak Alley, it's like seeing two completely different types of plantations. Granted both were built by Creoles, but Laura is "more" of a Creole plantation. Oak Alley is what you expect a plantation to look like: big white building with columns all around, beautiful green lawns, tour guide strolling around in hoop skirts. It's all so very "Gone With the Wind." Laura, however has been restored somewhat. However, when you walk inside you feel as though the people are still there - it's as though you can feel their presence. There is only basic furniture, the wallpaper is peeling off the walls, and it is terrific! The plantation is certainly Creole - from it's brilliant colors to the steps leading up to the front veranda, to the "women's parlor" and the "gentlemen's parlor". As a special bonus, some of the out buildings still survive at Laura, including the slave cabins. Laura also offers (or will be offering) a tour of the plantation from a slave's perspective. That should be interesting. I got more of a feel of what a plantation was really like and how it operated when I went to Laura. That was more important to me. Also, while both have the requisite gift shops, Laura just had a far less "touristy" feel to me. Probably because it isn't all shiny and "like new". And if you happen to get Jenny as your tourguide, you will be absolutely delighted! She is fantastic! She knows Laura like the back of her hand, knows the family, knows the Creole traditions, and will keep you laughing throughout. Jenny made the tour very personal and comfy. In contrast, Oak Alley had tour guides that recited from rote memory. I would have gotten as much from an audio tape. And while there were a couple of tired jokes, they couldn't match Jenny's wit and genuine humor. Neither should be missed - both have their excellent qualities. And both are very, very different. Besides, I could not imagine spending a half day at Oak Alley. I could have spent more time at Laura, though, and wished they had the slave tour open. Okay, I guess I've "highjacked" djjohn's thread long enough! Sorry!

ezmark....Camellia Grill is basically at the corner of Carrollton & St. Charles, so if you get off the streetcar when it makes the turn onto Carrollton, you'll be right there. If you are coming from downtown, it will be on your left after you make the turn. It is about a mile or so past Loyola/Tulane. Anne

Thanks everyone!!!!! I am going to drag my hubby kicking and screaming if I have to, to see both Oak Alley and Laura. Thanks so much for the other tour option of Spinato. Even if I can cut down the travel time by another half hour that will only help my husband that much more:).... Since we just had snow on Monday I am ready for something a bit more warmer even if it rains...

The comments were all great. I felt like I was there again but I thought of a couple more reason to take both tours. The plantations are only about 10 minutes apart by car and if you're going to do 4 hours for one tour you might as well do 5 hours for 2. There are only 11 people max in the van so we had a nice visit coming and going trading experiences with other tourists. Don't miss it!

I forgot a couple of things. We bought our 1 day pass off the streetcar driver early in the morning but shortly after lunch we heard another driver tell people that he was sold out, so if you're going to get passes off the driver best do it early in the day. We also had a couple of collapsable umbrellas in our pack and they came in very handy a couple of times.

Clover Leaf? Just curious, but do you mean the Clvoer Grill on Bourbon? I've never heard of a Clover Leaf but the place and the guy you described sounds like Earle at the Clvoer Grill. If so, that place is a hoot..... even for us locals!

Oops! Thanks Gator Lady, my mistake. Clover Grill it is. The guy was some character. He had had a rough night the night before and wasn't up to taking any nonsense from anybody!

I am leaving for NO next month for 4 days. Definealy planning on the 1/2 day Plantation tour do they leave in the morning? And does anyone have any information on walking tours (free would be fine). Is a tour of the cementry's worht it? Iam getting so excited Planning on on big nighr making Reservations for Nola hope its the right one.

rnbtr: Our 1/2 tour with Tours by Isabelle was an afternoon tour. We were picked up at our hotel at 12:15 and returned about 17:30. We originally asked for a morning tour but the lady said they weren't very popular, people didn't want to leave early in the morning and that a morning tour might take several days to fill. We were told to eat a healthy lunch - that wasn't a problem! Both plantations had gift shops with snacks and drinks available but nothing was included by way of refreshments in the tour price. Sorry, I can't help you with NOLA we didn't go. We had a lot of fun though.

We went on the Monde de Creole tour. This was a continuation of the Laura plantation tour and continued the family's story in NO. We visited several private courtyards, the phamacy museum and one other. Anyone that takes this tour can go back to the pharmacy museum free of charge or go to the museum with the LA Purchase documents for a reduced rate. The finale of the Monde de Creole tour was a visit to the Louis 1 cemetary to see the tomb of the family. We were told stories of others that were buried there and frankly after the 20-30 minutes I felt we had heard what we wanted to about the cemetaries. This is a walking tour and costs $20 each. I felt we received good bang for our buck. We also went on the Park Service walking tour - see earlier post. I wish we had gone on a Garden District tour but we ran out of time.

We took the cemetery/voodoo walking tour with Historic New Orleans Walking Tour Co and it was great. Our guide was very knowledgable and entertaining - and the cemetery tour was definitely worth it. Don't go without a tour though because the cemeteries can be dangerous if you are on your own. We didn't take any other walking tours, but I definitely would take another tour with this company next time we are in NO. I have heard that there is a free tour of the FQ given by the park service, but we didn't take it. I've heard it's good though.

We took a trip to NO a few years ago. After visiting the city, we did a couple of days touring plantation homes. We stayed overnight in the guest house at Nottoway Plantation. That was very nice. If you are an overnight guest, they let you go throughout the plantation home at your leisure after the other tour groups have left. You can walk the grounds in the evening with the resident peacocks, or sit in the garden. There is also an elegant restaurant onsite. Another interesting plantation is Houmas House. If you are a fan of "Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte" Or Bette Davis, this one is a must see.

Eh, the Parks Dept tours are kinda boring. Basically it's a dull history lecture. No pizazz! *{JAMIE}*