Today we went out to explore the city a bit more. Because the french quarter might be on every postcard, it’s not where most people live, and it’s just a part of the city.
So we found a bus to get to the end of the oldest continuously operated streetcar in the world : the saint Charles streetcar. The cars were renovated after Katrina, but still have the old wooden benches and the old green color. It’s a bit slow, but it goes through some of the most beautiful parts of town. Our first stop was the Audubon park, with its hundreds of live oaks and a lot of wildlife.
Here most squirrel are gray, and mostly considered like tree rats by locals. They eat in the trash, and reproduce way to fast. So most people don’t really notice them anymore, even when they’re 2m away. But for us, it’s not the same, we’re not used to seeing squirrels up close !
After a stroll in the park, we walked nearby and looked at the houses. And so we now understand where the design from the Sims comes from! All were huge, freshly painted and surrounded with a perfect little lawn. Columns, moldings, dormers and of course Christmas decorations were everywhere, varying in color and dimensions, but quite uniform in style.
We also visited a public library, which is located inside the old house of a silent movie star. The building is majestic, and the library very well organized, with cool reading rooms furbished with old furniture and a fireplace.
After this, we took the tram again and went to eat a Po-Boy, short for Poor Boy, the official local sandwich, invented for the working class who had to eat while working. Today it’s still cheaper than a restaurant, but probably too expensive for a poor boy… But it’s really good. The bread is really good, it looks like a giant baguette. Inside you can put a multitude of things, like an alligator sausage (Ben liked this a lot !). Afterwards, we had to hurry a bit to get the ferry to Algiers Point, the part of town across the river.
This part of town is much quieter, and we walked a bit around with the sun really low on the horizon. The house are painted in a lot of different colors, and we talked a bit with a man renovating his house. We really liked the place!
Then, we had to find our way back by bus, which brought us to wait under the Crescent Connection. As the bridge is so high, the slope actually starts very early inland. From underneath, it’s pretty impressive, but also not the best place to hang around…
Once back in the center, we met with our friend Milan in an Irish pub and had a couple rounds, and then we went to visit City Park, a park in town that is bigger than Central Park in New York ! Each year it hosts a lot of huge Christmas decorations, and they are quite something. But we only saw a few of them, because the park is way to big to see it all in one night!
And then we went to sleep ! See you later, alligator !
