Independence Day

It’s the 4^th of July! And we are Englishmen in the USA. Should we keep our heads down so as not to cause any disturbance? Nah, I’m sure they’ll be alright with it all. But hey, what a place to be for the 4^th of July....New Orleans!

Due to a slight mix-up with the booking of The French Market Inn, we arrived at 05:30 in the morning, safe in the knowledge that we wouldn’t have to wait til check-in time at 16:00. This is because we had accidentally booked our first night for the Monday, when we were travelling overnight from Birmingham. A slight mistake, but actually worked out for the best as we would have had to wait a looooooong time in the Greyhound terminal, as we had been advised not to walk to the hotel as the area the bus station was in (and it seems par for the course...) a pretty seedy part of town. That said, apparently most of New Orleans is pretty rough, especially after dark, so our visit to The Big Easy will be restricted to the few streets known as The French Quarter. Thankfully, our hotel is pretty much right next to the Mississippi river, although we cannot see it from our room it is definitely only a couple of minutes walk, if that. The taxi ride there took in some sights that people had been warning us about, probably the most memorable one was by the underpass, where there were almost 20 people (that I saw on one side, James said there were more on his too) sleeping rough in rags and cardboard. But we were prepared for it and the decision to get the taxi rather than walk was certainly justified.

Our room in the hotel was a cracker, and we were happy to be spending three nights there, although it would be great if we could get the Wi-Fi in the room and not have to sit in the lobby to arrange our next stages of travel and where the nearest “Man vs Food” restaurant was. We spent the day walking round the large market near the banks of the Mississippi, and through some of the streets that were located within our “restricted square” of New Orleans. And everything just seemed so......cool. Even a small window-box full of flowers looked great. A tiny alley held a certain amount of vintage charm. Even the vintage bike chained up against a lamp-post looked photo-worthy! I will never judge another tourist in England taking a photo of a mail box or a bus stop! The heat was again intense, but more of a muggy, humid heat than the baking dry oven that was Nashville. So we retired to the hotel after purchasing some items to make some sandwiches with – eating out for every meal certainly comes at a cost! After the two rounds of cheese and ham sandwiches we set off for Bourbon Street, famous for it’s tackiness, cheesiness, and debauch...iness. Having never been to Ayia Napa, Ibiza or Magaluf it was an altogether new experience for me to walk down the middle of the street with “prodders” trying everything they knew to get us into their bar/club. All manner of bars and shops were located here, and to our naive amazement you could walk past 3 bars in a row and then come across a.....ahem....gentlemen’s club, and then a few more bars, and another....”cabaret” club. People were even bringing their young children down here, but hey, I’m not gonna judge these people, it’s their call if they want their kids to grow up thinking this kinda place is the norm!

The...uuuuuh....French Market

If only the prodders had known that we were simply looking for the place with the cheapest drinks, they could have saved themselves the effort of handing us all manner of business cards, leaflets and so on, for we had only one goal in mind – find a place that serves a drink for less than $3. And we found said place, with two seats at the bar and a choice of $2 drinks! We started off on the $2 draught Dos Equis (a personal favourite of mine since my time working at Coors)......in a plastic cup with a segment of lime on the rim. Tasty enough, and down the hatch it went, within a couple of minutes! Apparently a $2 “Well Drink” was cheap spirits with a mixer, so we opted to try a Margarita. I went for the frozen kind (again, in a plastic cup, but this time with a rather natty straw) and James went for the un-frozen type and with salt around the rim. I had heard about this custom, and I am all for trying new customs, but I didn’t quite fancy salt around my rim, so the segment of lime would be plenty for me. These bad boys were pretty strong, and took a long time to get through, for my cup kept frosting over and keeping the drink so cold it gave me Brain Freeze whenever I took a hearty gulp. Once these were finished, we continued on our tour of Bourbon Street and decided that we should save ourselves for the 4^th July night, so headed back to our French Market Inn. Before heading up to our room we stopped off in the courtyard to put the world to rights and take a few more sips from our hip flasks, as the temperature outside was still very warm. A couple of episodes of Hardcore Pawn (an American TV show about a Pawn Shop in Detroit) and it was time for some zee’s...

A cold beer for $2 you say? Bring it on!