Grand NOLA Finale

Gus eating muffuletta with new friends on the Natchez!

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA – Our last day in New Orleans turned out to be special. We set out for lunch in the Faubourg Marigny section of the city and found a spot we’d highly recommend: Horn’s. Gus had another po’ boy—this one with barbequed shrimp—but Cece won the prize with a sweet potato waffle covered with fried chicken doused with real maple syrup (from Canada, sorry to say).

We then strolled Frenchmen Street, said to be the Bourbon Street for the locals. It is about as funky a place as we’ve seen anywhere. We stopped to enjoy a group called Organized Chaos in a place called Bamboula’s. Their vocalist was named Honey Savage. We decided that if Cece had been named Honey Savage and and Gus named John Countryman, we might have amounted to something.

Frenchmen Street scene

Honey Savage and Organized Chaos

Back on the waterfront, we collected our tickets for the Steamboat Natchez trip on the river. We decided to take this excursion simply because it was the only way to hear the Dukes of Dixieland play. Gus has a special affection for the Dukes. He bought their first LP back in the late 1950s. They are now five generations of musicians on. Our expectations were low because they play the same gig every evening (and have for 21 years!). And we didn’t expect much from the river trip either.

Cece buys a "Road Trip" t-shirt

Supertanker headed upstream

The Natchez is an actual steam-driven paddleboat.

Mississippi River refinery. Lots of oil moving on the river.

Well, we could not have been more pleasantly surprised. The Dukes played for about two hours of the three-hour trip and gave it all they had. They finished, of course, with a rousing “When the saints…” Moreover, it was fun being on the river, and we learned quite a bit, including seeing where the levee was breached during Katrina. The others on the boat were quite friendly, as the photo reflects. Rather than pay for the onboard dinner, we brought a muffuletta with us and ate it listening to the jazz. Split a praline. Hard to beat.

 

Dukes of Dixieland

We have got to get out of this town or we’ll run out of money and have to cut the trip short.