Wednesday 1st December - New York City - New Orleans
Today is the 18 month anniversary of Sue last being at work so we celebrated by catching a flight down south to New Orleans (or N'Awlins as the locals say!) . The journey to the airport was a quick shuttle bus direct from the hotel doors which was great as the rain was pouring down. Once again (for the 4th time in the US) Derek was given 'special security status' which basically means his bags are searched more thoroughly. 3.5 hours later we touched down in the 'Big Easy'. Our taxi driver spoke more French than English (he was from Haiti originally like many people around here) and dropped us at our Royal Hotel door. The small room was out the back of a French styled courtyard and a short walk from the 'party-central' of Bourbon Street. Our first stop had to be the laundrette as we hadn't been in over 2 weeks (a bit like confessions then!). We weren't feeling too great after last night's boozing so we headed down Bourbon Street for a look at the festivities. The place was alive with bars, clubs, live music and general razzmattazz and it was only 5.30pm on a weekday! French onion soup and local speciality 'Jambalaya' (sausage, shrimps and spicy rice) went down well for our dinner .

Thursday 2nd December - New Orleans
We moved rooms today as the small room we had was almost claustrophobic and we wanted to swing the proverbial cat. At breakfast we saw the hilarious site of a woman with a dog in her 'handbag' and the dog was about the size of a large rat! We joined a walking tour of the French Quarter based on the history of a local Creole family originating from France. Creoles are of French, Spanish or Portugese descent and dominated New Orleans until the Americans declared it part of the US in 1803. They were originally the only people to give black African slaves any kind of status, and in some cases they paid them very well for their work. New Orleans was the birthplace of the ragtime and jazz music styles as the native Africans found an outlet for their artistic abilities. We walked down to the Mississippi river with it's great width and history of being the longest inland nagivable waterway in the world (14,000 miles!). Back to Bourbon Street where we encountered the tradition of bead throwing from the iron work balconies of the French Quarter buildings . Men on the balconies throw beads at the passing women (and men too !?) in the hope that tops will be lifted to reveal bare breasts. When the lady obliges wolf whistles abound and beads are thrown from all directions! Also there are many strip clubs including one where the 'talent' (both male and female) are on show outside. Another club shows photos of a lady who looks about 25 but we have been told by our guide earlier today is actually 72 - amazing what plastic surgery can do!

Friday 3rd December - New Orleans
It was all aboard the steamboat today for a tour of the local Mississippi river - just like the one from TV's Huckleberry Finn series. As we waited to board the boat played some tunes from it's 'steam organ' and very good it was too! We opted to have lunch as part of the trip and spicy beans, rice and chicken was great. The muddy waters of the river drain all or part of 31 states in the US. We cruised past the 2nd largest oil refinery in the country and many foreign cargo ships biding their time before moving further up river wher the banks are even wider than here . Lots of tugboats and towboats too, which goes to show why this river is still so important to this part of the country. We stayed longer than planned in a bar drinking wine as it was bucketing down rain outside. Bourbon Street was buzzing despite the rain. You can buy 'drinks to go' and walk around sampling the different jazz, blues, soul and rock bands plying their trade in every 2nd bar you come accross. We settled for a rock band who kept us out till 3 in the morning (Derek cleared the floor with his 5-minute alchohol fuelled aerobic workout!).

Saturday 4th December - New Orleans
Our late night last night led to us feeling a little tender this morning. We planned a 'Cemetery/Voodoo' walking tour and headed to the local graveyard with about 20 other people. We were the only non-Americans in the group and for some strange reason got a big 'ooh' from everyone else when they found out. Our guide was a local Creole and showed us loads of above-ground tombs (when they used to bury their dead underground, if the area flooded the coffins would resurface!) . When they have 'jazz funerals' around here, music and food take top priority rather than church arrangements. If these funerals attract a crowd people can and do (!) stand on top of existing tombs which can and have collapsed! We saw jazz legend Louis Armstrong's self-titled park and finally got to the voodoo part of the tour. We entered a small room finding other groups sitting on the floor and did so too. An African woman was talking and without telling anybody much, proceeded to ramble on about nothing in particular boring the pants off most people. Though we were surrounded by black magic items and ideas she didn't mention 'voodoo' once and we concluded by the end that she'd, mistakenly or otherwise, taken one too many of her own potions!

Sunday 5th December - New Orleans
The streetcar (or tram) may be a National Historic monument but the journey itself was a bit dull to be honest and pretty slow too. Our driver pulled up for a couple of minutes to chat with his friend which was amusing (Round here Y'all seems to be used virtually every sentence - Derek tells people Youghal is a place in Cork, Ireland too!) . We rang some car rental companies to suss out the best deal for our bucks and soon discovered that it'd be cheaper to come back to New Orleans and then fly to Miami - the flights turned out the be 10 pounds more than a 24-hour greyhound bus - so we know we'll spend Christmas in Miami now! With a mix of internet and phonecalls we sorted it out but it all took time exploring the options. Quite often Derek would end up saying 'help' into the phone to get off the automated message lines and get to speak to a real person (you have to say 'help' to do this and thus people around think it's a cry for real-life help!). By the time we'd done all this it was time for a drink. We got some video footage of Bourbon Street and it's goings on despite the paranoia of the artist's stooges that we might be taping their 'performance' for 'commercial purposes' - these guys are nobodies anyway! We finished our night with a mule and carriage ride around the French Quarter with a very knowledgeable guy from New York.