The City and the Swamp

Amidst of all the festival fun, we managed to plan ahead and booked a two hour New Orleans city bus and three hour swamp boat tour for today. We woke up early to jump on the bus. The company is called VIP City Tour and costed us $35 USD per person. Our driver and tour guide was a local New Orleans fellow named Henry. He spoke with a mellow southern drawl but he drove like a bat outta hell.
Henry explained interesting facts about New Orleans along the way. We drove through the garden, lakeview, and the "beverly hills" areas and neighbourhoods. There were no gated communities. The poor, rich and the wealthy all lived together.




Author Anne Rice (Interview with the Vampire)'s house with a tree full of Mardi Gras beads in front it.




The areas that were affected by Hurricane Katrina back in 2005 drew the biggest fascination. Most of the city is built below sea level and most on top of swamp land. When Katrina hit, the water spilled over the levees below and caused severe flooding.




Some of the houses were still abandoned with the mark TFW which stood for Total Flood Water in front of it. Some houses you can see the yellow water stain mark left behind.
We drove through the neighbourhood Brad Pitt donated and built. The houses looked very colourful and funky looking. They are also now designed to have an escape hatch on the roof. A lot of people died trapped in their attics during the disaster.
The other fascinating attraction about New Orleans is their cemeteries and their culture.




One tomb can contain hundreds of bodies like this one. The whole family will be buried in it. They don't cremate bodies either. The body is allowed one year and one day to decompose before the casket is removed and body/ bones are pushed to the back of the tomb with a pole to make room for the next deceased family member.








This particular cemetery we stopped at ironically had a luxury retirement home right next to it. In addition, it almost blends into a residential area. This would never happen in China. No one would ever dare or want to live anywhere near a cemetery.
The city tour ended just before noon and we were ready for our next tour. Our swamp boat tour with Louisiana Tour Company cost $52 USD per person including hotel pick up. There was an air boat option which was $72 per person. The air boat has the big fan on the back and is very loud and fast. I wasn't allowed on it since I was pregnant. We drove about 30 minutes outside of French Quarter to reach the boats and swamp. Our boat captain and guide again was a local guy with a few missing teeth, but had all of his fingers.








Although the boat captain told us 'this ain't Disneyland' and there was no guarantee, we came across a young alligator within the first 15 minutes of the tour. He was resting under the shade on land.
Our second alligator was an adult about 7 feet long swimming in the water. The captain started throwing marshmallows at it. Apparently, the gators really like them because they float and are white and sweet. The captain then leaned towards the water with the gator alongside of the boat and less than one foot away from his face. He tapped the gator's nose and petted the top of its head. When the gator opened its mouth, he would throw a marshmallow into it. The captain even put a marshmallow on top of its head which the gator swam around with for a while.




The captain then showed off his pet baby alligator. He said it was his back up plan in case we didn't see any in the wild. He said baby gators are very prone to predators before the age of 2.5. In the wild, out of a litter of 50 eggs only 15% will survive. He plans to release his after 2.5 year old.




Locals Cajuns do hunt alligators. It is tightly controlled and an allowance is given to each family with alligators on their property. Each hunted must be tagged and reported.




On our way back from the swamp tour, it started pouring rain. We thought it was a fitting way to end the trip and condition our mind to head back to the always rainy Vancouver.
Our last meal in New Orleans had to be good, not that it has disappointed me so far. I have loved everything I ate, maybe a little too much. I even picked up Cajun cooking spices to bring back. ACME Oyster Bar off of Bourbon Street is very popular and we had to wait in a line up for a table.




The wait was totally worth it. I ordered my third crawfish boil dinner. Two lbs of pure heaven! By far the best tasting crawfish boil so far. It was more expensive at $9.95 USD per lb than Montrel's ($7.95 per lbs) and the festival ($8 per 1.5lbs) but it was worth very penny. The crawfish was big and fat and tasted like they injected the spices right into the crawfish individually. I ordered 2 lbs with the thought of taking half of it back to the hotel for later. None made it back. I ate the 2 lbs in one sitting and even mulled over the idea of ordering another pound to go. Did I mention I really love crawfish boil!!




Tomorrow we fly back home. I really enjoyed our Southern trip. New Orleans is a city with a lot of flavor from its history and culture from its people. I would totally come back here for a second round.
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Location:New Orleans

From the Sea to French Quarter Festival

Our last day at sea was pretty uneventful. The thought of no more towel animals on our bed every night or the 24 hour ice cream machine and pizza parlor made us a little sad. Greg put in a few more hours of sun time to even out his tan while I just napped and ate a little more.


Mongolian grill!!


We also explored the areas we haven't even been to on the ship, like the mini golf course,


and the water slide,



We still didn't manage to locate the gym. To be honest, we didn't look that hard.

At dinner our servers sang their version of "leaving on a jet plane (ship)" to us. We exchanged information with our dinner mates Timothy and Renasha. They were a lot of fun.

Our cabin guy left a seal tonight. Greg thought it looked something else...


When we woke up the next morning, the ship had already docked in New Orleans. Since we didn't have a lot of stuff we opted not to put our luggage out last night to be checked straight through. Immigration was smooth and since we didn't have to wait for our luggage we were in the French Quarter ready for the festival before 11AM.

It was actually the last day of the French Quarter festival. How lucky were we! There was live music everywhere in the quarter, but mostly concentrated in the Old US Mint, Jackson Square and along the water front.











It was a hot day. The solution: strawberry snowball with condensed milk!


Aftermath of the snowball.


Live latin band + crawfish boil = awesomeness! By the way, the big box of crawfish was only 8 bucks. For 25 bucks you can get the family size which came in an aluminum pan that you normally oven roast a turkey in. Can't lie I was very tempted.


Sugar, sugar, sugar!!!!


At the end of the day and before night fall, we made our way to Congo Square and Louie Armstrong park located on the north edge of the quarter. The square was where slaves gathered and played music. It is the birth place of jazz. It was a very serene little square with a giant oak tree hovering over it.





The Louie Armstrong Park has a canal that snaked around it. There are little bridges and bronze sculptures all through out the park. A few people were on the green lawn enjoying the sun.





We were told the park and square were not safe after dark. It is really sad to me that people would commit crimes in a such historically significant part of the city and in a park that honors the guy who wrote the song "It's a Wonderful World". Oh, the irony.

It was time for dinner. At Old Coffee Pot restaurant Greg ordered the Fleur De Lis Chicken which was a dish featured on the Food Channel. It consisted of a chicken breast paired with crabmeat and Louisiana crawfish stuffing topped with Buerre Blanc with Andouille sweet potato hash and green bean casserole.



I ordered a Crawfish Étouffée which had Louisiana crawfish tails, Creole tomato, onion, bell pepper, and celery shimmered and seasoned with Cajun spices and thickened with a roux served with white rice. I could've licked the bowl clean.



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Location:Gulf of Mexico and New Orleans

Finally, Hola Mexico

Cozumel, Mexico was our last port call on this cruise. We were again not too ambitious and took our time getting off the ship. The pier we docked at was full of shops and restaurants. Almost felt like we didn't even need to leave it to have access to everything.




But we did anyways. When we made it to the street people shouted at us for tours and scooter rentals, but they weren't as persistent or annoying as the hustlers in Jamaica. A friend recommended to us a beach park called Chankanaab. We caught a taxi for $10 USD (for 1 to 4 passengers) for the five minute ride to the park.




The standard entrance fee was $21 USD. For extra $2 USD, you can get a souvenir T-shirt and free drink or extra $27 for a 30 minute massage.
The park is a beach resort with different sea animal shows but to swim with the dolphins was extra.




We caught the sea lion show. They were cute and impressive, good for a few giggles.




We hit the beach after the show. The sand wasn't as white and soft and the water wasn't as calm or blue as the 7 Mile Beach in Grand Cayman but we could snorkel right off the beach. There were reefs, a lot of fishes, even a statue and tombstone.




We ordered lunch (pollo tacos, of course) and drinks right from our beach chairs.




On our way out of the park, we walk through its lagoon and the archeological garden. With everyone on the beach the garden was deserted, which was a shame. The path was full of tropical greenery, Mayan artifact replicas, and a small waterfall with three turtles just hanging out.




















I was a little disappointed that we had no time to check out rest of Cozumel. We picked up a few sample tequilas from the pier duty free shop which had to be checked when we re-broad the ship. They will be returned to us the night before we disembark.

The ship left the dock promptly at 5PM and we started our 7 hours of non-stop eating. Sushi bar first, followed by the dinner buffet, then our actual dinner (with dessert) and finished with a Mexican buffet at midnight!!! In between we took a break to watch a comedy show and 6 lap walk on the jogging track.

Can someone tell me what in the world this thing is?




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Location:Cozumel, Mexico

Swimming with the Lobster

Learning from our Jamaica experience, we wanted to book a diving excursion for our second port in the Grand Cayman. Since I wasn't able to dive and the ship wasn't sure if I could just tag along, we were told to speak to the dive company when we get to shore.

Our ship had to anchor in the bay due to shallow water. We took a "tender" or ferry boat to shore.


When we got to shore, the diving company told us we had to buy the excursion on the ship due to a none compete contract clause and the ship was unable to sell it to us on shore due to being a non-Cayman Island company. Our best bet was to go to another dive company down the road before it was too late. Crap! We didn't want a repeat of Jamaica.

We were in luck, Greg got on a two tank deep dive trip that was leaving in 40 minutes and I got to come along for a ride.





The first dive was 100 feet at a site called Knife. The site got the name because the topography looked like someone took a knife and chopped it up. Greg got to see plenty of marine activity. He's no fish connoisseur so he wasn't able to identify what he saw but he could recognize the lobster a mile away. Apparently it looked to be of the "tasty looking" variety.


As Greg was coming up from his first dive, he caught some jelly fish in the neck area and left these nasty stings. The dive master had to douse him with vinegar. I didn't stay downwind from him for the rest of the afternoon.


The second dive was a shallower dive at 60 feet at a site call Angelfish's Reef. It got its name due to schools and schools of angelfishes. I noticed both sites were very close to the city shores. All the other dives we have been on involved at least one hour boat ride out to the middle of the ocean or somewhere pretty remote. Greg saw a lot more colourful coral and tonnes more unidentifiable fish. No lobster this time.

I even got to snorkel here. I didn't see a lot, but the water was perfect. After the second dive was done, we were dropped off at the 7 Mile Beach, a beautiful white sand beach, but we had to grab lunch first. By the recommendation of our dive boat captain, we checked out Eats Cafe across the street from the Governor's mansion. We ordered an island specialty to start, conch fritters.


For main, I ordered a Jerk Chicken burger. The chicken came twice as big as the bun.


After lunch, we headed back to the beach, right in front of the Governor's Mansion. The beach was so hot that I kept running back to ocean to cool off.





When it was time to head back, we caught a mini van taxi off the street for $2.50 USD per person. This was a really good day. We did everything we wanted to do and no street hustlers were involved. It even ended with a rainbow.


Is there an elephant in my room?


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Location:Grand Cayman Island