New Orleans Weekend

Hotel Monteleone - Carousel bar - sit on stools as they rotate around the bar or possibly the bar is rotating around you, regardless try a two drink per trip around the bar minimum and you'll start to think the world is rotating around you.

Get your palm/tarot/bones read or caricature drawn in Jackson Square after eating beignets at the Cafe du Monde

Watch the street performers during the day along Royal while you pop in and out of all of the stores along street art glass, retro clothing, tacky souvenirs, new orleans art

New Orleans has too many great restaurants to eat anything you could have at home. Experiment. They can cook just about anything and make it taste good

Quick Tips:

Best Way To Get Around:

Walk around the Quarter. You'll walk farther than you realized though. Make sure to stop in at a bar on the way back to your hotel to give yourself a well deserved rest.

I'm more of a Marriott (Courtyard at that) price range type of a person, but most rooms in the French Quarter were sold out. It was between the Ritz Carlton (Papa Noel rates in December) or the Best Western. It seemed like a no brainer and it was.

The bed was luxurious as were the robes. I took all of the toiletries. Also, I got back to my room around midnight and there was an ice bucket full of unmelted ice waiting for me when I got in. The shower was kind of a letdown, but you're dealing with below sea level water pressure.

The location is the only drawback. There was about a block there that was a little seedy before you hit areas with lots of tourists.

I had the best cheeseburger I've ever eaten in the bar - where there was a band playing some jazzed up Christmas music. I wouldn't have felt comfortable wearing jeans in the bar though.

No Reservations You'll have to wait for a table like every other restaurant in the area, but here you progress from one waiting area to another. The first area is a garage like room where the restrooms are. The second room is a narrow room lined with tables and a piano player - It was December and he played the Charlie Brown Christmas song for me. Then dinner.

Dinner itself, I ate all of my vegetables. Literally. They served brocollini a brocolli kale hybrid I think. It tasted like sweet brocolli, looked like asparagus and was delicious. I also had the veal the sauce was a little overpowering. Baked Alaska is supposed to be their specialty but I was too full for dessert.

Space is very tight.

I wouldn't go there again. There are just too many restaurants to try in New Orleans, but I would recommend it to someone who'd never been there.