New Orleans Museum of Art (Not as great as I had hoped, but they have a great Faberge egg collection, along with some really interesting Meissen pottery)

The French Quarter (a bit wild for a family with children. We took a carriage ride down Bourbon Street and saw some things we wished that our little ones hadn't seen!)

Musee Conti Wax Museum, The Audubon Zoo, the Steamboat Natchez Dinner/Jazz Cruise, Audubon Aquarium of the Americas, and Dr. Wagner's Honey Island Swamp Tours

City Park (we liked Storyland for small children, a children's playground modeled around storybook characters)

Blaine Kern's Mardi Gras World (This was one of our favorites. You can come see where Mardi Gras is made. They make about 80% of the Mardi Gras floats here, and many of them are on display. You can watch while the artists create them. They give you a chance to try on some Mardi Gras costumes (they are heavy) and take photos, as well as sample King Cake)

Grayline Super City Tour (a great way to get introduced to the city)

The River Road plantations (outside of the city, but an absolute must-see for anyone visiting)

Good places to eat nearby -- The breakfast at the Embassy Suites Hotel (right down the street) was $10 for Plaza Suites guests. It was fabulous and had everything, like beignets, omelets made to order, cereals, crawfish, and more. The Embassy suites also had a nice little restaurant for lunch or dinner called the Sugar House.

The Ernest Cafe (right next door) was good. Tuesday night is steak night. For $10 per person, you get an 8-ounce rib-eye, a baked potato with butter and chives, and popcorn to munch on while you are waiting. It was good and a real bargain.

Another great place is Mother's Cafe. It is about 2 blocks away. It has traditional New Orleans soul food. The red beans and rice and jambalaya were great. My son ordered three pancakes. They would have fed an army.

Best Things About the Resort:
Location, location, location. This resort is in a great location. It is not in the French Quarter, but only about a 10-minute walk from there. It is about 1 block away from a major parade route, so it would be an awesome place to stay during Mardi Gras. We loved that they had daily maid service, so our bed was made and we got clean towels daily. The maids were really nice as well.

They had a free continental breakfast three times a week (Saturday, Tuesday, and Thursday). They had a variety of pastries. Our favorite was the carrot muffins. They were served with coffee, juice, or water. The breakfast was right outside our door, so it was very convenient and helped us defray some of the cost of the vacation.

Resort Experience:
The resort is in an old firehouse built in the 1880s. The rooms are much smaller than we are accustomed to at other timeshares, but they are in such a great location that you don't spend that much time in the room. There is a community hot tub, but no swimming pool. Parking is $12 per day and limited. That seems like a lot to pay, but after being there and looking around, it is actually a good deal. You park in Harrah's lot, which normally charges $25 a day.

• Unit Type: 1 Bedroom
• Activities: Not Available
• Amenities: Fair
• Unit Satisfaction: Very Good
• Family Friendliness: Excellent
• Service: Excellent

On first approaching this hotel’s massive facade, stretching the length of a football field along the boulevard fronting the Royal Palace, my first thought was . . .

"My God! What’s this COSTING me?"

Waiting at the apex of the canopied driveway were several footmen . . . er, bellmen . . . who wouldn’t think of letting me carry my own backpack into the elegantly appointed lobby. It looked like the kind of place the Colonial British would have reserved for their upper-est crust.

I was here as part of a "ground package" lumping 16 hotel nights together with various tours, transfers, and intercity transportation. Tour organizers, who negotiate substantial discounts, rarely if ever disclose a particular hotel’s rate, nor would the hotel say what I was paying. I can tell you that it was considerably less than the Sedona’s published rate. My guess is less than US$100.

For this I got a large twin-bedded room with a private balcony (though it looked down on the swimming pool, not the Royal Palace). Plus, a full buffet breakfast including custom-made omelets, assorted hot meats, and Asian noodle dishes. There was a large outdoor swimming pool and outdoor bar, a small work-out gym, and two lighted tennis courts.

The "Coffee Shop," which was actually a quality full-service restaurant, was more than adequate for my needs. There was a smaller, more intimate fine-dining restaurant, but it didn’t open until 6:30, later than I prefer.

Though the Sedona was directly across the street from the walls and moat of the Royal Palace complex, one had to walk more than a half mile to reach the only entrance open to the general public. There was what appeared to be a quality restaurant and night club 2 to 3 blocks to the east, but the rail station and main shopping areas were more than a mile away.

Sedona also has a hotel in Yangon, even larger and more opulent. (You could launch a small yacht in its swimming pool.) The Yangon Sedona offered me one of Asia’s greatest travel bargains: 8 hours’ daytime use of a room, the pool and fitness club, and the restaurant for just $32 to tide me through an awkward airline connection on the way home.