Author Archives: JimG

Lafayette Cemetery is located in the Garden District.  It takes up a city square block but has over 1000 tombs and 7000 people buried there.  It is also the most filmed cemetery in New Orleans including “Double Jeopardy” and “Interview with a Vampire”.

Most of the tombs had more than one person buried in them.   It was not uncommon to see generations of family members from the 1800’s until now buried in tomb.  It is interesting to read the names and try to figure out the relations between the different people in the tomb. Continue reading →

Godzilla Crab

I found Jacques Imo’s Cafe via a list my friend Cindy sent me.  It had a lot of great reviews on Yelp and the pictures of the food looked good. That was enough for me.  Later I found out, that it had been featured on the Food Network many times which for me, is not a reason for going there.

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, I had been to New Orleans many times before, but it was on this trip that I realized there was much more to this city than the French Quarter, Warehouse district and the Garden district.  There are pockets of neighborhoods all over the place that are worth exploring.

We arrived at Jacques Imo’s Cafe and was told it would be 40 minutes until our table was ready, they would send a text.   We went walking around and was surprised when they texted me, had 40 minutes passed?  Where did the time go?  We had to walk very quickly to get back to the restaurant before they gave the table away. Continue reading →

Jackson Square

The French Quarter hasn’t changed much since I saw it last.  Then again, most of the buildings date back more than a hundred years, it would be a shame if it had changed significantly.  Some of the businesses have changed but it pretty much looks the same.

Bourbon street still has that same stale alcohol smell.  You cannot escape it, nor can you escape the loud music.   It doesn’t matter what time of day it is, there are always people walking around with drinks in their hand, often two.  Some of them extremely drunk.  I was probably one of them years ago but somewhere along the way learned a few things.

As always, groups of people (mainly men) stood on balconies drinking and smoking trying to tempt women into showing their tits for a string of plastic beads.  It never ceases to amaze me what can happen when there is alcohol involved how else would someone be enticed by a 50 cent string of plastic beads to expose themselves?

The atmosphere of the French Quarter is amazing.   I love walking up and down the narrow streets and taking it all in.  There is so much history.  There really isn’t any other place like it. Continue reading →

Joseph Merrick Jones House (Currently John Goodman’s Home)

May 20, 2017

After brunch, it was onto the Hop on and Hop off tour.   After we circled the Mercedes-Benz superdome we headed over the Garden district.  We got off the bus and took a walking tour.  I am glad a took a tour, I had been to the Garden district before but I hadn’t taken a tour.  There is looking at nice houses and then there is looking at nice houses while be told who built the house, what they did and who visited them.  We saw the house that was the inspiration for Disneyland’s Haunted House, we saw the house that Anne Rice lived in.  We saw the house of the Carroll family and learned how Mark Twain would stay there when he visited New Orleans. Continue reading →

Saturday, May 20, 2017

We started the day with brunch at Atchafalaya.   After I gave the hostess my name, I noticed that a couple of women walked in behind us.  For some reason I took notice, both were impeccably dressed and one of the woman was just stunning.  For some reason, I felt like I knew her,  there was a sense of familiarity, it wasn’t just her face but her manners.  She noticed me looking and smiled.

I casually turned to Sophon and Cindy and pointed out the two ladies saying that there was something very familiar about the one and added the I think she might be famous.  It wasn’t until the following day when I mentioned to Cindy that I saw on the local news that Helen Mirren was in town, in fact she speaking at Tulane University’s graduating class.  She said that she used to live in New Orleans and was having fun getting re-acquainted with it.  Cindy made the connection and said, the woman we saw at Atchafalaya, that was Helen Mirren. Continue reading →