Hello, and welcome to day three of the wonderful road trip!
We began day three on Friday, May 17, 2013 in Baton Rouge, LA. After packing everything up quickly and leaving the Motel 6 around 6AM, we set a course of New Orleans, LA.
The original reason why I chose the route of New Orleans was because of my friend Molly, who lives in New Orleans with the plan of going just to surprise her. After speaking with her for a few months since planning my trip a while back, I finally received a message from her that now wasn't the best time but she was thoroughly upset. My other reason for visiting her was to give her the gift I had been putting together over the past month intending to give to her, that I had finally finished the previous night. Anyways, back to the adventure...
After driving for a bit, we ended up over Lake Pontchartrain, which has an amazing bridge over the diameter of the entire lake. Given that Louisiana is a marsh-like swamp with all of its smaller bodies of water, there are a lot of bridges. We soon arrived in New Orleans and visited the visitor center which was an older train station on Basin Street. I took a few minutes to ask the nearest guide for some information, and she was really quite darling. She had the cutest New Orleans accent that I have ever heard, and she just started handing me information, informing me about everything. I then thanked her for all of her assistance, and went to take photographs of the entire visitor center. After that we went to go visit St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 behind the visitor center where Nicolas Cage's pyramid grave plot is located and where Homer Plessy is buried. We then decided upon going on the City Sightseeing New Orleans tour, which was a classic re-purposed Double Decker bus. Somewhat similar to the original buses back in London, but nothing genuinely similar.
The bus started at the Basin Street Station, and goes throughout New Orleans making several stops. The first stop on Basin Street, we got off to take the trolley up and down the street which you must have exact change for. After walking back to the original stop we departed from, we waited half an hour for the next bus. while the bus was making a turn on Canal Street near the Mississippi, I lost my hat because of the swift turn. I ended up running down off the bus and jumping off while every looked at astonishingly amazed. I ended up grabbing my hat in the middle of the street, which several cars had driven around and people had walked past. I then got a few pictures of the Audubon Aquarium, which I'm hoping I make back to see sometime soon! I took a few more pictures, and then went back to the bus stop, where there was a guy working the stop. I made small talk with him for quite a while, but he seemed slightly clueless.
Anyways, the transport arrived after another half-hour wait since the tours arrive in intervals of thirty minutes. I got on the bus with a really personable funny guy, and stayed on until French Quarter as it drove through a few older parts of town. He told an interesting story about Brad Pitt during dinner one day, and another about John Goodman. We finally arrived at French Quarter on Decatur Street in front of Jax Pub, and as we were departing the tour guide made a joke of not eating too many beignets from Café du Monde or you'd look like Charlie Sheen. He then informed us if we showed our transport ticket we'd get a discount buy one get one.
The next thing I did was get in line at Café du Monde since I was informed that there was a line. While waiting in line, I realized there were several middle school kids from a nearby parish since others came up to them. The first original group of primary school kids were standing in front of me, waiting in line when a second group approached them asking if they could just buy them what they wanted since they were towards the back of the to-go line. One of the girls from the second group handed the bigger African American girl some money, telling her to get her a bag of beignets. There was a smaller girl in the second group, who wanted some as well, but hadn't any money. The bigger girl started bullying the smaller girl, trying to intimidate her for asking her, and continually telling her to "get out of my face" when the girl was standing right next to me. Neither of the chaperons did anything to condone this girls behavior, but I appreciated that the younger girl stood her ground. Understandably enough, these girls would only have money from their parents since they're all so young. We then arrived to the beginning of the line, and the girls left after making their purchase. Once I made my way to the front after them, I asked the cashier about the buy one get one, showing her my ticket. She gave me a confused look and said they didn't do that she knew of. I then asked for two bags, and handed her the money, and instead of getting four bags I received two. From there, I looked around for the group of girls, whom I found about to cross Decatur Street going up Toulouse Street. Right before they crossed, I tapped the little girl on the shoulder that I had seen being bullied. I got down on her level, handed her the extra bag of beignets I had purchased, thanked her, and then walked off. I will admit I did it graciously, albeit it nearly gave me a heart attack.
Over the course of the next hour or so I walked around Jackson Square to get a few pictures. The one thing I noticed that the nice lady back at the visitor centre had mentioned was that there were a lot of street performers, who were only allowed to perform between 11AM and 6PM due to an ordinance. The main areas I wanted to visit were the Andrew Jackson Statue, and the St. Louis Cathedral. I took pictures of both, which I thoroughly enjoyed given their history. Before going into the cathedral I took several pictures of a bird cleaning himself off in the fountain between the statue and the cathedral for one of my favourite gals, who loves animals. My favourite part of the entire trip would have to be St. Louis Cathedral because of the amount of work that was put into the architecture and elaborate decorating of the cathedral. It really is a beautiful building, and being an Engineering major I would love to work on a such one someday soon.
After that, I visited a few shops and found several racks of postcards where I purchased two from. I visited the state visitor center, which was a bit more formal than the last. I had the gentleman running the desk if I was from Barcelona, which I told him I was from the United Kingdom. We spoke for a bit, and he informed me of the Jeanne d'Arc statue farther down Decatur street. I took several pictures of the statue from the middle of the street, and several detailed photographs. From there I walked back to the stop where we departed back for Basin street. While waiting for the transport to depart, I began writing the first postcard letter to my friend, Molly in Metairie, LA since I was unable to see her.
After arriving back at the car, we finally departed for the nearest post office. We ended up finding the post in Lafayette Square, where I shipped her package along with the New Orleans postcard for Molly, and the Texas postcard from New Orleans, LA to Aurora, CO.
We finally departed New Orleans for the final time, stopping at a McDonald's off of Interstate 510 before leaving Louisiana. I messaged Molly, informing her that both packages would arrive the next day, on Saturday. We then headed for Pensacola Beach, FL which we made in excellent time since it was so nearby. After traveling through Mississippi and Alabama, we finally arrived in Florida where I took a picture of a state sign for the final time. We drove into Pensacola, heading towards the beach which was just over the bridge with a toll at the very end. The hotel which we had made a reservation for was the Spring Hill Suites Marriott which really was a beautiful hotel right off of the beach. The difference with Pensacola Beach is that the entire land is surrounded by the Gulf of Mexico.
Since we arrived a bit more decent time, we went to go get food. The very first place we stopped was an outdoor restaurant with cars everywhere. The place we ended up stopping for dinner that night was Flounder's on Gulf Breeze Parkway, which was quite neatly themed since I found a ship called the "Pretty Molly" which I sent to my friend Molly. The rest of the night was spent catching up with my budget, and a few other things that I really needed to do.
The entire day consisted of 284 miles, taking approximately 4.5 hours from Baton Rouge, LA to Pensacola Beach, FL while making a stop in New Orleans's French Quarter.
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