New Orleans, Louisiana Day 2

Our only full day in New Orleans was very wet.

Walking around the French Quarter, we happened upon the visiting film crew of the CBS Daytime Drama The Young & The Restless. They were in town for some on-location shooting scheduled to air around Thanksgiving Day.

The Presbytere, one of the Louisiana State Museums, houses the new interactive multimedia exhibit "Living With Hurricanes: Katrina and Beyond" which opened on October 26, 2010.

Unfortunately, our full day in New Orleans was Election Day and all the Louisiana State Museums were closed today.

The first New Orleans streetcar line dates all the way back to 1835!
This is Natchez IX, a sternwheel steamboat which has been running harbor and dinner cruises since it was built in 1975. It temporarily relocated to Baton Rouge following Hurricane Katrina.

One of New Orlean's newest attractions is the Southern Food & Beverage Museum located at the Riverwalk Marketplace.

Little white lunch buckets full of red beans and rice were common at the workplace in New Orleans in the mid-1900's.

Prices at the turn of the 19th century were quite a bit less than those at the turn of the 21st century. Who says we don't have inflation?

Southbend has been making commercial cooking equipment for over 100 years. Here is a range from around the time the company was founded.

Here is a modern range from the company. Complete with its own PC!

Here is a range from Munchkinland.

While at the Southern Food & Beverage Museum, you can learn how to distill your own rum and gin, just like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

Marlon has decided bartending may be a good profession for him.

Eddie Gabriel was known as "The Rhythm Man" by tapping taped thimbles on the metal tray he carried. He died during Katrina at 95 years of age.

In 2009, Rick and Monica Defenbaugh donated these file cabinets full of literally thousands of recipes they had collected over the years.

Yeah, the drawers really are filled with recipe cards! The couple discovered recipes on the internet in 2002 and now print their recipes instead of writing them on index cards.

How about a little something from the Katrina Deli?

Yummy!

Shop here for all your Mardi Gras needs.

This would be a great place to relax on a nice dry day.

The rain of the day provided us with the opportunity to catch this nighttime picture which we thought was pretty neat.

For more pictures, click here .

To be continued...

New Orleans, Louisiana & French Quarter RV Resort

Our final major destination before reaching Florida was New Orleans, Louisiana.

On the way, someone lost their load of big, rusted metal pipes.

Our entire trip from West Yellowstone has been dry, but it looks like we may be heading into some storm clouds.

The skyline of Downtown New Orleans includes the Superdome, home of the New Orleans Saints.

The French Quarter RV Resort features rv sites with red brick pavers and plenty of room.

The office is designed to remind visitors that they are very near the French Quarter.

Amenities at the French Quarter RV Resort are among the nicest we have seen.

The best amenity is its close proximity to all the festivities of Bourbon Street.

On a stroll down Bourbon Street, we spotted some horse-mounted police.

For more pictures, click here .

To be continued...

Beaumont, Texas Part 2

While visiting Downtown Beaumont, we could see broken windows remaining in some of the buildings as a reminder of Hurricanes Rita and Ike.

Next, we visited the Texas Energy Museum where they had just had Dinosaur Day the day before.

This interactive movie takes you from the Gulf of Mexico to the Port of Beaumont, the same route ships carrying barrels of oil take.

Since it was the Energy of Museum and the State of Texas, there were obviously a lot of old oil and gas artifacts.

This tank wagon was used to deliver 500 gallons of kerosene from 1910 to 1926.

This pump was from a time when Regular meant LEADED, not UNleaded.

Driving around Beaumont, foundations can be found where houses stood prior to the hurricanes.

Many houses have still not been repaired and reinhabited.

Alfred E. Neuman is Beaumont, Texas' Muffler Man.

The gusher at Spindletop, discovered in 1901, was the first significant oil discovery along the Gulf Coast.

We visited the Spindletop Gladys City Boomtown Museum to learn some more about Spindletop's history.

The living history museum contains over a dozen reproductions of historical buildings from the era of Spindletop's boom.

The first company to drill on Spindletop was the Gladys City Oil, Gas & Manufacturing Company, named after a little girl named Gladys Bingham.

Gladys received two shares of the company in 1901 which she later sold for over $250,000. That was in early 20th century dollars!

The museum was hit by Hurricane Rita in 2005 and closed for about two years for repairs.

For more pictures, click here pictures 75-166.

To be continued...