(For those of you on both the NOLA and WFD threads, I do apologize....these take too long to write out two times, so I admit to copying and pasting.)
Day 2....
We had my DH drop us off at the Algiers/Canal St. ferry. From there, we walked to Cafe du Monde in the French Quarter. We didn't have to wait for a seat, and we had prompt service. My friend decided she liked the beignets and her cafe au lait.

I had my beignets with chocolate milk. I drink hot coffee every morning, but INSIDE! It was too hot for hot coffee outside!
Then, we walked up St. Ann Street to the state visitor center to see if they had any useful brochures and maps. (Really I was looking for the coupons that they sometimes attach to them, but no luck there...) They ask anyone who walks in the door to write down your zip code and how many nights you are staying. I gave them my zip code but left the # of nights part blank.
Then of course we had to go to Jackson Square to see the St. Louis Cathedral and take pictures.
After that, we went to the Presbytere and the Cabildo. If you plan to visit both in the same day, you can get a 20% discount if you buy the tickets for both at the same time. It was $9.60 per person to enter both museums. The Presbytere currently has a Katrina exhibit on the first floor and a Mardi Gras exhibit on the second.
I was not sure what to expect out of the Katrina exhibit, but we both thought that it was well presented. It told stories from several different perspectives, all of which made me cringe. They had stories from medical workers, tourists who were stuck here, residents who stayed, and some news clips from that time. It was a mix of video, written information boards, photos, artifacts, and some audio stories. They also had information boards about the levee system and what does and does not work as well as the importance of wetlands.
The Mardi Gras exhibit was like the cheap version of Mardi Gras World, without the stale king cake sample and seeing actual floats worked on. They had videos of parades and a lot of info boards. They also had a reproduction of a float stuck behind NOPD barricades.

The part that we found most amusing was this, however:
Yes, they put a facade of porta potties in front of the real bathrooms!
The exhibit covered both current and past Mardi Gras, and other parts of the state. They also had historical artifacts like old trinkets and ball invitations and a large collection of dubloons.
My friend rarely ate lunch, but I was hungry and wanted a counter service meal so we actually went to Arby's and I got a sandwich and she got a milkshake.
Then we went to the Cabildo. This is Louisiana history. Three floors of it. It's an interesting history, but I think two museums in one day might be too much for my attention span.
They did have a hallway of all the flags that have flown over Louisiana.
I think this was the day I took the least amount of pictures. We were allowed to take pictures in both museums, I just didn't take that many.
After the Cabildo, we went into St. Louis Cathedral before heading back to the ferry. We remembered that the ferry left the EB at the :15 and :45 after the hour. We left the Cathedral at about 4:30 and made it on the 4:45! That was a quick walk in that heat!
The river level has gone down, but it still looks so high in this picture since that tree is there.
We got to my house and freshened up a bit before heading out to the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. On Thursday nights they have live music in the atrium; you can listen and browse the galleries for $10 admission.
I like this mural across the street from the Ogden:
The Ogden has a photo exhibit on the Haiti earthquake. I thought for sure that after seeing both the Katrina and Haiti exhibits in the same day I was going to have some sort of nightmare. Fortunately, I didn't!
We ended up leaving the Ogden at 8 and getting dinner at Popeye's on the way home. We had to wait a few minutes for the chicken to be ready, so they gave us both a free mud pie.
