Scary Spice

My internet service was lacking the past several days so I was unable to post.  We left Georgia and made our way across Alabama.  We were suppose to stay in a state park along the Mobile Bay, but when we got there the gates were locked.  We ended up spending the night in a Wal-Mart parking lot.  This is the second time we stayed at a Wal-Mart during our travels and it really wasn't bad.  The Wal-Mart's are well lit and they do save us some money.  We also bought donuts for breakfast which weren't so bad either.

We left Wal-Mart and made our way to New Orleans.  We stayed in Bayou Segnette State Park in Westwego.  This is on the West Bank of the Mississippi.  To get to the city we drove about 20 minutes to the Algiers Ferry which took us across the river to the French Quarter.  Driving to the ferry was interesting because we went through these areas with very dumpy shacks directly across the street from nice, neighborhood-looking houses.  We originally thought this area looked that way because of Katrina, but we later learned that this was one of the only areas not affected and it was one of the first areas opened for people to return to.

Getting off the ferry was very intimidating.  I lived in Chicago for a period of time, but my kids have never really spent time in a big city.  They've been to Baltimore and Washington, D.C., but this was very different for them.  We also didn't know our way around so we used my map app to navigate.  


We made our way to the French Quarter and walked the streets taking in the architecture and general atmosphere.  We had a wonderful dinner of catfish, shrimp, ettoufee, jambalaya, and gumbo.  I was not a fan of the gumbo, but loved the ettoufee.


We walked down to Bourbon Street, stood there, looked around, and then we moved on.  The kids were very intimidated and honestly so was I since they were there too.  Dave and I concluded it would be more fun to visit just the two of us because we could visit the different places more freely.  

As we made our way back to the ferry, the girls found a store on St. Louis Street that had beautiful masks.  They each got one as a souvenir and they looked adorable!  It was an interesting yet intimidating first encounter.


The next morning we decided to head back to explore further.  Several friends and family suggested we go to Cafe Du Monde so it was first on the agenda.  Before we even left Westwego, we saw a seafood market where we decided to stop.  There were maybe twenty vendors all selling the same thing.  They had fresh shrimp, crawfish, blue crabs, fish, and more.  We learned that many of the blue crabs in Maryland are actually shipped in from New Orleans. We made plans to stop back there to pick up our dinner.

Our next trip to the city was better.  The kids were less nervous, which allowed all of us to enjoy things more.  We stopped at various stores and we got Beignets at Cafe Du Monde.  They sort of reminded me of funnel cake, so they were a nice treat.  After we left there we walked through the farmers market and got a Shoe Sole Praline which was a huge, sweet, cinnamon-ee cookie.  It was delicious!  We continued through to the flea market and had fun visiting each of the stands.  We worked our way back to the River Walk and tried an original praline.  It was not even close in comparison to the praline's we had in Savannah.  I highly recommend trying a Savannah praline some time in your life.  If you like sugar, as I do, you will never forget the experience!


On our way back to the campground, we stopped at the fish market.  We bought crawfish and shrimp to boil for dinner.  We did learn that if you ask for "cray"fish, they have no idea what you want. Yet another language barrier.


So, we were educated on how to cook these Louisiana delights.  They do not steam their shrimp or crabs.  You boil everything in Cajun spices and you let them sit in the juices to soak up all the seasoning.  We bought our spices at one of the stands.  It was a homemade batch and the lady working at the stand told us how much to buy and how much to use per batch.  We got back and boiled our crawfish and shrimp as directed by our adviser and we let them sit to soak up the flavor.  Well, that was an eye opening experience!  We all took our first bite and suffered the burn and heat immediately.  It was scary, crazy hot!  I finally had to rinse both the crawfish and shrimp multiple times just to get them to the point of enjoying them.  I sat and popped the heads off and cleaned them as best I could for the kids.  By the time I went to bed, after showering and washing my hands several times, my skin still burned!  It was the most bazaar thing.


The next morning when we went back to buy the crabs, we found out from another vendor that we should have only used a tablespoon or two of seasoning and that we were probably told differently so we would buy the larger amount.  Gotta love how they mess with the tourist.  Seriously, a painful lesson to learn.