Friday, August 17, 2007

We're Back

We arrived back from New Orleans Thursday evening as the dirty side of the Hurricane was making its way over our city. It took us so long to get home and then we had to get ready for work the next day. Today was my first official day back. It was a work day and my Principal let us work in our rooms all day. My room is just about ready. For lunch today she had our lunch catered from Olive Garden and the superintendent was there along with some others from the Central Office to celebrate our success. We made Recognized due to our TAKS scores last year. Something to definitely celebrate.


Below I am going to share some pictures from New Orleans. It was a hot, not crowded place and we had a great time sightseeing and eating! The above picture is the Superdome for their football team.Above is our hotel. We stayed at the Hampton Inn Convention Center. I didn't want to stay in the French Quarter since we had our son along on this trip. It was an old mill converted into a hotel. It was very open and lofty feeling. The flowers were sitting on a table in front of the elevators, so you got a nice smell coming and going. They are real! If you look in the background you can see the loftiness of the lobby. Our room had super soft beds that were high up. They had little step ladders to help you crawl into them. And the ceilings were very high as well.
The view out our window. There was a nice green space next door. Just pass the tall building is the French Quarter.





This building is on Decatur Street. I love the balcony. The flowers were not very colorful since it was so hot. I would love to have a chair up there and people watch!

These building were along Royal Street. I love the architecture in the French Quarter area. The ironwork with all the swirls and the cute canopies just add so much charm. We didn't linger down there once it started to get dark. The atmosphere changes and you can sense it. Also, I didn't want my son to experience too much!
If you ever get to New Orleans you have to make a stop here, Cafe Du Monde, to eat beignets. Be careful not to laugh while eating or you will end up blowing powder sugar all over your dining partners!

These pictures are from another favorite area of New Orleans, the Garden District. In this area are beautiful old homes. The pictures are not great because we were in a moving car. There is a street car that use to run down St Charles Street but since Hurricane Katrina it is not operating so we had to drive it ourselves.

Every where we went we always asked about Hurricane Katrina and how they were impacted by this terrible storm. The stories the people shared with us were awful and brought tears to my eyes. We drove through areas devastated by the hurricane but I didn't take pictures. You would be absolutely shocked. The storm happened two years ago and people are still struggling to get their homes and their lives back.

Tomorrow I'll share the fun excursions we did.

2 comments:

Terri Steffes said...

Your trip sounds totally fascinating. What a roller coaster ride with your emotions, though, huh? I once sneezed when I had a beignet in my hand, well, you can imagine the results!

Terri Steffes said...

CJ is not near JC it is probably a good 3-4 hours away... too bad, that would have been fun!