Mardi Gras Weekend in New Orleans

I've visited New Orleans a couple times before (for a bachelorette party and then a long weekend getaway to celebrate K's birthday, which turned out to be Southern Decadence weekend so that was an unexpected amount of fun people watching).

2015 Year Recap: Part 2

It's incredible 2015 has come to an end. Overall it was an amazing year and I kept very busy with traveling and celebrating weddings, birthdays, new babies and everything in between. I posted Part 1 of 2015 last week so here goes the second half of the year.

July:
We traveled to Las Vegas to celebrate a girl friend's 30th birthday and our fifth wedding anniversary. We saw Tiesto in concert and had dinner at the top of the Stratosphere for our anniversary.


 

August:

Celebrated Kate's birthday at Sunday brunch downtown Orlando.

September:

September was a fairly busy month. K and I flew to New Orleans to celebrate his birthday and explore the city. One of my favorite restaurants we ate at for lunch was Pierre Maspero's.

We went to explore Wekiva Island with Kate and her hubs.

Celebrated some friend's at their joint bachelor/bachelorette party.

Also went to Animal Kingdom with K and enjoyed a safari ride and a few other rides.

October:

My parents came in town to visit for a couple weeks and we went to Epcot's Food & Wine Festival.

K and I went back to Disney the following weekend to explore Hollywood Studios and went on several rides.

November:

We flew to Barbados for a girl friend's wedding which I was a bridesmaid in.

 

While we were in Barbados, K and I took an amazing catamaran boat cruise around the island and then toured the island with friends.

Met Kristen at Epcot while I was there with Pamela and Kerri for the Food & Wine Festival.

K and I also visited Magic Kingdom one last time before our Disney annual passes expired.



We attended our first holiday party a friend's house and got to catch up with all the girls.

December:

December is always a busy month with holiday parties and my birthday so lots of fun was had.

We went to Kate's annual holiday party which included a photo booth so everyone had a blast with that plus the white elephant gift exchange had some hilarious gifts.

My work holiday party at Universal Studios was also an amazing night and Kate came as my date since K was traveling for work.

I got to reconnect with some  college buddies over a sushi dinner and ring in my 32nd birthday downtown Orlando at a bar for a quick drink at midnight.

The girls came out on Sunday the 13th to celebrate my birthday at the best brunch spot in Orlando and I got spoiled with their love and gifts.

K finally returned from his work trip and we had another (late) birthday celebration the next weekend at the Orlando Eye.

Christmas was spent with my in-laws and extended family in Sarasota. It was a nice relaxing weekend with lots of good food and quality time with family.

I have to say 2015 was a pretty epic year and I'm looking forward to what 2016 has in store for us.

I hope you all enjoy NYE night and wishing you the very best for 2016!

NOLA Take 2

We arrived in New Orleans on Friday night just in time for some dinner and touring Bourbon Street. Our original plan was to go to Acme Oyster House for dinner but after arriving there and seeing the line was out the door, we went across the street to Bourbon House which also had great seafood. K and I shared some oysters, gumbo, and the most delicious crab cake ever!

Since it was already late we went to check out the bar scene on Bourbon Street which is a never a dull moment.

My favorite bar was probably Huge Ass Beers because they had the cider I like and well the name is just funny. Labor Day in Nola is also Gay Pride weekend (as I mentioned yesterday in Part 1) so there were some protesters on Bourbon Street which caused a scene considering the crowd. We saw crazy characters like drunk Homer Simpson and most of K and I's photos together had a funny photobomb of some sort.

On Saturday after touring Jackson Square and trying some beignets, we met up at Lafittes Blacksmith Shop Bar to go on the Bloody Mary's Ghost Pub Crawl with a small group of people who were also visiting and a tour guide, who shared lots of great history about New Orleans along with all the ghosts stories. It wasn't exceptionally scary and we didn't see any ghosts (thankfully) but it was a fun tour.

On Saturday night we had dinner at Oceana Grill. K and I shared more oysters, crab cakes and ettouffe. We clearly couldn't get enough of trying all the seafood but we enjoyed taste testing everything instead of getting big meals.

We also really liked the view from our hotel every morning and the location was perfectly central in the French Quarter near to the Mississippi River.

Sunday was all about some jazz brunch, touring the Mississippi Riverwalk, and then over to Frenchman Street which is where all the locals hangout as opposed to Bourbon Street.

We ate at The Original Pierre Maspero's. I definitely recommend this restaurant for lunch or dinner. So good!

Finally we ventured over to the Decadance festival to walk around and check out all the action. There was so much going on. So many fun costumes, dancing in the streets and just overall craziness. I think the pictures can speak for themselves.

As you can see from the photos, we had a blast touring NOLA and celebrating K's 35th birthday.

Wanderlust Wednesday: New Orleans

I'm back online today just in time for Kate, Kerri and my Wanderlust Wednesday travel linkup. On the 2nd Wednesday of every month, we host WW so feel free to linkup your travel-related posts. I love reading and living vicariously through your travel adventures.

My trip to New Orleans this past long weekend was a fantastic and very hectic time. K and I stayed in the heart of the French Quarter which made it easy to walk around and explore. The only time we took a taxi was to and from the airport. We arrived on Friday night with a loose itinerary and a list of restaurants to eat at. It wasn't possible to accomplish it all in 3 days but we covered good ground and kept very busy from morning til late night. Needless to say we're pretty exhausted but it was all worth it.



The food there is incredible and of course Bourbon Street provides great entertainment and live music all day everyday. What we didn't know is that it was also Gay Pride weekend or "Southern Decadance" so you can imagine people watching was at it's finest and I'm glad we got to experience the craziness that is Labor Day/Decadance weekend. I love attending the Gay Pride festivals in downtown Orlando so it was great to experience it somewhere else.

On Saturday we went to Coop's Place on Decatur St which has amazing local food if you're looking for casual New Orleans style dining. 

We went over to Jackson Square to walk around and check out the art, architecture, and history scene.

The line for Cafe Du Monde was about 100 people deep so we decided to go to New Orleans Famous Beignets Cafe instead for some beignets and coffee.

On Sunday morning we had brunch at Mr B's Bistro with live jazz music which was amazing!

We then toured the Riverwalk along the Mississippi river. Unfortunately the ferry was closed that day so we couldn't make it over to the other side of the river. 

We stayed at the Sheraton off Canal Street. Great location and price and we also had a nice view of the Mississippi River!

I literally have almost 200 photos on my camera and iPhone so it was hard choosing which ones to share. I've decided to split this trip recap into two posts and share photos from my camera today which are more touring the city photos with some food and restaurants we enjoyed.

Part 2 tomorrow will also be food and touring but more of the bar scene which is when my big camera gets put away and iPhone comes out. So check back tomorrow for some of the crazier sites and scenes we experienced in New Orleans.

<div align="center">
<a href="http://peridotkutie.blogspot.com/" title="Wanderlust Wednesdays"><img src="http://i60.tinypic.com/14ttvdc.jpg" alt="Wanderlust Wednesdays" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

Link-up Rules:
1. Follow Kerri, Kate and myself on Bloglovin
2. Link up your favorite travel recaps or travel related posts
3. Grad our Wanderlust Wednesdays button and link back to our blogs
4. Be sure to visit other blogs and build your travel bucket list!