New Orleans

Fat Tuesday had arrived! I had talked so long about going to New Orleans for Mardi Gras and now it was here and I was there too! I am so lucky, all the things I had really wanted to do, I have pretty much done so far. However in the tradition of me being a "glass half empty" girl I can't help thinking that I have only one more big event before I return to England, St Patrick's day. I am not sad about that, I find it hard to believe that I've been here for seven months, that I am at the tail end of a year long trip and I don't know if I'll ever be able to do this again or even if I would want to.

We all woke pretty early, me first of all, but that's nothing new. I went down to breakfast while the other four were getting their stuff together. Danny had decided to stay in bed as he had had enough of parades and didn't want anymore beads or a coconut. Fat Tuesday sees the two biggest parades, first the Zulu parade and second the Rex parade, where you get to see the carnival king. This is what I had come to see and to party on Bourbon St. afterwards. We walked towards uptown, John had a place in mind for us to stand and we followed. We were walking parallel to the parade route and it wasn't looking good, all the side roads were full and it didn't look as if we could get anywhere near then we just decided to go up to the parade route and take a look. It was a sunny morning but if you stood in the shade it was freezing, so that's what we did. We found a stretch of street with no barricades in the shade and staked out our ground. Luckily the parades must have started pretty much on time as we didn't have to wait hours for the first float to come through. I was still having a few issues with getting beads, this time it wasn't my tall friends causing me problems, it was people with their kids on their shoulders. This was one of those times where I don't like children. Despite this I managed to get two coconuts, a Beanie Baby and a load of beads. Jess and I were getting so many beads that we were getting picky about whether or not we would accept them. Then we started throwing the crappy beads back at the floats! The parades are good but our one issue, not just mine, but the others as well was with the marching bands. There are loads of bands interspersed with the floats and I'm sure they're great, it's just that we never got to hear that many play actual music. We heard a lot of drumming, which was good, but not a lot of music. I was very disappointed. The Rex parade started almost as soon as the Zulu one had finished going past, which was great. Even better was that there were a load of porta potties set up two minutes walk from where we were watching the parade and they were free. No paying to go to the toilet or getting to a toilet and finding out it was a "private" porta potty. Yes, people had rented their own toilets. If you have enough people, it makes total sense and I'd do it in a heartbeat. Although I am not sure I would come back to the city for Mardi Gras. I am sure you get to see more at quieter times of the year.

Danny joined us for the last portion of the Rex Parade, I think he had gotten bored waiting for us at the hotel and had had enough of a lie in. We sorted out all our of parade loot in the room and got some lunch on the way to the French Quarter. The French Quarter was heaving as you'd expect, we went in via the "Gay" part according to John, but it wasn't hard to see that he was correct. Despite this I got to see my first pair of boobs in about five minutes of arriving on Bourbon St., this woman was just walking around with her boobs hanging out of her top. She was surrounded by people taking photos and by people, I of course mean men. It was like these guys had never seen boobs before. This was one reason I was not going to get mine out, also I didn't want any more beads and it was too cold to expose myself. We had pooled all of our beads and piled them into three bags, we were going to get rid of them from a balcony if we could get on one without paying an obscene amount of money.

Walking down Bourbon St. is an experience any time of year, I'm sure but during Mardi Gras, it's like you've entered a whole new party world where anything goes. It's even worse than Vegas as there are random acts of nakedness by both sexes.I don't think I've ever felt so nondescript in my life and not minded being so unnoticeable. We asked at a few bars about balcony prices and John managed to haggle one guy down from $75 to $30 with drinks and we seriously considered it. We tried a bar that had been recommended to me, the Bourbon Blues Company and they were charging $5 balcony access and they were doing 3 for 1 beers, we were in!! We got up onto the balcony and of course it was packed with no space at the front, I decided that I was going to selfish this time, Fumi would have to get her own space or John could do it for her. I was getting a space for myself. I touched a guy on the back to get his attention and put on my best British accent to ask very nicely if I could squeeze in by him to throw some beads, he said yes. I spent the next couple of hours throwing beads, seeing girls boobs and guys asses, it was great. I had an awesome time, I even managed to get Danny a spot at the front. He was all about the boobs of course. When we had exhausted the beads in the bag I started to throw away the beads I was wearing, I didn't want them and I certainly didn't want to carry them in my rucksack. I had a pendant that had flashing lights and down below was a young girl, at least she looked young. I felt that I couldn't ask to see her boobs, it felt pervy so I was looking to give the pendant to someone else, but she did flash me so she got it!

Finally all the beads were gone and we decided that it was time to rejoin the crowds down on the street. John, Fumi and Misako headed off to get some crayfish as Misako hadn't eaten any yet. Jess, Danny and I went to a specific bar so that Danny could get a Zombie, a drink one of his friends had recommended. The bar was great, it was at the very end of Bourbon St., so there was room to move around inside and out, the doors all opened on to the street so you could hear the music and people were dancing in the street. We wandered a little before deciding that this bar was the best place to be. In the middle of the Bourbon St. intersections were groups of people with signs asking us all to repent and to accept Jesus into our hearts. I don't know why they think that Jesus wouldn't want us all to have a good time. I don't have an issue with them and in fact I respect that they have the courage of their convictions to come out and do this, especially what is a very hostile crowd. There was also a silent demonstration by another Christian group, they marched through the crowds and didn't say anything to anyone, I think it was more effective at getting me to think about what I was doing then the other people telling me I was going to Hell.

Danny, Jess and I danced in the streets and were generally having a good time. This is what Bourbon St. should be all about . I was inside when I noticed everyone running outside, further up the street a house had caught on fire and was well ablaze. I ran up there and saw that everyone was taking photos, I asked a guy if someone had called the fire brigade, thankfully someone had. I have to admit that I took photos too. Not a very nice side of human nature. Eventually the fire brigade and police turned up and cleared everyone out of the area. Us three decided that we didn't want to stay at the same bar any longer and headed back to the main part of the street. We met the other three on they way and they decided that they were going into another bar which we didn't fancy. It wasn't long before we headed back to the hotel, John and the others arrived not long after us. It had been a long, eventful day.