Bourbon Street, Uploaded by M+MD.
It was another lazy day by the pool. The sky was clearer and the sun was hotter. But there are lots of shady spots in the garden. When it gets too hot we can either go for a swim or go inside where the air conditioning is a cool 70 degrees.
We consulted Zagat again and decided to see if we could locate a good value point. We also thought we might explore the French Quarter again. We settled on Adolfos on Frenchmans Street. Frenchmans is also a good place to check out the music venues - d.b.l. and Snug Harbor being just 2 I have read about. We headed out around six and we found a parking lot at the Farmers Market just on the eastern edge of the Quarter.
We walked up Frenchmans and found Adolfos . We almost past it by. It is located above a bar in a run down looking timber building. Only for the name on the door; some reassurance that the address was correct and that we were using the current edition of Zagat we would have assumed it was closed down. We went up the dark stairs and found the restaurant on the second floor as Zagats had promised. It also promised southern Italian cuisine with a Louisiana touch. The room was dark but cool. We were a little early but there were some diners there before us. We were greeted by someone who looked like he might even be Adolfo and he showed us to a table by the window. Adolfo gave us the menus and asked us if it was our first time here. When we confirmed that it was, he then advised us that it was cash only if that was ok! No problem!
The menu was very interesting, seafood of course but also a range of veal and chicken dishes. Adolfo told us that the house speciality (not on the menu) was rack of lamb. Another speciality was the blue ocean sauce which was a seafood sauce with shrimp and crawfish. It all sounded delicious. I ordered the veal with ocean sauce; Lisa decided on the Cannelloni and Mags ordered spicy chicken. Senan went for the rack of lamb. Each main course came with a salad or pasta served Italian style, as a first plate. The meat dishes were each wonderfully tasty. Senan's rack of lamb was amazing as you can see! We couldn't even think about dessert so we paid up and headed out into the evening. We certainly are planning a return trip there.
We wandered over towards Bourbon Street. We were at the far end of the quarter but we could see the bright lights of the Bourbon Street bars in the distance. By now it was dark and it was also warm and humid. There were some interesting houses at this end of Bourbon Street. Most buildings had what looked like a 2 seater sofa out front - they were steps up to the door with a little low wall built up each side.
As we walked along we wondered if Senan would get into any of the bars or venues. One of the first bars we passed offered European Jazz and we noticed a family with some young kids sitting inside the door. We marked that down for later, in any event the music wasn't due to start for another 30 minutes. We wandered into a Voodoo Shop selling all sorts of things including dolls - very strange. There was an interesting poster and photo shop - Senan got some postcards of Jimmi Hendrix and Bob Marley. As we moved down Bourbon the bars got louder and although it was mid-week and not too busy it was still starting to rock and you could see how it might be at the week-end or during Mardi Gras, or even at 2 in the morning!. Most bars had live bands. There was probably more rock than jazz being played in the bars we passed. We didn't go the full length of the street it was just getting brighter and louder!
Somewhere past Pat O'Briens we headed back to the first pub we had seen. The music had started and as we stood looking in we were ushered to seats just in front of the band - we ordered beers and sat in and enjoyed the music. It turns out that this was Fritzels, one of the better known spots. The band played old fashioned jazz. The trumpeter played and sang in the Louis Armstrong style. Senan was pretty impressed with the banjo player. The place was pretty small but they packed them in and sold them drink. We were on a narrow bench with a table behind our backs - not the most comfortable but we had a good view of the action. We stayed about 40 minutes. The music was very good - but we were getting past our bed-time! We headed home exhausted. Another good day.
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