We then drove to the rookery site and the owner was more than happy to let us walk out to see the birds. For those of you who are not Facebook friends I have added a few of the pictures I was able to capture. The area was alive with birds in their finest breeding plumage. There was a lot of squawking and fighting going on for nesting sites, and it seemed to be standard practice for the birds to steal sticks from other nests. Some birds were already on eggs, some were still building nests and we saw a few instances of coitus while we were there. Josie was enjoying it all till we started to see gators coming in. She was back in the car in a flash. I must admit having a 13 foot gator crawl out of the water only a few yards away was a little unnerving.
We have been to New Orleans many times but we keep coming back for the fabulous food and drink. So in this post you will see a lot of food and drink pictures. Also just walking around the French Quarter is an experience in itself. The people, the architecture, and the smells, some good, some bad, make for an interesting time. But for us it's mostly about the food. On our first evening in town we visited the suburban location of one of our favorite restaurants The Acme Oyster Bar. As the name implies they specialize in raw oysters. On this visit we tried their Oysters Rockefeller Soup for the first time. It is so rich and tasty we will make it a must do on our next visit.
We have seen Willie Mae's on many of the Food Network shows, so decided to give it a try. We waited in line for 40 minutes to get in but the food made the wait worthwhile. The Fried Chicken was delicious, a little spicy as is almost all food in New Orleans. Josie ordered the Butter Beans and Rice side which was fantastic. I had the Mac and Cheese with peas, also very tasty. Now we know why the line was so long.
Later that evening I attended a baseball game, with the New Orleans Baby Cakes playing the Omaha Storm Chasers. Baby Cake is a reference to the King Cake, a dessert made for Mardi Gras, A small baby statue is placed in the cake and whoever gets the baby in their slice has to make the cake the next year. This is not how the tradition started. Originally a bean was placed in the cake and the lady who got the bean was selected to be Mardi Gras Queen.