The Big Easy part deux

Day #3- NOLA part 2

          Allison's Dad had recommended The Old Coffee Pot for breakfast, but we obviously weren't the only ones who knew about it, because there was a line down the street! We didn't really feel like waiting so we ended up going to a little cafe called La Divina. We all ordered egg panino's and they were AMAZING! And Meredith got a "Manhattan Espresso Soda" that was really good too. 

Egg Panino

          Once we finished breakfast, we headed to LaPlace ("LaPlace to be!" as Meredith would say) for a Cajun Pride Swamp Tour. We all bought Groupons for this so it was only $11 and was so worth the money! 

 I wasn't really expecting to see much because that's how they make it sound on the website, but within 5 minutes we had already seen 2-3 baby alligators. Our captain "Coyote" was really entertaining and had some fun stories to tell, which mostly involved making fun of blondes and being semi-scared of his wife. One of his "acts" during the tour is that he gets out on a platform on the side of the boat and feeds huge gators chicken from his hand…Allison and I later admitted that we would not have hated for him to lose a finger/hand for entertainments sake. We are sickos that way.

watch that hand coyote...or don't! haha

 We also got to hold lil' baby "Elvis," a gator that was rescued from a mound after being forgotten by his mean mamma after he was born. Coyote told us that once the babes hatch, the mom puts 3-4 of them in her mouth at a time and carries them to a safe place since they could swim, but don't know where to go on their own yet. But if she goes back to the mound and doesn't hear/see anything, she goes back to stay with the others because they must be protected at all times. A typical "litter" is 30-40 gators, so it's pretty common for a few to get left behind. So anywho, that's how Elvis came to be. He was real cute and had a bite that felt like a baby kitten…beware of squeezing his soft little belly though or he would pee on ya! So between the gators and the weirdos on the boat with us, this was a great time!

Ferocious!!

        Dinner was lame because we chose a random spot along the way home without any recommendations...won't be doing that again!  So after leaving there we stopped at Cafe Du Monde and tried the famous beignets and frozen cafe au lait which were both great! But it seems like it would be hard to mess up a piece of fried dough.. although I'm pretty sure the restaurant we went to for dinner would have found a way.

Couldn't hold Meredith off the beignets before a picture

      Next was a little jazz bar called Fritzel's, where "Shrimp Creole" was playing, and they were great, but there was a 3 drink minimum to sit and listen which cost us $20 for 3 coors lights! Ridiculous! So we left there and wandered around some more, stopped into a dueling piano bar (fun fact: Pat O'Briens in New Orleans was the place that dueling pianos were created) and then headed back to the hotel.

Shrimp Creole

Dueling piano bar