One of our favorite things to do in New Orleans is bike around and stare at everything – houses, trees, people, street names, flowers. All the neighborhoods along the river – from Downtown, where we live, all the way through Uptown and up to Carrollton are great for this. Biking up Esplanade to Bayou Saint John and City Park is also GREAT. If you don’t want to bike, take the street car up St. Charles. Don’t forget to get off and wander around in the direction of the river.
Listening to music is essential, and the easiest thing to say is: go to Frenchmen Street (between Royal Street and the River.) We also recommend going to Preservation Hall. They’re open every night, 8 -11 pm, St. Peter Street in the Quarter. WWOZ (90.7 FM) plays great music and broadcasts who’s playing where on the odd hour, as well as on their website, wwoz.org.
Eating wise, we LOVE breakfast and lunch at Satsuma (Dauphine Street, near Piety, Bywater). We also love Cake Café for food (corner of Spain and Charters, Marigny) -- which serves breakfast and lunch till 3pm every day but Monday. Coffee can be found at Sound Café (Port and Charters, Marigny), Orange Couch (Mandeville and Royal, Marigny), Café Rose Nicaud (Frenchmen near Royal, Marigny) and Croissant d’Or (Ursulines, near Chartres, Quarter). Beignets and café au lait at Café Du Monde (Decatur Street near Jackson Square, Quarter) are SO worth it. Adolpho’s (above the Apple Barrel on Frenchmen near Charters) is one of our favorite places to eat dinner. Across the street, at 536 Frenchmen, our friends just opened a great tapas restaurant called Three Muses, serving dinner every day but Tuesday from 4 to midnight. Coop’s Bar (Decatur at Ursulines Street in the Quarter) has yummy New Orleans food of all varieties. You can get a good po-boy anywhere. Really. Any corner store will do a good job. Get it “dressed” and we recommend shrimp or oyster, if they're local. Napolean House (St. Louis and Charters in the Quarter) is great for food and Pimm’s Cups. If you want BBQ, our friends Pete and Jenny can feed you pork at The Joint (Poland and Dauphine Streets, Bywater.) You’ll need a car to get to Crabby Jack’s on Jefferson Highway, but it’s well worth it. Also accessible by car are our favorite Vietnamese restaurants on the West Bank – Pho Tau Bay and Kim Son. You can get yummy food in two Marigny bars -- Vietnamese food is served at Love Lost Lounge (Dauphine and Franklin, Marigny), and right down the street, in the upstairs of Mimi’s (Dauphine and Royal, Marigny) you can get yummy tapas.
Looking for a good place in the French Quarter to get brunch?
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