This is it

Monday 20^th.

The sun is shining in a true blue sky, it's hot now and the radio is playing Dr. John and Bon Ton Roules tunes. We cycled right through the French Quarter along the river to a district called Nola which had old wooden houses to meet with people having a small unofficial parade of there own with everything bean themed. Bean covered costumes and even a bean covered VW car and beaned bar. A small brass band in caps, white shirts and black trousers led the walkers and a shopping trolly sound system rounded off the ones in costume followed by everyone else around a couple of blocks. When it ended we headed back and stopped at a large covered market to browse the many stalls of tourist tat, T shirts and crafts. In the evening we biked a long way to get to Chickie Wah Wah, a bar on Canal street where the British pianist and singer, John Cleary was playing. He was brilliant as usual and we got talking in the break about him coming to Tenby. He was delighted to see some Golden Virginia as it is rare here, so I left it with him when we left. He played guitar and sang some Taj Mahal songs his playing as good on guitar as piano. The guys wanted to go back into the quarter even though it was 1am by now. I wanted bed so we all went back to the RV park where the radio was so good and fitted with our evening by playing piano tunes, for us to dance to in and out of the van. 

Eventually I was called to bed but the guys still had not had enough and went back to the French Quarter, but in the morning they could not remember anything about what happened. I was just grateful that they got back without any robbings or accidents as they were well gone when they left.

Tuesday 21^st. February Fat Tuesday Mardi Gras

Mardi Gras day dawned bright and warm but it took a long time to raise the guys to go out and explore.When we finally did we found that we could not get very far as the parades and crowds had sealed off our area with no way through for the bikes. This is an all black neighborhood and so the crowds were all black and the first parade seemed to be the Zulu, but strange to see all the floats with black people with blackface make up on.

Scott adjusts his costume before we head for the parades

 Many of the participants were dressed as cowboys and on horseback with confident control of the horses despite the noise and excited crowds all around. Later we abandoned the bikes and escaped on foot down to Bourbon Street where there was a constant stream of crazy costumes of extreme imagination parading along seemingly forever. Changing to the next street the scene was the same pirates, spacemen, crawfish, crocodiles, semi naked body painted girls with blue hair, gorillas and charlie Chaplin were all there, and music blasting out everywhere. We made our way down to the river where it was a bit calmer, but everyone was wearing some bizarre hat or mask. 

 There were a lot of gays involved but I loved this pair

Along Canal Street which is a big highway the main parades were still going by, huge floats pulled by trucks and showering the crowds with beads balls and small furry animals. Scott and I called in to the Court of The Two Sisters, a large old place that went back a long way from the street and then opened into an elegant courtyard where a lunch for a group of well heeled and load people was breaking up. A cold beer went down very well as my legs and feet were telling me to sit and rest. Further wandering through happy and totally strange people went on untill we went back to the van for a break. Mardi gras is the time when people can reclaim the streets and cars have to give way to humans. The lords of misrule reign this day, but the christian groups are also out again trying to convert people, a completely ridiculous task. This must be the greatest free party in the world!