baton rouge

capitol building



mississippi river





view from capitol building

capitol gardens

jazz statue

i can just touch it!

capitol building

 Thursday 6th October 2011

Today we started out in Port Allen which is just on the out skirts of Baton Rouge.  We could see when we arrived that there was a very tall building in the cbd area that we knew we wanted to visit.  Once at the motel we looked up the building and found out it was the Capitol Building and it had an observation level that was free to go to. That was definitely on our list before setting out for New Orleans.

Designed by Huey Pierce Long its a 34 story, 450 foot art deco building which was completed in 1932.  From the top it gave a great view of the Mississippi River and the suburbs of Baton Rouge.  There is a garden area in the front of the building which is laid out beautifully.  This garden has the tomb and statue of Huey Long as he designed and pushed for the building to be built and he was ironically shot and killed inside the building in September 1935.  Long was the 40th Governor of Louisiana and was loved for his radical populist policies.

We grabbed some lunch before setting out for about a two hour drive to New Orleans.

riverwalk market place

fudge factory

canal st street car

bourbon st

anything goes on bourbon

that little red string on the side was the widest part of material

howlin wolf den bar and grill

We arrived at our motel at just after 3.30pm and when I booked it in the morning I either made a mistake reading the description or booked the wrong one.  We were in the slums and it was bad, I checked in and went to the room and it got worse.  The motel was meant to be close to the city, within walking distance of the sites and was meant to be 3 star.  After getting to the room and realising that we cant walk around the city from here I cracked out the computer and looked at the booking and some more motels.  I ended up booking another place in the city paying extra money and checked out of the shit hole we were in.  $120 wasted but who cares, how much is a kidney really worth!

We got to the Hilton Garden Inn and checked in, it was beautiful and was only about 5 minute walk from Canal Street.  We walked towards the city and located the Riverwalk Market place which was very empty of people.  We walked through slowly looking at the shops when we came to the 'Fudgery and Fun' where a fellow was turning fudge.  He was a comedian, or at least he thought so, he got everyone sucked in to watch him as he paid some of us out and made us do stupid things all for free fudge.  We stood there around half an hour and he was actually really entertaining.

We walked down to Canal Street and then down to Bourbon Street.  Bourbon Street was packed, people every where.  It was a great atmosphere and felt a little like Vegas without the casinos.  Anything goes in Bourbon Street apparently!  We ended up walking around for a few hours before making our way back to South Peters Street which is where the Hilton was and we found the 'Howlin Wolf Den and Grill Bar.'  We had some drinks and some food for dinner trying a local delicacy, boudin balls.  They were really yummy and hit the spot.  Went back to the room and planned what we were going to do on Friday.