The Garden District, New Orleans

Thanks to Frommers, I was able to guide myself on a tour of the historic Garden District in New Orleans. A very thrifty way to tour a city, you can download recommended walking maps with your stops laid out, with a little blurb on each place.

Nicholas Cage's House

The Garden District is home to many historic homes and mansions, many dating back to the mid 1800’s. The architecture is stunning; many homes have several balconies with ornate iron banisters. Many are reported to be haunted. Several celebrities have homes here, like Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, John Goodman, and Nicholas Cage.

A visit to the Lafayette cemetery was perfect for a mid-afternoon spook (especially in the wake of Halloween).  Graves are all above ground here, due to frequent flooding.  They call these cemetaries the house of the dead, and they do like like miniature neighborhoods, with rows and rows of small marble monuments. Instead of funeral plots, families are placed in these mausoleums where the corpses are essentially cremated and mixed together, thanks to the extreme heat. (No coffins – eek!) What a way to spend eternity.