On leaving the bar we learnt the correct method of listening to live jazz.
Buy a much cheaper drink in a plastic cup (the most popular drink being a
‘hand grenade’) on the street and just listen from the doorway. Sadly a
technique that we only noticed once we had blown our budget for the day.
Fortunately dinner was cheap as we ate at the Clover Grill, a small very
American diner. We chose it because Lonely Planet described it as very
entertaining.
Now, a lot of the entertainment-value of a restaurant depends on the
staff and some of the people on duty when we visited were not particularly
friendly, making a big difference to the experience. The food was very nice
and cheap however and our waitress, who was being trained/observed, was
crazy enough to keep us entertained through most of the meal. It felt a bit like
a locals place, with the more senior staff chatting at length to customers at the
counter. This feeling was re-enforced when we left. The cook shouted 'bye',
we shouted it back, and then I heard another person mutter 'tourists!' How
welcoming.
So far we were having a very mixed visit to New Orleans with good
experiences following bad quite quickly, and vice versa. This continued as we
made our way back to the bus stop.
Bourbon Street, in fact most of the French Quarter, is lined with houses
that have beautiful wrought iron balconies - and these are packed during the
Mardi Gras parades as they offer some of the best views in town. Even while
we were there the balconies were quite busy and people were throwing plastic
beads (known as throws during Mardi Gras) down on unsuspecting passers