#116 Nollens Pelican RV Park, New Orleans, Louisiana

The other day I heard a guy say the only people who say Nollens are tourists who are trying too hard. All I can say is I spoke to an elderly lady who really lived there and that how she talked. I like the way it sounds all the same

I was looking at what possibilities there would be in New Orleans and there were two state parks. I got a little creeped out by the whole visit because on TV they were talking about how bad the murder rate had become in New Orleans. I thought wrongly that the state parks were too far off the main trek. Looking back, they weren’t that much outside of town so we ended up staying in a crappy little place under a big bridge. I didn’t think about it at the time but that huge bridge was going across a little river called the Mississippi. I thought it would be great because there would be a lot of commuting between the RV park and the French quarter. I tried to find a place that would be easy on and easy off. This particular RV park was right on Highway 10 and so whether it was perfect or not it was easy to access once you finish with the New Orleans visit. I thought if I drove into town I would spend all my time in traffic looking for parking. The three of us went to the French Quarter using the city bus system. It's not bad or good it's just you stand around and wait a bit for the bus to come and there’s a little bit of a learning curve there. We went to trim a part by where Louie Armstrong spent a lot of time. It was very famous. The name was Treme park. It was just a very cool free concert Crab Festival and we had lots of good tasting food and lots of jazz. It was such really good music and I bought a CD from the band. Everybody had a good time as we were leaving it was pitch dark and we were standing on a corner for like 30 minutes and these are the times that you wonder why is this a good plan? They say they're having a lot of murders in New Orleans and I'm standing here in the pitch-dark vulnerable on a street corner. Nothing bad happened but it does go through your mind hand that it was such a wonderful experience but it could’ve ended badly. India and I decided maybe we were going it alone and Savannah was fine with that. It was Sunday so we went to church service We were going to an unknown place it had a deadline of 9:45 and if we got on the bus I thought we wouldn’t make it. We got an Uber and it was about $16 so I did that and they did everything right. We had often thought maybe what the heck let's go to a Quaker Meeting. I didn't know anything about it but I just thought it was one of the things we should do someday. He dropped us off at where the address was and it didn't say Quaker Church but there was a Methodist Church there. Someone said yeah the Quaker meetings upstairs and to the right so we went up there and what we found is that it's not a big gathering. It's like they can't afford to own real estate for such a small meeting so they just kind of carve out a classroom for them and that's their Quaker Meeting.

I was in for education because I knew they were peace-loving people but I knew nothing else. A young person in his thirties was babysitting the little people and they were coloring. For a moment I thought is this it, him and two kids and else nobody showed up? He was just the daycare guy for the meeting. He said well here's how it works you walk into the meeting which is already underway and if you would just sit quietly and remain silent and I think it will just kind of come to you. He said for the most part most people sit in there for about an hour silently and just think thoughts and try to be spiritual. We sat there quietly but after about 15 or 20 minutes of this getting close to God thing I just said to myself I think we're done. There were probably about 8 people in the room. I think we just quietly left and decided to go to what I would call a normal service. It seems we weren’t Quaker material at this time. We just weren't there yet so we went downstairs and it was a Methodist Church which turned out to be pretty cool. They said it was the jazz service and I thought its amazing to be in New Orleans with a really loud brass Jazz Ensemble Rock band on Sunday morning. That was pretty cool and we sat there and just kind of did the service. It was all very nice and it was the opposite of the Quaker version. Maybe in the future, I can get my mind right and sit quietly and learn how to benefit from the Quaker experience. We always ask where's a good place to eat can we take the streetcar to it which was right across the corner. They said it takes you into the French Quarter we found a little restaurant called Eats.

When we got off the streetcar we would walk down Bourbon Street passing all of the novelty type naughty this and that. Eventually found our way to the restaurant called Eats. We stepped in and told him we wanted to table for two and they put us on a 15-minute list and said but you can't stay inside so go outdoors and wait out there. This was for practical reasons because they had no space for us to stand. We had a marvelous meal and then moseyed back up towards the streetcar. It took us up to the main hub and we're thinking about taking a bus back. It was all good as we looked at our ticket it was a one-day ticket so it was still good all day until 3 or 4 o'clock. It sort of made the bus ride back seem free.

We left out of the French Quarter and went to Jackson Square and saw the big Cathedral Church and looked at the Mississippi River. We had to get a beignet and all of this is just wonderful food.

Out of nowhere, there was a high school marching band playing for us so to speak.

I enjoyed myself and we headed back to the RV park. Savannah had decided to stay back but whenever we take the phone, she has no internet. She wasn't getting what she wanted and started kind of having a bit of withdrawal for some internet. She decided to go to a cafe and so she left the RV park and went to Smileys Grill next door.

I'm sure it's safe enough but again in my mind, I'm remembering the murder rate in New Orleans has never been higher. She does what she wants to do but she doesn't have the best judgment because she’s young. As we approach, I see her, and she just kind of sitting on the corner on a concrete stoop. She would say I was just out there in public because that's where I can catch some Wi-Fi. All I can think is that she’s standing up against a wall in New Orleans and somebody might think she's like a girl standing on a corner. I just thought, damn girl, I gave her a hard time about it. I told her she wasn't thinking clearly and she got pissed and I got pissed. Sooner or later, we got over it sometimes we're not thriving we just surviving.

I am just glad that she has a guardian angel.