New Orleans is an old soul. 

She’s a dowager queen, regal, foreign, and mystical, cloaked in chiaroscuro – filtered light and darkened shadows.

She’s a woman masked for Mardi Gras, mysterious and irresistible.New Orleans is different from the rest of America, in culture, ethnicity, and spirit. You see it in the architecture, once elaborate, now cracked and etched with age.  You notice it in the melodious French street names: Dauphine, Chartres, Barbonne, and on restaurant menus: rémoulade, etouffée.  You hear it in the throaty “R” of the accent, in the music that wafts from open bars. You taste it in the distinctive cuisine emanating from deep in the bayous, flavored by influences from around the world.  You smell it in the staleness of night-before-booze along Bourbon Street and in the fragrant jasmine creeping up courtyard walls. You feel it in the humid air on your skin.   

Her ancient-looking, graceful brick and stucco architecture, layered and louvered, reflects her style. 

Fern-draped balconies, laced in black iron balustrades, overhang sidewalks.

Narrow doors, brightly painted, and darkened side entrances lead to moss-covered brick garden alcoves tucked out of sight, illusions of secret rendezvous.

Music is her soul – jazz, blues, zydeco, brass band – impromptu and improvised. She’s the birthplace of distinctive New Orleans jazz. Brass is her sound, haunting and jubilant.  Music seeps out of bar doorways.  It trails to the street from louvered windows.  It comes from street musicians earning a dime; from marching bands strutting their stuff; from funeral processions, grand send-offs, at first mournful, then joyful.      

Food, rich and robust, is her self-expression. Her flavorful Creole and Cajun cuisine comes from the rich harvest of her coastal waters – volumes of shrimp, oysters, crab, and crawfish – spiced with French, Spanish, and African influences, blended together in remarkable ways into gumbo, jambalaya, and bouillabaisse.   

Restaurants are her piéce de résistance. Non-pareil food is served in places equally remarkable in atmospherics – old world oyster bars; antique filled, old-style dining rooms with tiled floors, beveled glass and tin ceilings; plant-shaded courtyards, old warehouses, town houses, firehouses, and small cottages. Great chefs, Paul Prudhomme and Emeril Lagasse, started here, and the great culinary heritage of the region continues.

 The grand celebration of Mardi Gras defines her – an elaborate parody of life, a cacophony of sound and color – horns, umbrellas, costumes, crowns, feathers, beads, drummers,  revelers, royal krewes, parades, floats and processions.

A mixed-use city, New Orleans feels like a small town. Residences are layered over and behind shops, bars and restaurants, with locals living, shopping, and dining along her streets. She’s friendly and comfortable, and behind her mask of frivolity she’s proud and stately.

And yes, this proud dowager is haunted by Katrina, a name synonymous with suffering, and defined by devastation. But, like a tattered royal with her head held high, New Orleans is cherished for what she was, for what remains, and for what she can be.

After Katrina, what is there to see?  Plenty.  This historic old Creole city, steeped in another era as if in an absinthe haze, is simply a must see. The parts of town most visited by tourists were relatively unaffected by Katrina – the venerable French Quarter, known by its ancient name, Vieux Carré, the Garden District, the Warehouse District, the Central Business District, Uptown, and Mid-City/Esplanade. Sitting as they do on ridges in the delta with the Mississippi curving languidly around them, the floodwaters of Katrina lapped at them, dangerously close, but not over them. Here, hotels, bars, restaurants, shops, and attractions are as lively as ever, either undamaged or repaired and refurbished. 

So, eat, drink, walk, and dance in the street.  Indulge in fabulous food, move to the incredible music.  Take walking tours of above-ground cemeteries, gracious homes, and voodoo altars. Go into old churches, buy a piece of local art, and yes, even strings of beads.  See all things Mardi Gras: memorabilia-filled museums, places where the elaborate floats are made, costume houses, and mask makers.

Cruise on a paddlewheel steamboat along the Mississippi, the great river that gave the city life. Ride the St. Charles Avenue Streetcar. Take the kids to the Louisiana Children’s Museum, to City Park, to the Audubon Aquarium and Audubon Zoo. Antique along Royal Street or Magazine Street. See Degas paintings and more in the New Orleans Museum of Art. Wander through the French Market. 

Brunch at Brennan’s, savor chicory coffee and a sugary beignet at Café du Monde, lunch on a poor boy at Johnny’s Po-boys. Try the oyster sampler at Arnaud’s, shrimp rémoulade at Antoine’s, redfish meuniére at Delmonico, bread pudding soufflé at Commander’s Palace, all venerable New Orleans institutions. Taste Creole gone contemporary at Nola or Ralph’s on the Park …and the list goes on. Cruise down Bourbon Street, but look beyond it. Clubs and lounges are popping up in other areas too.  Find them in Faubourg Marigny and in the Central Business and Warehouse Districts.   

Head off the beaten path on tours deep into Cajun country through eerie, moss-draped swamps and bayous, or on tours of plantations of another era, like lovely Oak Alley Plantation, which dot River Road from one side of the Mississippi to the other.   

Even Katrina’s devastation is an attraction, but not in a morose way.  The Hurricane Katrina Tour is carefully designed to provide an understanding of why such devastation happened, and why this special city matters, spiritually, historically, and economically. 

Go to New Orleans.  Despite her tragedy, she offers more than most cities do at their best.    Go to feel the spirit, to fully enjoy the bon temps.  By your presence and through your enjoyment, you’ll help her rebuild.  Go, because she beckons.

Walk on the unusual side – take a tour of a historic cemetery, graveyard or burying ground. Macabre, moving, or appealing, these silent cities have fascinating stories to tell.  Beneath fieldstone, granite, marble and bronze, lie superstition and belief, tragedy and triumph, romance and scandal, humor and sadness, politics and war.

Burying ground, graveyard or cemetery - all are time frozen, part history, part folklore.  There is a certain stillness about them - reverence mixed with intrigue.  In them, gravestones, simple or ornate, provide clues that fuel the imagination.  Through artistic symbolism and fascinating phraseology, gravestones tell the stories of a generations, one person at a time.  They reflect the historic quirks, artistic taste and architecture of a moment in time. They lay bare prejudices and honor heroes.  They tell of prince and pauper; the known and unknown.

Some silent cities, moss-covered, ancient-feeling places like Boston’s historic burying grounds, tell America’s early story through those buried there.  Others, like Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah, are serenely quiet green spaces with magnificent grounds and remarkable statuary.  Some make unique architectural statements, like those in New Orleans, so dryly observed by Mark Twain: ”There is no architecture in New Orleans, except in the cemeteries.”   Yet others, like Arlington National Cemetery in Washington D.C., in their sheer simplicity, have the power to move.

Boston is home to some of America’s oldest burying grounds.  It is in King’s Chapel, Copp’s Hill, and the Granary, that legendary figures of America’s founding, those we learn about in history class – Paul Revere, John Hancock, Samuel Adams, victims of the Boston Massacre - are interred.  These sites are of such historic value that Boston’s Freedom Trail runs by them, and all are highlights of the stops on Old Town Trolley Tours of Boston’s tour route.  For the more sinister, Old Town Trolley Tours of Boston’s entertaining Ghosts & Gravestones tour offers a different prospective on night walks through Copp’s Hill and Granary Burying Grounds.  In nearby Plymouth, on the interesting Historic Plymouth Cemetery Tour, the meaning behind some of some of the gravestone iconography is explained.

In other colonial cities, look for early graveyards alongside historic churches, testaments to the religious beginnings of some colonies. Benjamin Franklin and four other signers of the Declaration of Independence are buried in the Christ Church Burial Ground, two beautiful acres in the heart of the historic “Old City” of Philadelphia.  Other signers of the Declaration of Independence are buried in graveyards of St. Michael’s and St. Philip’s Churches, the early churches of Charleston, S. C.

As populations outgrew small burying grounds and church graveyards, the large, park-like ”rural” cemeteries of the mid-1800s provided final resting places.  They, too, offer interesting perspectives on history and are great places to walk.  All contain unusual elements, beautiful and bizzare.  Some have spectacular grounds; others, elaborate monuments.  All have an atmosphere more uplifting than the burying grounds of the somber colonial era.  Noticeably absent is the ”death’s head,” common on colonial gravestones, which gave way to the more hopeful winged cherubs, reflective of the more romantic thinking of the Victorian era.

Spend an awesome morning or afternoon walking through Savannah’s Bonaventure Cemetery, a fine example of America’s rural cemeteries, revealed to the world in the book, “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.”  Here, under canopies of live oak, surrounded by an array of elegant statuary and impressive monuments, the silence is serene.  While you won’t see the famous Bird Girl there anymore (she’s been moved to Savannah’s Telfair Museum of Art for viewing), there is so much else to see and photograph.

Big and diverse, Manhattan should have equally interesting cemeteries, but all it has are remnant cemeteries!    Forbidden by ordinance as available land became scarce, graves were relocated to the other boroughs, displaced by glass and concrete towers.  What’s left are remnants: the tiny, tucked away Marble Cemeteries in the Lower East side.  And, in San Francisco, similarly land-limited, nothing is forever - at least one’s final resting place is not!  The city has moved its dead time and time again, each time to a “newer” spot, further and further off the peninsula, and there are amazing stories of those left behind, only to be discovered during later ground excavation!  Today, there are only two cemeteries left within city limits, the graveyard at historic Mission Dolores Church and the San Francisco National Cemetery in the Presidio, and two columbariums, one inside the famous Grace Cathedral on Nob Hill.

While each historic burying place is unique, it’s hard to top the visual impact of the above-ground vaults of New Orleans’ “Cities of the Dead,” miniature cities of elaborate tombs built like small houses laid out along streets.  Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, in the historic Garden District is significant for its history, location and architecture.  In St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, just outside the French Quarter, offerings are left for Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau.  Elaborate marble tombs and larger-than-life statuary in Metairie Cemetery are dramatic statements of “new” wealth and prestige of the city’s intriguing, ethnically diverse residents.   For safety reasons, as well as for a memorable time, take one of New Orleans’ Cemetery Tours.

Bigger isn’t necessarily better.  Another sea-level city, albeit small, with an above-ground cemetery is the island of Key West.  As haphazard and colorful as the island itself, and true to the character for this quirky place, the small-scaled cemetery, located in the dead center of town, as locals are amused to say, is not grandiose.  Eye-level, whitewashed tombs are close-quartered, and giant gumbo limbo tree roots pushing up against the ground, causing cracked gravemarkers and lopsided statuary, leave a lingering sense that the tropical elements are about to take over.  It’s a great place to take in the oddities of the inscriptions on some of the gravestones: “I told you I was sick” reads the gravemarker of a well-known hypochondriac!

Wherever your travels take you, tour a historic cemetery.  Bring your camera; bring paper for gravestone rubbings…and most of all, bring your imagination!

This summer and fall, as you travel about the US, include a visit to a city market, community garden, greenmarket, farmers’ markets, tailgate market, and seek out restaurants whose menus feature fresh, regionally grown vegetables and sustainable cuisine.  You’ll love this new tourism twist!Enjoy make-shift stalls and shaded lots filled with bins and buckets exploding with color.  Smell, pinch and snap, sample. Indulge in something delicious, freshly baked or locally canned.  Take in the regional flavor, the fresh air, the bustling sounds, the camaraderie.  Mingle with locals.

Get used to the term community garden as it’s making a comeback. They’ve been around since man began farming, and in the US became popular and patriotic during WWII when they were known as Victory Gardens.  In urban centers, blighted areas have long been greened by window boxes, roof gardens, green sproutings carefully tended in tiny plots, or in abandoned lots tucked between concrete walls.

The most recent urban community garden to make a big splash is the Slow Food Nation Victory Garden on the lawn of San Francisco’s City Hall, part of the Victory Gardens 2008+ project that is sweeping the city!  The food from the garden will be donated to local food banks and meal programs, and the overall message is to show urban residents that they, too, can grow their own, even in a limited space.   If you’re visiting San Francisco between July and September 2008, stop by City Hall in the Civic Center area.  You can get there several ways, but why not take the San Francisco Trolley Hop, get off at its Union Square stop, walk a couple of blocks to the BART stop at Market & Powell.  Get on the BART to the Civic Center stop.  You can’t miss the domed City Hall.  Or, if you’re just walking about, find one of San Francisco’s 40 community gardens on city-owned property.

Visiting Boston?  Hop on the Old Town Trolley Tours of Boston (a great tour with the added perk of being able to hop off at any one of the convenient stops to see the sights), get off at Stop # 11, walk down to the light, cross the street and Fenway Victory Gardens, the last of the WWII Victory Gardens, is right in front.   Or, get off at trolley Stop # 8, walk past the John Hancock Building, turn right onto Berkeley Street and walk 4 blocks to Berkeley Gardens, where Asian families carry on centuries-old tradition of farming garden plots.

Whether in a big city or small town, greenmarkets and farmers’ markets are no longer off the beaten path.  They’re sprouting up everywhere.  Greenmarket is a term more frequently associated with urban areas, while farmers’ markets can be large and urban, or small-town and colloquial.  Both can sell not only produce, but meat, seafood, baked goods, arrays of cheeses and other dairy products, preserves, honey, flowers and even crafts.  The produce can be organic, or not.

In big cities, while greenmarkets are becoming increasingly popular, some have been around forever. New York City, the penultimate urban community, has over 40, the biggest of which is Union Square Greenmarket, a must see!  Be sure to get there early as this is where the city’s famous chefs go shortly after dawn in search of the freshest ingredients for the day’s menu.  Washington’s beloved Eastern Market, a neighborhood market in the Capitol Hill neighborhood for over a century, was badly burned in a fire in April 2007, but vendors have kept the market open by setting up outside or across the street!  In Philadelphia, the year-round Reading Terminal Market has been a city fixture since William Penn’s time, and in historic Boston, the Copely Square Farmer’s Market sets up from mid-May to mid-November on Tuesdays and Fridays right in front of glorious Trinity Church on the famous square.

And the list goes on … Chicago has its Green City Market, a year-round market set up at the center of Lincoln Park in the summer, and inside the Peggy Notebaert Nature Center in the winter, which encourages sustainable practices from farmers selling there.  In New Orleans, be sure to stop by the Mid-City Green Market, which, to the delight of locals and visitors, just re-opened in May after having been closed since Katrina.  Glittery Las Vegas is more than nighttime neon - stop by Garden Park Farmers’ Market for a breath of fresh air.  On Saturdays in trendy Miami, walk through the venerable Coconut Grove Organic Farmers Market for a change of pace.

Smaller farmers’ markets, more regional in flavor, tend to have a real neighborly feel.  In Washington DC, within the beltway residents love their year-round Farm Fresh Market, open Sundays in the Dupont Circle neighborhood, and seasonally in Foggy Bottom and in up and coming Penn Quarter.  In the Los Angeles area, surrounded by miles and miles of fertile fields, farmers’ markets are everywhere, many featuring Asian and Hispanic specialties. San Diego has so many that the Farm Bureau of San Diego County pulishes a Farmer’s Market Schedule!

Likewise in small communities and towns across the country, small farmers’ markets and even smaller tailgate markets are everywhere. Traveling about by car this summer? If you see a farmers’ market along the way, stop. Get out to stretch your legs and pick up fresh ingredients for a spontaneous picnic lunch.  Sure beats the packaged, fast-food alternative!

For a change in restaurant fare, become a  “Locavore!” Designated as the word of the year in November 2007 by the New Oxford American Dictionary, it means one who is passionate about eating local ingredients.  In many cities, chefs are creating market-driven menus with selections prepared with regionally produced and available ingredients. In San Diego, locavores go to JSix in the Gaslamp District, just a couple of blocks from Old Town Trolley Tours of San Diego’s Stop #5A for innovative lunch and dinner menus featuring fresh, seasonal regional produce and sustainable seafood.  In New York City, many restaurants are following the market-driven menu trend, and do so with creativity and flair.  For example, Tribeca Grill, owned by Robert DiNiro, is fabulous and reflects the artistic character of the surrounding Tribeca neighborhood; BLT Market in the Ritz Carleton reflects its upscale Midtown East neighborhood.  In Washington, D.C., Nora’s became America’s first certified organic restaurant in 1999; 15 ria’s new American cuisine is fabulously created with market-fresh ingredients that change with the season; and, Hook in Georgetown offers a wonderful dining experience with a menu that changes daily to reflect whatever sustainable fish are in season and available.

Get out; get in touch.  See America as you have never before see it!

1. Museum of Bad Art (MoBA) – Not sure how else to describe this museum… the title sums it up pretty well. The Museum of Bad Art describes its mission perfectly – “dedicated to the collection, preservation, exhibition and celebration of bad art in all its forms.” Artists that are featured at the MoBA are talented, esteemed artists that have created works that cause fans to say “what was he thinking?”. Founded by Scott Wilson who began the museum with its first masterpiece in 1993, “Lucy in the Field of Flowers”, apparently discovered in a trash pile in Boston. Museum Of Bad Art, Basement of Dedham Communitiy Theatre, 580 High Street, Dedham MA, Telephone: 1-781-444-6757 www.museumofbadart.org
    
    

 

2. Glore Psychiatric Museum – Housed in the building that was originally called the “State Lunatic Asylum No. 2”, the Glore Psychiatric Museum takes a look at the history of psychiatric institutions and techniques for administering “care” for the mentally disabled. Earliest diagnoses for treatment of the mentally ill started with a sharp stick or perhaps a club. Human progress and compassion through history introduced humiliation, dunking, burnings at the stake and bleeding as “treatment”. Fortunately, modern 20th century medicine has made significant breakthroughs in psychiatric care including icy baths, shock therapy, tranquilizers, and vibrating chairs (just a hint of sarcasm here). The museum has an exhibit entitled “1,446 Objects Swallowed by a Patient” (see picture… includes 453 nails, 409 pins, 63 buttons, 42 screws, 5 thimbles, and 3 salt shaker tops). Other artifacts and exhibits include a tranquilizer chair, a giant “hamster wheel” for energetic patients, electroshock devices, and hydrotherapy devices (ice bath) www.stjosephmuseum.org/glore.php Glore Psychiatric Museum, 3408 Frederick Ave., St. Joseph, MO, Telephone: 1- 816-364-1209
   

3. Fall River Historical Society – If you ever find your way up through the New England countryside and the quaint town of Fall River, be sure to stop in to visit this little museum of history. Amongst its collection of 19^th century decorative arts, costumes, steamship history and other mild-mannered-exhibits will you find an exhibit of one of the most horrific murder s of the late 19^th century. Lizzie Borden (as in “Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks….”) was charged in 1892 of murdering her mother and father with an axe (and giving them both 40 whacks). Later acquitted, this was considered to be the trial of the century. The Fall River Historical Society boasts the largest collection of memorabilia from the crime and trial including the hatchet used, photographs of the crime scene, pillow cases with blood on them, pictures of Lizzie’s mom and dad skull’s, and other REALLY macomb artifacts. If you haven’t had enough of Lizzie Borden, you can visit the crime scene. In fact you can even stay at the place. The home where the crime was committed is now open as a bed and breakfast. www.lizzieborden.org, Fall River Historical Society, 451 Rock St, Fall River, MA Telephone 1-508-679-1071
    

4. Liberace Museum – While in Las Vegas be sure to pay your respects to a very famous Vegas showman – Wladziu Valentino Liberace (you may call him Liberace). Famous for his outrageous costumes, incredible piano skills and performances, and a Baldwin piano encrusted in with thousands of rhinestones, Liberace deserves his museum in Sin City. The Liberace Museum has on display (including the Baldwin piano) Liberace’s legendary wardrobes, elaborately ornate cars (check out the Rolls Royce), and his jewelry. www.liberace.org/liberace_museum/ Liberace Museum, 1775 East Tropicana Avenue (at Spencer) Las Vegas, NV Telephone: 1-702-798-5595
    
    

5. National Museum of Funeral History – dedicated to the history of the coffin building industry and the funeral business, the National Museum of Funeral History is located in the reproduction of an early 1900’s coffin factory. Visitors will experience and learn how coffins were constructed over the years and how coffins are made today. Other exhibits include Civil War embalming, fantasy coffins (how about a coffin made in the shape of a fish, or an airplane, or how about a chicken?), and the funeral industry Hall of Fame. www.nmfh.org The National Museum of Funeral History, 415 Barren Springs Drive , Houston, TX Telephone: 1-281-876-3063
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    

6. The Mütter Museum – M, m, m, m…. museum of horrors! The Mutter Museum is a medical museum located at the College of Physicians in Philadelphia. It was originally created in 1858 from the collection that was donated by Thomas Dent Mutter. The museum displays medical oddities, instruments, and preserved human specimens. Highlights of the Mutter Museum include the skeleton of the tallest human being in North America, a preserved 5’ long colon, preserved human organs and body parts, President Grover Cleveland’s tumor, the conjoined liver of Siamese twins Chang and Eng Bunker, a growth removed from Lincoln’s assassin John Wilkes Booth, and mummified corpse of the Soap Lady… all here and preserved for your viewing pleasure. www.collphyphil.org/mutter.asp The Mutter Museum , 19 South 22nd Street, Philadelphia, PA, Telephone: 1-215-563-3737
    

7. Vent Haven Ventriloquist Museum - Coined as the only museum dedicated to the art ventriloquism, the Vent Haven Ventriloquist Museum will delight visitors of all ages. The museum showcases over 700 figures and thousands of books, playbills and photographs that are related to ventriloquism. www.venthavenmuseum.net Vent Haven Museum, 33 West Maple Avenue, Fort Mitchell, KY, 1-859-341-0461
    
    
   

   
    
   

8. National Museum of Health and Medicine – Haven’t had enough of seeing preserved body parts? Well, you’re in luck! Skip on over to Washington DC for fun filled day of people watching (dead people watching that is). John Wilkes Booth sure does get around! At the National Museum of Health and Medicine you can find even more preserved parts of the assassin. Other exhibits include Civil War skeletons and pictures and illustrations of wounds, Korean War artifacts, live leeche display, and largest collection of microscopes dating to the 1600’s. The National Museum of Health and Medicine claims to have more than 10,000 preserved organs and 5,000 skeletal specimens that explore medical cases of disease and injury. Be sure to visit the “Anatifacts” exhibit featuring the preserved giant tumor, a human hair ball, and body parts of famous Americans – vetebraes of John Wilkes Booth and James Garfield. The National Museum of Health and Medicine also has on display the bullet that killed Lincoln. www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/medtour/nmhm.html National Museum of Health and Medicine, 6900 Georgia Avenue, NW Washington, DC
    

9. American Sanitary Plumbing Museum - Located just outside of Boston in Worcester, MA, you will find the official museum dedicated to the history of the commode. Why shouldn’t there be a museum dedicated to such an important household fixture? The museum tells the history of the toilet and other sanitary fixtures as well provides visitors with a number of “artifacts”. Visitors will learn interesting facts such as how we went from corncobs to toilet paper (ouch!)… now that is something to be grateful for! 39 Piedmont Street, Worcester, MA Telephone: 1-508-754-9453
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    

10. BODIES…The Exhibition - I guess Americans have a fascination (obsession) with seeing dead people preserved. Now if you’ve visited the Muller in Philadelphia and the National museum of Health and Medicine in Washington D.C. and you want more… Bodies… The Exhibition is your next stop. You can find Bodies in a city nearest you as they have exhibitions in New York City, Fort Lauderdale, San Diego, Framingham, Columbus, Las Vegas (now that’s a big surprise) and Pittsburgh. Utilizing a patented preservation process, curators of Bodies display real human cadavers in everyday positions (minus skin tissue of course) www.bodiestheexhibition.com
     

11. New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum – Believed to be the only museum dedicated to the practice of Voodoo, the New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum tells visitors about the traditional practices of the Voodoo religion in New Orleans. The Voodoo Museum houses artifacts of the Great Voodoo Queen, Marie Laveau. Walking tours are provided daily and during the evening. www.voodoomuseum.com New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum, 724 Dumaine Street, New Orleans, LA, Telephone: 1-504-680-0128

Air Force Brigadier General Paul Tibbets just died. He was 92 years old and requested that no funeral be held and no marker be placed on his grave. He was concerned that these memorials might draw protest. Protest for what he and his crew flying the Enola Gay did on August 6, 1945. They dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later a second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. It’s estimated that over 200,000 people lost their lives as a result of these two explosions. Six days later World War II ended with the surrender of Japan.

My Uncle Harry was one of almost a million U.S. soldiers staged in the Philippines at that time…waiting to see if the bombs ended the war. If they did not, an invasion was planned.

I learned this weekend about a program called Honor Flight dedicated to bringing the remaining World War II veterans to Washington D.C. at no cost to tour the WWII Memorial in their honor. They estimate that 1200 of these veterans are passing away each day. I saw a man in the street that wore a t-shirt saying “Freedom isn’t really free.” The Sky and Sea Spectacular took place in Jacksonville, Florida this weekend featuring the U.S. Navy Blue Angels. It all reminded me of my mother and my father and a visit I made earlier this year to the National World War II Museum in New Orleans. It all made me pause and reflect.

During these challenging times, I think it’s important to take the long view. Now is an excellent time to look back on American history and see where we came from and where we are going. Here are a few spots to get you started.

Tour Boston and walk the Freedom Trail. Visit Paul Revere’s house and tour Old Ironsides. Stand in the Old South Meeting House and visit Fanueil Hall.

Tour Washington D.C. and see where laws are made. Tour Mount Vernon and Ford’s theater. Stand at the Wall and visit all the monuments to our Nation and it’s citizens.

Tour Philadelphia and see the Liberty Bell. Be moved at the National Constitution Center and visit Independence Hall. Experience where it all began.

There are thousands of stories and places and people but time is running out for some. Spend a little time with the Greatest Generation before they are all gone. Thank them for their sacrifices and humble service to America. Travel and tour the places where history was made. Do it now. Thanks, Mom and Dad…

Savannah, Georgia is a town I enjoy. History, architecture and creepiness combine with creative, eccentric folks living there for a singular experience. Of course, it rained non-stop.

I was doing a ride-along on our Ghosts and Gravestones in Savannah, which starts at the riverfront and goes to the Sorrel Weed House for the big finish. As always, I had a blast.

The ghost stories are well told and the atmosphere of the Sorrel Weed House is spooky. (Major kudos to Danica for the excellent design and art work of the Voodoo Room.) Everyone contributes so much here and SCAD is a great resource.

Both Savannah and St. Augustine have a natural creepiness similar to New Orleans in my opinion. Maybe it’s the spanish moss? Just seems to be a thickness, a heaviness that lingers over them and makes the shadows longer. One of my favorite things is to walk in these towns when they are quiet and dark. Listening, looking and remembering. See you in Savannah.

I’m not sure what I can add to the discussion about New Orleans, Louisiana almost two years since Hurricane Katrina changed the area forever. I feel compelled to say something…

“You can stand on Bourbon Street and the sounds of Jazz will wash over you as the deep smells of bread pudding and coffee laced with chicory fill your nose.”

The New Orleans that many folks remember and love is still there, although it is harder to find. It is easy to think that everything is fine when you visit but much has changed. For the locals who still live there, basic services are a challenge. Water, electricity, banking, groceries and all the things we take for granted are slow in returning to “normal”. There is a staffing shortage and many former residents never returned to the area. New arrivals are filling in the gaps and the new cultural influences on the town will change it too. This is a city in transition.

Some want it to return to the way it was and some want it to become something new. I’m not sure what will happen in the end but I am sure that we need to be willing to visit New Orleans and participate in her recovery. It’s the right thing to do.

We met at Rev. Zombie’s Voodoo Shop on St. Peter Street and I knew we were in for a treat. Our guide, Midian, was dressed in leather from head to toe and had the “look”. You know, the look that he knows something you don’t but if you follow along he will reveal his secrets to you. Well, he did and them some.

The Haunted History walking Ghost Tour in New Orleans, Louisiana is top notch! It is theatrical but not silly and the stories are good for all ages. This is one of the best Ghost Tours I have been on and I would do it again.

Not only did we hear great stories from a great storyteller but halfway through the tour we stopped at the wonderful “Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop” bar where we warmed up and heard tales of hauntings that took place in the building. It is a unsettling with the candlelight in the “actual” location. We even got a creepy Vampire story as a bonus.

The best part is that the tales are told in a “you decide” style for any non-believers in the group. Excellent storytelling sets this tour apart and leaves everyone satisfied. Do you believe?

The New Orleans Super City Tour is a great way to start your visit in New Orleans, Louisiana. Starting at the river front near the JAX brewery building, you travel in comfortable shuttle buses and learn the amazing history of the Crescent City.

The cultural influences in this area are enormous from the food to the music to the customs. This tour gives you an insiders view of all that is “Nawlin’s” and will have you saying “ayeeeee” in no time! (The focus is not on Katrina for this tour since they have a special tour for that but, of course, it is mentioned.)

I really enjoyed hearing about the history of the city and the many countries that influence every facet. A highlight is stopping at St. Louis cemetery #3 for a quick tour. The elaborate sculptures in this above ground graveyard are striking. We talked about Carnival and Mardi Gras, the best places to eat and the state of the City now. Very nice. After this tour, you can explore the city with confidence.

A walking Ghost Tour in New Orleans, Louisiana just seems natural. The mood, the buildings, everything works. I’m a fan of Ghost Tours and often learn unexpected history that you don’t get on daytime tours.

We started from the JAX brewery building and walked to our first spot at Jackson Square. The guide shared with us the rich history of New Orleans and the triumphs and tragedies that lead many to believe that the town is haunted.

Site after site was revealed to be haunted until you began to feel that every building had a story! Our intrepid guide took us all around the French Quarter until we finished near the Church. We left creepier and wiser than when we started.