New Orleans

Called by some 'The City That Care Forgot,' New Orleans has a well-earned reputation for excess and debauchery. It's a cultural gumbo of African, Indian, Cajun and Creole influences. Katrina caused a mass exodus and roughly 40% of New Orleans' residents have reportedly returned, but only time will tell how the city will ultimately repopulate.

New Orleans' climate is influenced by its subtropical latitude and proximity to the Gulf of Mexico. It's hot, wet and sticky for most of the year - other times it's just wet. February through April is the best time to visit, when easygoing weather coincides with the city's two most spectacular events, Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest. The city is hoping both will be start the engines of recovery and return. May sees the heat begin to intensify, and June marks the official beginning of hurricane season, which lasts through September. The oppressive heat and humidity of the summer months are a misery, driving many residents away from the city.

If you're visiting in summer, prepare for the 'oven' effect of going from chilly air-conditioned interiors to overwhelmingly tropical 35°C (95°F) streets. September and October tend to be much more agreeable. Christmas is an off-peak period with discounted accommodation, although the winter temperatures during the large New Year's Eve celebration can be chilly.

At the big toe of boot-shaped Louisiana, New Orleans nestles between Lake Pontchartrain, a huge but shallow body of saltwater that forms the northern edge of town, and a meniscus-shaped bend of the Mississippi River. The original and most visited portions of the city parallel the northern riverbank. Directions upriver or downriver are relative to the water flow, which bends maddeningly to all points of the compass. The Mississippi and Lake Pontchartrain also provide 'riverside' or 'lakeside' orientation.

Pre-Katrina, New Orleans comprised a checkerboard of neighbourhoods of different wealth and ethnicity - it was often only a few steps from ghetto to endowed estates. At the easternmost point of the city's crescent-shaped core is the heart of the original city, the French Quarter, built on high ground and largely spared of flooding. To the southwest, the Uptown area encompasses the Garden District, universities and palatial mansions along the St Charles Ave Streetcar Line, which led to the Riverbend area but was knocked off-line by the hurricane. (It's not scheduled to be back online until late 2007.)

Older faubourgs (suburbs) border the crowded French Quarter - to the east, the Faubourg Marigny appeals to a bohemian, mostly gay crowd, while downriver lies the Bywater, a burgeoning artist's hangout in an otherwise marginal district. Both escaped major flooding but had lots of wind damage. The more down-at-heel Faubourg Tremé to the north of the Quarter is a black neighbourhood known for its music, and beyond stretch Mid-City, Gentilly and Lakeview, residential areas that suffered some of the worst of the flooding. Hardest hit was the Lower Ninth Ward, a poor neighbourhood completely wrecked by the flood.

New Orleans International Airport (MSY) is 18km (11mi) west of the city centre in Kenner, while both trains and buses share New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal ('Union Station') on Loyola Ave in the Central Business District (CBD), between the French Quarter and the Uptown area.

West of New Orleans you'll find the Cajun wetlands, an area of French patois-speaking rural people who still depend on the natural resources of the swamps. The Cajuns' Spanish counterparts, the Isleños, live in the coastal fishing villages south of New Orleans. Upstream along the Mississippi River, antebellum sugar plantations attract visitors who marvel at elegant plantation homes. The occasional slave cabin remains as a reminder of how the wealth was gained.

Canadians need proof of Canadian citizenship or a passport to enter the USA. All other visitors must have a valid passport, which should be valid for at least six months longer than their intended stay in the USA.

Travellers from countries such as Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom can enter the USA for up to 90 days under a visa-waiver program if they have a round-trip ticket that is nonrefundable in the US, and have a passport valid for at least six months past their scheduled departure date. All other travellers will need a visitor's visa. Visas can be obtained at most US consulate offices overseas; however, it is generally easier to obtain a visa from an office in one's home country.

The USA is regularly adjusting entry requirements in an effort to reduce the threat of terrorism. It is imperative that travellers double- and triple-check current regulations before coming to the USA, as changes will occur for several years. A procedure introduced in 2004 requires most visitors travelling on visas to the United States to have two fingerprints scanned by an inkless device and a digital photograph taken by immigration officials upon entry at US air and seaports.

Under new regulations to be phased in toward the end of 2005, travellers from VWP-eligible countries will need to present a biometric passport or US visa to enter the country. You don't need a visa if: your passport was issued before October 26, 2005, but is 'machine readable'; if it was issued on or after October 26, 2005, and includes a digital photo as well as being machine readable; or if it was issued on or after October 26, 2006, and contains a digital photo and 'biometric data,' such as digital iris scans and fingerprints. Further details and information on the changes to the visa system can be found at www.travel.state.gov/visa.

All incoming travellers must fill out customs declarations. Travellers must specifically disclose all agricultural products and all cash and cash equivalents worth $10000 or more.

Overseas visitors may bring in up to $100 in goods or gifts duty free, together with 100 cigars, 200 cigarettes and a litre of alcoholic beverages. As of this writing, Cuban tobacco products are still prohibited in the USA.

Because of the high level of hygiene in the US, infectious diseases will not be a significant concern for most travellers. The high cost of medical care could leave you feeling a little poorly though.

New Orleans had a high violent-crime rate before the hurricane, now it may be the most policed city, percentage-wise, in America. Nevertheless, stick to places that are well- travelled and well-peopled, particularly at night, and save some cash for a taxi fare to avoid dark walks. St Louis Cemetery No 1 and Louis Armstrong Park had particularly bad reputations, even by daylight, and were more safely visited in groups. In the Quarter, hustlers may approach tourists, but you can just walk away - no hard feelings. In the impacted neighbourhoods beyond the tourist's trail, haphazard driving conditions and unreliable electricity may still exist.

The Gulf of Mexico provides New Orleans with plenty of moisture - the city receives about 150cm (60in) of rainfall annually and no season is immune from it. In March, April and May the weather is quite variable, with plenty of rain; but spring has sunny, mild days that are perfect for the festivals. Summer is hot, sticky and steamy, often with thundershowers. September and October days are the most likely to offer clear, temperate weather. Winter temperatures average a comfortable 12°C (54°F), yet occasional drops in temperature, combined with the damp atmosphere, can chill you to the bone. Snow is rare but December's short days, fog and rain conspire to allow only a few hours of daily sunshine.

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Nomadic Paleo-Indians probably spent time in the New Orleans area over 10000 years ago. By the time the French founded the city in 1718, seven small tribes known as the Muskogeans inhabited the Florida Parishes north of Lake Pontchartrain and, occasionally, the banks of the Mississippi River. Other tribes south of New Orleans inhabited the bayous in Barataria and the lower course of the Mississippi River.

In 1699, brothers Pierre Le Moyne and Jean-Baptist Le Moyne de Bienville became the first Europeans to ply the Mississippi upriver from the Gulf of Mexico. Guided by a Native American, they sailed north, pausing to note the narrow portage to Lake Pontchartrain. Less than 20 years later, Bienville returned to lay out Nouvelle Orleans on that same spot.

Early settlers arrived mostly from France, Canada and Germany, while the French imported thousands of African slaves. Despite the influx, however, colonial mercantilism proved an economic failure in New Orleans and the harsh realities of life there kept further civilian immigration at a minimum. The colonists developed an exchange economy based on smuggling and local trade, while their city earned a reputation for its illegal enterprise and swarthy character.

In 1762, the French ceded the Louisiana territory to the Spanish in exchange for help in France's war against England. During this time, French refugees from Nova Scotia (Acadia) began arriving, following the British seizure of French Canada. (The British deported thousands of Acadians for refusing to pledge allegiance to England.) Unfortunately for the Acadians - or Cajuns, as they are now called - no one had told them they were to become Spanish subjects. Creole society turned their noses up at them and banished the Acadians to the bayous west of the city, where they continued their livelihood of raising livestock.

France regained possession of New Orleans in 1800 and took up an offer to buy it from Thomas Jefferson, who coveted the river capital to proceed on a path of western expansionism. Preferring it fall into American rather than British hands, Napoleon sold the entire Louisiana Territory at a price of $15000000. On 20 December 1803, the French tricolour on the Place d'Armes was quietly replaced by the American flag.

In town, the response to American control was less than welcoming. Protestant American culture was seen as domineering and vulgar. In 1808, the territorial legislature adopted elements of Spanish and French laws - especially the Napoleonic Code - elements of which persist in Louisiana to the present.

By 1840 it was the nation's fourth city to exceed 100000 inhabitants. Americans gained control of the municipal government in 1852 and by 1850, New Orleans had become the South's largest slave-trading centre. Though Louisiana was the sixth state to secede in 1860, New Orleans actually voted three-to-one to preserve the Union and became the first Confederate city to be captured.

After the fall of New Orleans, about 24000 Louisiana blacks served in the Union forces and played a key role in the Reconstruction. After occupying troops left in 1877, many civil rights gains were lost as Jim Crow segregation became commonplace, with skin colour serving as the ultimate arbiter for people who chose not to trace their lineage. Governor Huey Long reportedly summed up the distinction by noting that all the 'pure whites' in Louisiana could be fed 'with a nickel's worth of red beans and a dime's worth of rice'.

By the early 20th century, New Orleans was ripe for the musical revolution that gave birth to jazz. Blacks had long congregated at Congo Square every Sunday to dance and sing to an African drumbeat - the only place in the South where this was permitted. Eventually, the indigenous musical genre called jazz took shape, with many early jazz musicians performing in the red-light district.

As the 20th century dawned, New Orleans struggled to get itself back on track after the turmoil of Reconstruction. It snapped out of the Great Depression as WWII industries created jobs, and its continued prosperity in the 1950s led to suburban growth around the city. Desegregation laws finally brought an end to Jim Crow, but traditions shaped by racism were not so easily reversed. As poor blacks moved into the city, many middle-class whites moved out. New Orleans' population quickly became predominantly black. The city's tax base declined, and many neighbourhoods fell into neglect. However, the French Quarter, which had become a dowdy working-class enclave after the Civil War, was treated to restoration efforts, and it emerged primed for mass tourism, which was becoming one of the city's most lucrative industries. Even as the oil and chemical industries boomed in Louisiana, spurred on by low taxes and lenient environmental restrictions, New Orleans fastened its eyes on the tourist dollar. In the mid-1970s the Louisiana Superdome opened. The home of the city's NFL team, the Saints, it has also hosted Super Bowls and presidential conventions and sparked a major revenue-earner for New Orleans: trade shows. All around the Superdome, new skyscrapers rose in the Central Business District, but by the end of the 1980s, the local oil boom went bust.

In recent years, the steady growth of tourism - despite reports of the city's high crime rate - made up an increasing share of the employment opportunities in New Orleans. Like most US cities at the end of the millennium, New Orleans benefited from trends toward urban revival, and crime had dropped in recent years. Still, New Orleans remained largely a poor city with a small tax base to support public schools and social programmes. Gentrification mostly highlighted a growing divide between the haves and have-nots. And, still, the divide was defined primarily by race. Everything changed, however, on those fateful days in August 2005 when Katrina roared ashore.

New Orleans

468 sq km

1200000

Central Time

first Sunday in April

last Sunday in October

US Dollar

American-style plug with two parallel flat blades above a circular grounding pin

Japanese-style plug with two parallel flat blades

Baby Cakes

King Cakes, which are made only during Mardi Gras, are sponge cakes covered in purple, green and gold sugar, with a small, inedible baby doll inside. Whoever gets the piece with the baby buys the cake next Mardi Gras.

America uses the tiny RJ-11 snap-in phone jack.

New Orleans' print media is often progressive and usually of high quality. Its radio stations reflect the city's many-coloured musical life. Television, as in the rest of the US, soars between the sublime and the ridiculous.

Drunk young men in the Quarter and along parade routes have been a particular nuisance for women, though things are more subdued these days. Otherwise respectable students and businessmen can be transformed by New Orleans - they expect to drink and carouse in a manner that is not acceptable in their home towns. Women in almost any attire are liable to receive - or deliver - lewd comments. Conducting yourself in a common-sense manner will help you to avoid most problems.

Of course, any serious problems you encounter (including assault or rape) should be reported to the police (tel: 911). The YWCA also has a Battered Women's Hotline (tel: 486 0377).

The gay community in New Orleans revolves around the lower French Quarter, below St Ann St, and the adjacent Faubourg Marigny neighbourhood. While many businesses in the area are gay owned and gay oriented, many of the clubs cater to a mixed crowd. The Lesbian & Gay Community Center (tel: 945 1103; 2114 Decatur St) is a great resource centre where you can pick up all of the numerous free rags available in New Orleans. The Faubourg Marigny Book Store (tel: 943 9875; 600 Frenchmen St) is the South's oldest gay bookstore and is a good place to learn about the local gay scene. While you're there, pick up a copy of The Weekly Guide, a free pamphlet that's chock-full of information about gay and lesbian businesses, entertainment venues, hotels and guesthouses. For nightlife ideas, check out the free biweekly tabloids Southern Voice and Ambush Magazine. Publication schedules may be spotty after the hurricane.

Thanks to the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, more and more lodgings and transit agencies are meeting the needs of disabled people. Older hotels are obligated to provide wheelchair access, although accessible bathroom accommodations are primarily found only at newer properties. Wheelchair ramps and/or elevators are available at the ferry crossings. A few of the RTA buses offer a lift service. For information about paratransit service, call the RTA (tel: 827 7433).

The French Quarter is especially difficult for disabled travellers as the rough masonry sidewalks hinder wheelchair travel and can be equally challenging for nearsighted individuals. Few of the picturesque galleries projecting over the Quarter's streets are accessible to wheelchairs. Of course, most federal facilities and parks - including Lafitte National Historic Park - offer access for the disabled.

While this might not be the best time to take children to New Orleans, the city had been building a reputation in recent years as a great place for kids. Audobon Zoo in Uptown was a major reason for this, and its November 3 reopening was a psychological boost for the city. For specially scheduled children's activities, check out the 'kid stuff' listings in the living section of the Times-Picayune. The Louisiana Children's Museum (tel: 523 1357; 420 Julia St) in the Warehouse District caters to kids from ages one to 12. The Maple Street Bookstore operates the Children's Book Shop (tel: 866 4916; 7529 Maple St) with cosy readings for kids. Though childcare services in the city are patchy nowadays, some of the bigger, more expensive hotels may provide babysitting services.

US Dollar

American banknotes (bills) often confuse visitors: they're all the same size and the same colour. Be especially careful not to hand over too much cash, and always check your change carefully. Be careful not to accept incomplete or severely torn notes, as they can be refused; small rips are usually not a problem. Bills come in denominations of 1, 2 (rare), 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 dollars.

Coins come in 1 (penny), 5 (nickel), 10 (dime), 25 (quarter) cent and 50 cent denominations; there is also a dollar coin.

If you can't use your credit card in the US then you probably can't use it anywhere. ATMs are hard to miss, well networked and offer an even cheaper option if your card is set up to use them. Otherwise travellers cheques are almost as good as cash; you'll save yourself hassle and expense if they are in US dollars.

Major credit and debit cards, including the Visa Cash Passport Card, are widely accepted. You can also access your bank account using US ATMs which are ubiquitous. Travellers cheques are easily converted to cash at any bank. You'll probably need to take your passport along to prove your identity.

If you camp or stay in hostels, catch buses and cook your own food, you could feasibly explore the country on around $50 a day. Staying in motels and eating at modest cafes will mean you'll hit the $100 mark, and enjoying the convenience of a rental car will push your daily budget up to $150.

Tipping is expected in cafes, restaurants and better hotels. The going rate in restaurants is 15% or more of the bill; never tip in a fast-food or self-service environment. Taxi drivers, bartenders and hairdressers depend on similar-sized gratuities. Sales taxes vary from state to state but are typically 5-8%, though some states have no sales taxes at all. Top-end accommodation also often attracts a bed tax, which can be as high as 15%. It's worth checking whether quoted prices for lodging include all relevant taxes.

There's an information booth at the airport's A&B concourse and the Airport Shuttle goes to downtown hotels. The Regional Transit Authority runs the local bus service. The RTA also operates two streetcar lines.

Try to avoid bringing a car to downtown New Orleans as it can be a costly and frustrating proposition, dealing with the narrow one-way streets, congestion and parking. The main taxi companies are White Fleet Cabs and United Cabs. Don't forget, you can always rent a bicycle too!

The Regional Transit Authority (RTA) offers decent bus and streetcar service. From the French Quarter, most destinations are served by buses that stop at the intersection of Basin and Canal Sts. All stops have signs noting the route name and number - you may have to explore all four corners of an intersection to find the stop you want. The free New Orleans Street Map, available from information booths at the airport and downtown, shows most route numbers and lists the route names you can expect to see displayed on the front of the bus.

Bringing a car to downtown New Orleans is a costly proposition, and traffic and parking congestion may actually hinder your visit. That said, all the big rental companies can be found in the city or at the airport.

The guides offering mule-drawn carriage rides through the French Quarter are certified by the city to have at least a modest understanding of the quarter's history. However, be aware that 'historical embellishment' is commonplace. Carriages depart day and night, until midnight, from Jackson Square.

Three Amtrak trains serve New Orleans at the Union Passenger Terminal. The City of New Orleans runs to Memphis, Jackson and Chicago; the Crescent Route serves Birmingham, Atlanta, Washington and New York City; and the Sunset Limited rolls between Los Angeles and Miami.

Pre-Katrina, New Orleans had three streetcar lines in operation. The 1923-24 vintage cars of the St Charles Ave Streetcar Line rumbled through streetcar-era suburbs full of Georgian architecture and ornate churches. Its cars survived the flood but the line was widely damaged. The Riverfront Streetcar Line operated vintage red cars on the old dockside rail corridor, connecting the Old US Mint, in the lower end of the French Quarter and the upriver Convention Center, passing the new Canal St line on the way. These lines survived but the cars flooded, and will need extensive repair work before being fully operational again.

Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, 18km (11mi) west of the city, handles mostly domestic flights. A departure tax of $24.00 is charged to all passengers travelling to foreign cities. Greyhound buses run from the Union Passenger Terminal, with regular services to other southern cities. Amtrak trains also operate from the Union Passenger Terminal.

Visitors to New Orleans during Mark Twain's time arrived by boat via the Mississippi River. This once-common mode of travel continues to be offered by a few paddlewheel river boats and ocean-going cruise ships. Costs are high compared to other travel modes - the era of steerage passage is over - and river travel is now typically offered as a package tour or excursion that includes top-end food and lodging.

As is typical throughout the South, you can rely on good bus service to New Orleans. Greyhound is the only regular long-distance bus company operating to the city. All trains and Greyhound buses share the New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal, seven blocks upriver from Canal St.

Interstate 10 is the nation's major east-west route along the southern boundary linking Jacksonville with Los Angeles via New Orleans. The north-south routes, I-55 to Chicago and I-59 to Chattanooga, meet I-10 to the west and east of New Orleans on either side of Lake Pontchartrain. Driving is done on the right.

New Orleans International Airport's flights are about 98% domestic - the only 'international' flights are with other North and Central American countries. Its proximity to major hubs at Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston and Atlanta make it easy to find a convenient flight or connection to and from just about anywhere in North America.