Cruise Vacation day 2- New Orleans and Boarding the boat

Today has been such a long, busy, fun day!  We got up and dressed pretty early, we were out of the hotel by 8:30.  we took a nice walk down the streets of the french quarter to the Cafe du Monde.






 The last time Jon and I were here, the line was over 45 min long and wrapped around the building.  Today we walked right in and got a table right away.  We all ordered hot chocolates and beignets.  They were sooooo good!  We had to wait a while for them to arrive, but it was worth it.  The chocolate was too hot at first so after we finished the doughnuts we took our cups to go and walked down to the french market.








 We browsed down the isles for a while and Damon and Andrea got some souvenirs for their kids.  Jon got me a beautiful glass starfish necklace and I got Jon an alligator sausage to eat.  By the time we finished there, it was about time to start meandering back to the hotel.










  We took a quick walk around Jackson square and then went to get our things from the hotel.  We got there with just a few min to spare before checkout.  We got checked our and went to find the port.  We got a bit lost due to one way streets and bad directions, but made it to the parking garage in the end so all was well.  We had to wait in a long line to drop off our baggage and park then more long lines to board the boat.  Jon's bag got flagged by security because of his contact juggling balls so we got pulled aside while we proved it was safe.



Once on board, we checked our our rooms, got lunch at the buffet, went to the safety briefing then headed up to the top to watch us leave New Orleans and head down the river.  We stayed on deck for quite a while watching the sunset over the city.  It was so beautiful.













After it was too dark to see much, we decided to grab some dinner in the dining room.  We all ate WAY too much.  I had the spring rolls and chicken fingers for apps and the sweet and sour chicken for the entree (that was meh) then chocolate melting cake and a cheese plate for dessert.














 After dinner we rolled our of the restaurant and took a tour of Deck 5.  We were going to go in a hot tub next fut we felt the water of all the tubs and it was barely warm!  Now Jon is entertaining the public in the hallway with his juggling balls while Damon, Andrea and I unpack and I write this.  Next we will plan our day out for tomorrow and either play games or go watch the welcome show.  Tomorrow we have our first "Fun Day at sea"  This has been a great day with our friends.