The French Quarter

April 9, 2006
French Quarter, New Orleans

We drove across the causeway again to finally see the French Quarter. Going south into The City, as they call it here, like they do in San Francisco, there is a toll. The lady at the booth looked over the combination trike and trailer and decided to charge me an extra buck and a half for three axles. Seemed like a rip off since the front wheel does not have an axle but it wasn’t worth a hassle. Crossing the freeway bridges near the Superdome reminded me of the sorry events of Hurricane Katrina. It’s hard to believe they actually barricaded them and wouldn’t let people walk out of the disaster zone.

The GPS worked well this time and we were soon in the French Quarter looking for the National Historic Park visitor center and the Voodoo Harley shop that showed on the map as being within a couple of blocks of each other. We arrived and the lunch hour and traffic, both pedestrian and vehicular was jammed. Parking was impossible on the streets so when we saw a sign for public parking we zipped in only to be confronted right at the gate that motorcycles were not allowed. We had no room to turn around so we went ahead and entered and parked. This turned out to be a minor rip off as well as causing worry while we stolled around. (When we left, the attendant was polite as everyone is here but she chastised us and charged us double the rate since we had two vehicles including the trailer.)

Another very polite gentelman at the tourist information booth on Decatur Street gave us directions to our two destinations and we got our Louisiana passport stamp then walked three blocks to the Harley store. It may be unique in the country as it does not sell any motorcycles, only clothing. I got a couple of shirts for a whopping 60 bucks but I had to have them! (Some may not know but it is something of a tradition for Harley riders on tour to buy t-shirts at Harley stores with the shop’s own logo and name on them.) The Voodoo graphics are cool and I had a hard time picking one out.

We then walked back to the trike. Bentley is a nervous wreck in crowds even when he is being carried. When we got to the trike he tried to climb up the fender to his kennel. This was encouraging as we have been concerned that he would begin to hate his kennel after spending so much time in it but not so. We had discussed previously leaving him in it on the trike while we went into restaurants or other places that don’t allow dogs and since we wanted to eat we decided to leave him there while we did that. It worked out well, he was sleeping when we got back so that should allow us to do more museums and other sightseeing.
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We also made another large contribution to the French Quarter economy at the camera shop there on Decatur Street. We saw the shop and we needed to get Von a spare battery for her little point and shoot camera so in we went. We got the battery, for 60 bucks, the going price but the shop owner saw my DSLR around my neck and quickly began trying to sell me a lens for it. He was quite good without being pushy and was suggesting what he called a compensation lens. The smaller DSLR’s like I have do not actually take pictures at the focal length listed on the lens due to the size of the sensors in them. In my case if the lens says it is a 18mm you multiply that times 1.6 to get the equivalent length of a full format 35mm camera so my 18 mm’s on the standard telephoto that came with the camera box is actually closer to 30 mm, not all that wide an angle. I knew all that and I was intrigued by what he was saying. His first ’sell’ was that he had this lens on sale at half price. That was enough to get me to let him take my camera and put the lens adapter on it.

He first took a picture of Von and me without the adapter from about 4 feet away right there across his counter. He then put the adapter on and took the same shot.

Then he demonstrated the macro function the adapter has by shooting a shot of Von’s ring.

Then we went outside and he did the same thing but of a building across the street, the Jackson Brewery.

Then we went inside again and he took a picture of the inside of the box the lens came in.

Amazing. The macro function, the increased gathering of light, and the wide angle of the building combined with my experience having to create panoramas all the time to show landscapes had me hooked. Von was amenable to spending the dough so out came the credit card and we contributed another $350 to help out the New Orleans recovery. With the t-shirts, the camera stuff and our lunch we helped them out some $500 worth. I wonder if it’s tax deductible?