The Atlantis-New Orleans Connection.

Today was a good day.  Every day in New Orleans is a good day.  You should try it sometime.

I was talking with Serra, the masseuse yesterday.  We were talking about the Causeway.  I hate the Causeway.  Why?  Because I hate to leave New Orleans.  You will, too.

The Lake Pontchartrain Causeway is the longest bridge in the world.  I don’t know about you but I have seen water before.  I don’t need to see another twenty-six miles of it.

Here is what Serra, the masseuse told me.  She told me that she doesn’t like the trip on the causeway away from New Orleans but she enjoys it on the trip into New Orleans.  Here is what she said: “It shouldn’t be easy to get here.  It’s like traveling to Atlantis, surrounded by so much water.  The Causeway is the buffer between New Orleans and the rest of the world.”

When you live in New Orleans you think about the city a lot because you know it is like nowhere else in the world.  People will wax poetic about New Orleans at the drop of a hat.  New Orleans inspires strong emotions.  I hadn’t thought about it that way before.  Every day in New Orleans is full of small epiphanies.

New Orleans does not feel antebellum so much as antediluvian.  It is the 21st century but everything in New Orleans is old before its time.  The air is thick.  It is thick with the stench of history and layers and layers of grime.  It feels like Atlantis.  New Orleans is moist.

The smell of hope is everywhere in New Orleans.  Hope and bayou April freshness.  I know because I cross the bridge over Bayou St. John almost every day.  It is much shorter than the Causeway.  It always smells like April at Bayou St. John.

It always smells like April on Esplanade Avenue.  It smells like April in December.

I was talking to Frau Schmitt about it earlier.  Frau Schmitt is the better half of this operation.  We are going to the symphony tonight.  I am eager.  Frau Schmitt is the nicest person you will ever meet.  Me?  I’m a bon vivant and a lovable scamp.

At La Belle Esplanade we are here to share what it is like to live in this wonderful city we call home.  When you want to Visit New Orleans like you mean it, you are on the right website.  You have two friends at La Belle Esplanade.  Welcome to our world.  We are here for you.