St. Louis Cathedral overlooks Jackson Square and is the most identifiable building in New Orleans.
New Orleans is known for its rich culture, lively jazz music and haunted history. If you are planning your first visit to The Big Easy, using professional tour companies is an invaluable way to see the most popular sights and learn about this stimulating city from the locals. Since New Orleans spans 181 square miles, bus tours offer a comprehensive overview of the day's attractions in a shorter amount of time than a walking tour.
French Quarter
The French Quarter is the name given to the downtown area south of Rampart Street and east of Canal Street to Esplanade Ave. A bus tour that covers the French Quarter will always take you through the wharf area that covers Jackson Square and the French Market. It will introduce St. Louis Cathedral and the infamous Bourbon Street. Since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans when the levee of Lake Pontchartrain broke in 2006, many of the bus companies have added the 9th ward to their French Quarter tours so visitors can understand the breadth of the devastation and how far the efforts to rebuild have come. For an intimate exploration of these sites, choose a tour that uses vans as opposed to large buses. These excursions cost approximately $45 for a two hour guided ride.
Garden District
Lafayette Cemetery's most notorious resident is Marie Laveau, a voodoo priestess who died in 1881.
The Garden District is the area west of the French Quarter between Magazine and St. Charles Street, the avenue most known for its historic street car. This area of New Orleans boasts magnificent mansions built in Greek Revival and Italianate architectural styles. Although the kings and queens of Mardi Gras lived here, it is also known for some more recent celebrities such as author Anne Rice and it is the hometown of NFL brothers Eli and Payton Manning. In the heart of the Garden District is Lafayette Cemetery No. 2 which is a must see attraction. Its above-ground tombs feature some of New Orleans' oldest families with headstones that date back to the 18th century.
Garden District tours average 90 minutes and are reasonably priced from $15 to $18.
Plantation Tours
A trip to "N'awlins" is not complete without a tour to the plantations on the outskirts of the city. The most notable are Oak Alley, the Hollywood home of Louis de Pont Du Lac in "Interview with the Vampire." A visit to Laura Plantation will whisk you back to 1805 when the sugar crops were abundant and American Creole living was at its pinnacle. Although Evergreen Plantation is still a privately owned sugar cane farm, it offers daily tours of the 22 slave cabins that still stand down a dirt path off the Old River Road. Bus tours offer access to one or more of these plantations in a number of combinations. You can choose a half day or full day excursion and the prices range from $52 to $85, which includes admission to the historic homes.
