Remembering the Girl’s Trip to New Orleans
This past February, three of my best girlfriends and I decided to go celebrate Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Louisiana. Every year we try to plan a girl’s trip where we can get away from the daily grind and let our hair down a little. None of us had ever been to New Orleans, so we figured what better time to go than at the height of the well-known Mardi Gras celebration in the heart of the French Quarter.
We arrived on Sunday before Fat Tuesday and checked into our hotel. We planned our trip about eight months in advance, so we were able to get rooms at the Le Richelieu in the French Quarter. The rooms were beautiful and full of French Quarter charm. All of the excitement was within walking distance, which was a great thing considering the taste we developed for the infamous hurricane cocktails served up at Pat O’Brien’s.
Naturally, one of our frequent stops during our trip to New Orleans was to the legendary Pat O’Brien’s bar. Pat O’Brien’s is the home of the very first dueling pianos and the birthplace of the hurricane cocktail. We made sure to experience our fair share of both.
All four of us immediately fell in love with Pat O’Brien’s hurricane drinks. Supposedly the drink was created to get rid of a surplus of rum. During World War II scotch and whiskey was scarce, so liquor salesmen forced bar owners to buy extra rum, which was very common, before they could purchase any good scotch or whiskey. The bartender at Pat O’Brien’s concocted a tasty recipe to get rid of the rum, and they decided to serve the drink in a tall glass shaped like a hurricane lamp, hence the name. The hurricane cocktail is a tasty mix of limejuice, passion fruit syrup, and rum. We thoroughly enjoyed our share of hurricane’s while jamming out to the dueling piano show.
There really is nothing like being in the heart of New Orleans during Mardi Gras. The entire trip was a blur. We collected beads during the parades, walked the streets of the French Quarter, ate beignets, po-boy’s and gumbo, and saw some of the most interesting people on the planet!
As soon as we got home, I knew I needed a way to commemorate our trip to New Orleans. My girlfriends and I are all suckers for personalized gifts, so I decided to order some personalized hurricane cocktail glasses from a specialty personalized glass website. I had each of our names etched on the glasses along with the location and date of our trip. I am going to hold onto the set of glasses and give them to everyone for Christmas at our annual holiday party. I think the hurricane glasses will remind everyone of the great trip we all had last February. Next year we are planning a trip to Napa Valley. I believe I see some wine glasses in our future!