New Orleans, Louisiana Travel Guide

New Orleans sits on a tight bend of the Mississippi River, and for most first-time visitors it means three things: the French Quarter, Bourbon Street and Mardi Gras. The city that local writers and repeat visitors point to is wider than that: brass bands in neighborhood bars, Creole lunch rooms in Tremé, a Vietnamese bakery in New Orleans East whose king cakes sell out every Carnival, and costumed walking krewes in the Marigny and Bywater. Mardi Gras 2027 falls on Tuesday 9 February, at the end of a parade season that opens on 6 January.

It suits travelers who come for music and food and are happy to walk, ride a streetcar or take a ferry to find them. The trade-offs are real. Carnival rooms fill early, parades divert the streetcars for hours, and the summer heat and the June–November hurricane season make the second half of the year harder going.

This guide covers what travelers keep asking about: where to watch the parades and the route rules that catch first-timers out, what the latest crime figures say, which famous spots have closed or moved, and seven places to go beyond Bourbon Street. If you're choosing between Carnivals, note that Trinidad Carnival falls on the same Monday and Tuesday in 2027.

St. Augustine Church, Tremé. Free people of color founded this parish in 1841, and it is often called the oldest Black Catholic parish in the United States; Louis Armstrong was a parishioner. Outside stands the Tomb of the Unknown Slave, a cross made of large chains in a garden plot, honoring enslaved people who died nameless or forgotten. Hurricane Ida damaged the church in 2021, and services moved to the parish hall for years. In August 2026 the annual Satchmo Jazz Mass was held in the main church for the first time in nearly five years and ended with a second line through Tremé. Sunday Mass is at 10am, and the church is at Gov. Nicholls and Henriette Delille streets, a few blocks from the French Quarter.

St. Roch Chapel and Cemetery. Father Peter Leonard Thevis built this chapel to keep a promise after his parish came through a yellow fever epidemic, and the cemetery around it dates from 1874. The side room is why people come: behind a locked gate sit plaster feet and hands, false teeth, prosthetic limbs and crutches left by people who credited St. Roch with a cure. The catch is access. After a restoration that ran from 2018 to May 2022, the chapel opens only on the first Friday of each month from 11am to noon, or the second Friday when the first is a holiday. In 2027 that means 8 January and 5 February, the Friday before Mardi Gras weekend. The cemetery is at 1725 St. Roch Avenue.

Dong Phuong Bakery, New Orleans East. A family who arrived as refugees from South Vietnam has run this bakery since 1982, and it now supplies bread to hundreds of local restaurants. In 2008 it added a laminated cream-cheese king cake that people queue for every Carnival, and in 2018 it won a James Beard America's Classics award. For the 2026 season, online orders were fully booked, but walk-in cakes went on sale from 8am every day except Tuesday, three per person. Outside Carnival, come for bánh mì and pastries: the bakery opens 8am–5pm and the restaurant 9am–3pm, both closed on Tuesdays. It's about a 30-minute drive from downtown, and in 2026 it closed for a week from Mardi Gras Day (17–24 February).

Killer Poboys at Erin Rose, French Quarter. Half a block off Bourbon Street, the Erin Rose dive bar has a po-boy counter in its back room. Killer Poboys makes chef-driven sandwiches: Time Out singles out the seared shrimp with pickled carrots and daikon and the beer-braised roast beef, and the Michelin Guide lists it among its recommended New Orleans restaurants. Order the bar's frozen Irish coffee while you wait. The Erin Rose counter is 21+ and closed on Tuesdays; it opens from noon to 8pm on Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Thursday and from 10am to midnight on Friday and Saturday. The Dauphine Street shop about a block away has the full menu.

Bacchanal Wine, Bywater. Bacchanal starts as a wine shop: pick a bottle off the shelf, then carry it into a backyard of mismatched chairs where local bands play; The Infatuation's 2023 review found music every night. The Infatuation calls it a "wine garden utopia", Punch rates its rosé selection, and its wine program has twice been nominated for a James Beard award. It opens at 4pm Monday to Thursday and at noon from Friday to Sunday, takes no reservations and admits no one under 21, and it closes on Mardi Gras Day. Trains pass right outside the gates, so expect the odd interruption.

Maple Leaf Bar, Uptown. This Oak Street bar has put on live music seven nights a week for most of its history, from James Booker and the Rebirth Brass Band to Walter "Wolfman" Washington, and The Points Guy names it as an alternative to Bourbon Street. Thursday is the night to plan around: drummer Johnny Vidacovich leads a trio with rotating guests, and he was on the bar's calendar again on 29 October 2026. It's far Uptown from the French Quarter, so pair it with dinner nearby, such as Dakar NOLA a few blocks away.

Old Point Bar, Algiers Point. Ride the $2 ferry from the foot of Canal Street and walk a few blocks to this century-old bar on Patterson Drive, decorated with Algiers memorabilia and a carved mermaid hanging from the ceiling. Local bands play several nights a week, and WWOZ's music calendar listed shows there in early 2026. It's the quiet counterpoint to the Quarter. The catch is the boat back: ferry service ends around 8:45pm from Sunday to Thursday and 10:45pm on Friday and Saturday, so check the last crossing from Algiers Point before you settle in.

Skip: Bourbon Street as your big music night. Instead: Frenchmen Street from about 8pm, or the Maple Leaf on a Thursday. Bourbon Street made a New Orleans TikToker's tourist-trap list that Narcity reported in 2023, and The Points Guy's list of tourist mistakes sends music fans to Frenchmen Street, Tipitina's or the Maple Leaf instead. On Frenchmen, the Spotted Cat, d.b.a. and Snug Harbor are a few doors apart, many clubs charge no cover or $5–10, and Afar says the street picks up around 8pm, earlier on weekends.

Skip: waiting for a table at Café du Monde on Decatur Street. Instead: take your beignets to go, or use the City Park branch. The same TikTok list included the French Quarter Café du Monde and suggested the branch in City Park, which opened in 2019 in the park's 1913 Casino Building. The Points Guy's fix for the original is simpler: order to go, or look for free tables inside on the left near the restrooms.

Skip: turning up at St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 on your own. Instead: book a tour there, or visit St. Roch and Lafayette No. 1. The Archdiocese closed St. Louis No. 1, where Marie Laveau is believed to be buried, to the general public in 2015, citing vandalism; you now need a tour company or a family pass. Lafayette Cemetery No. 1 in the Garden District reopened on 1 October 2026 after seven years, but only for small guided tours (six a day, up to 16 people) booked through the Preservation Resource Center at prcno.org.

Skip: the old Willie Mae's Scotch House address in Tremé. Instead: Willie Mae's NOLA on Baronne Street. The family's St. Ann Street restaurant was badly damaged by an electrical fire on 10 April 2023. In October 2026 the restaurant's own site listed only its downtown location at 898 Baronne Street, which is closed on Tuesdays.

Skip: driving to the parades. Instead: walk, bike or ride, and plan around the detours. New Orleans & Company says walking is the best way to get around at Mardi Gras, rideshare prices surge, and roads may already be closed before night parades. On the RTA, St. Charles streetcar detours start four hours before Uptown parades and other detours two hours before, lasting until the route is cleared.

Go between February and April for mild weather, parades and festivals; plan Mardi Gras 2027 around Tuesday 9 February. Average highs run about 66°F in February, 72°F in March and 79°F in April (NOAA 1991–2020 normals at the airport), and February lows average about 50°F, so bring a jacket for night parades.

Carnival 2027. The season opens on Twelfth Night, Wednesday 6 January. Parades roll on select days through January, then every night from Wednesday 3 February to Fat Tuesday on 9 February, with Lundi Gras on Monday 8 February. The City Council fixes each parade's start time in late January (it voted on 27 January in 2026), so treat any 2027 times you see now as provisional.

If the 2026 pattern holds. In 2026 Krewe du Vieux, a satirical, adults-only parade with mule-drawn floats, rolled 17 days before Mardi Gras, and 'tit Rəx, a micro-krewe that marches shoebox-sized floats through the Marigny, followed the next day. The same spacing would put them on 23 and 24 January 2027. In 2026 the big parades ran Muses on the Thursday, Endymion in Mid-City on the Saturday, Bacchus on the Sunday, Orpheus on Lundi Gras, and Zulu (at 8am) and Rex on Mardi Gras Day; in 2027 those days fall on 4, 6, 7, 8 and 9 February.

Mardi Gras morning. Beyond Zulu and Rex, the Society of Saint Anne's costumed walkers gather in Bywater and wind through the Marigny and the French Quarter to Canal Street, with the Storyville Stompers brass band. Mardi Gras Indian tribes don't publish routes, but they have traditionally met around Claiborne and Orleans avenues after Zulu passes, and near the Backstreet Cultural Museum in Tremé.

Jazz Fest and spring. The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival fills the Fair Grounds over two long weekends, 22–25 April and 29 April–2 May 2027.

Summer and fall. July averages a high of 91°F with dewpoints above 70°F, and hurricane season runs from June to November. In early August the Satchmo Jazz Mass at St. Augustine Church marks Louis Armstrong's birthday.

You don't need a car: the French Quarter, Marigny, Tremé and the CBD are walkable, and streetcars, buses and a river ferry cover most of the rest. The exception is New Orleans East, home of Dong Phuong Bakery, which is easiest by taxi or rideshare.

From the airport. Taxis charge a flat $36 for one or two passengers to the CBD or French Quarter, or $15 each for three or more, and must accept cards; the taxi zone is outside Door 7 on the baggage-claim level. The RTA's Airport Express (route 202) costs $1.25 from Door 2 on the same level and runs to Elk Place and the Union Passenger Terminal downtown.

Streetcars and buses. A ride costs $1.25. A Jazzy Pass costs $3 for 24 hours from first use, $8 for three days or $15 for seven, and you can buy and show it in the RTA's Le Pass app (fares checked October 2026). The St. Charles streetcar is a scenic ride rather than a fast one, so take a cab for anything time-sensitive.

The ferry. The Canal Street–Algiers Point ferry costs $2 and leaves the foot of Canal Street at quarter past and quarter to the hour, from 6:15am until 8:45pm Sunday to Thursday and until 10:45pm on Friday and Saturday. The crossing itself takes 5–10 minutes.

During Mardi Gras. St. Charles streetcar detours begin four hours before Uptown parades and other detours two hours before, and buses and streetcars run a weekend schedule on Mardi Gras Day. During Carnival 2026, police and National Guard troops also restricted traffic into part of the French Quarter from about 5pm to 5am, so plan to walk the last stretch to your hotel.

Stay along the St. Charles Avenue parade route or in the CBD if Mardi Gras is the point of the trip, and in the Marigny if live music is. For Carnival, book as early as you can: downtown and French Quarter hotels averaged nearly 87% occupancy across Mardi Gras 2025, and 95% on the Saturday night.

Garden District and Uptown. New Orleans & Company recommends the stretch of St. Charles between Napoleon and Jackson avenues for families, with a more relaxed crowd than the Quarter. You can walk to the Uptown parades, but expect the streetcar to detour for hours on parade days.

CBD and Warehouse District. The tourism board calls this area convenient for both parades and nightlife, and it puts you near the airport bus, the ferry and Willie Mae's NOLA. Hotels on St. Charles Avenue and Canal Street sit right on the route and sell out first.

French Quarter. The most central base, close to Preservation Hall, Jewel of the South and Erin Rose, but it gets crowded at Carnival and is better suited to adults.

Marigny and Bywater. Walkable to the Frenchmen Street clubs, Bacchanal and St. Roch, and away from the big parade routes.

Mid-City. Near the Endymion route, Parkway Bakery and City Park, and a short ride from the Fair Grounds for Jazz Fest.

The Michelin Guide reached New Orleans in 2025: its first American South selection gave Emeril's two stars, and in October 2026 Dakar NOLA earned its first. Its Bib Gourmand list, which marks good cooking at moderate prices, takes in po-boy shops, a sandwich counter and a Creole institution, so you don't need a tasting-menu budget to eat well. Dong Phuong, Killer Poboys, Bacchanal and the Maple Leaf are covered in the hidden gems above.

Domilise's Po-Boy & Bar. An Uptown po-boy shop on Annunciation Street with a Michelin Bib Gourmand; Time Out recommends the classic fried oyster, fried shrimp or roast beef with debris.

Parkway Bakery & Tavern. A family-owned po-boy shop by Bayou St. John, open since 1911 and also a Bib Gourmand; order the surf-and-turf po-boy and save room for the banana pudding.

Dooky Chase's Restaurant. Tremé's Creole landmark serves gumbo, shrimp Clemenceau and fried chicken among its art collection. Lunch runs Tuesday to Friday from 11am to 3pm and dinner on Friday and Saturday, and the restaurant strongly recommends reservations.

Willie Mae's NOLA. The downtown home of the fried chicken that won its Tremé original a James Beard America's Classics award in 2005, now on the Michelin Guide's recommended list. It's open daily except Tuesday, from 10am at weekends with brunch until 3pm.

Turkey and the Wolf. A Lower Garden District sandwich shop with a Bib Gourmand, known for its griddled bologna sandwich and collard green melt; go early to beat the line.

Dakar NOLA. Chef Serigne Mbaye's Senegalese tasting menu, made with Louisiana ingredients, won the James Beard award for Best New Restaurant in 2024 and a Michelin star in October 2026. It moved in June 2026 from Magazine Street to 937 Leonidas Street, so ignore older listings. There are two seatings, at 5pm and 8pm, Tuesday to Saturday; prepaid reservations open three weeks ahead at 10am Central, and the menu is pescatarian, with no vegetarian, vegan or kosher option.

Jewel of the South. Bartender Chris Hannah's French Quarter bar, in a refurbished 19th-century house, won the James Beard Award for Outstanding Bar in 2024. Order the brandy crusta, and arrive around 4:45pm to join the line for the first bar seats.

Frenchmen Street. The Spotted Cat plays traditional and modern jazz, d.b.a. has a long beer and spirits list and its own stage, and Snug Harbor presents modern jazz in a seated music room, with barbecue shrimp in its bistro. Bring cash for covers, drinks and the tip bucket.

Preservation Hall. The St. Peter Street hall has live New Orleans music every night; tickets are sold through its online calendar.

Most first-timer problems at Mardi Gras come from the parade-route rules, the transit detours and booking late. These are the ones that come up again and again, with the fix for each.

Claiming a spot too early. Nothing may go on the public right-of-way more than four hours before a parade starts, and ladders or items left on the neutral ground overnight are thrown away. Arrive within the four-hour window instead of camping out.

Bringing a tent, ropes or a grill. Tents, canopies, ropes and other barricades, open flames (including grills), generators, upholstered furniture, confetti and pets other than service animals are all banned on the routes. Ladders are allowed if they're no taller than 6 feet, free-standing and at least six feet back from the curb.

Counting on the streetcar. The St. Charles line detours four hours before Uptown parades. Walk or cycle, and expect rideshare surge pricing on parade nights.

Booking too late. Downtown and French Quarter hotels were nearly 87% full across Mardi Gras 2025 and 95% on the Saturday, so lock in a room as soon as your dates are set.

Dressing for the postcard, not the weather. February nights average about 50°F and parades run late, so bring layers and closed-toe shoes, plus cash for food and restroom fees along the route.

Picking beads up off the ground. Locals consider it bad luck, and the streets get grimy during Carnival; catch them in the air instead. Open cups are fine on the route, but glass isn't allowed.

Staying in the French Quarter all trip. The Points Guy's advice is to cross Canal Street for the Garden District, Bywater and Mid-City, and six of this guide's seven gems are outside the Quarter.

Forgetting the tip bucket. Covers on Frenchmen Street are low or free, and Afar's advice is to give generously and often when the bucket comes round.

Safety. Violent crime has fallen sharply. Police counted 121 murders in 2025, including the 14 people killed in the New Year's Day attack on Bourbon Street, down from 266 in 2022, and armed robberies and carjackings fell 28% and 35% from 2024; shoplifting rose. At Mardi Gras 2026, police said more officers than ever would be on the parade routes. Keep a cross-body bag zipped in crowds, as the tourism board advises.

Working out. The New Orleans Athletic Club on North Rampart Street sells $30 day passes, and visitors who show a hotel or Airbnb booking can buy as many as they need; it's open 5:30am–9pm on weekdays and 8am–6pm at weekends. For climbing, the New Orleans Boulder Lounge on St. Claude Avenue charges $20 a day ($16 reduced, $24 sustainer) plus $4 for shoes, after a risk form (online or at the desk) and an orientation quiz. Both checked October 2026.

Mardi Gras Day closures. Some favorites shut on Fat Tuesday itself: Bacchanal closes for Mardi Gras Day, and in 2026 Dong Phuong closed from Mardi Gras Day for a week.

Cash. Small bills cover club doors, restroom fees on the parade route and the musicians' tip bucket.

One day

Start in Tremé: on a Sunday, join the 10am Mass at St. Augustine Church and see the Tomb of the Unknown Slave; on a weekday, book lunch at Dooky Chase's (Tuesday to Friday). Walk into the French Quarter for the afternoon and stop at Erin Rose for a frozen Irish coffee and a Killer Poboys sandwich. After dark, head to Frenchmen Street from about 8pm for the Spotted Cat or a seated set at Snug Harbor.

Two days

Day one as above. On day two, take beignets to go or ride out to the City Park Café du Monde, then see St. Roch Cemetery; if it's the first Friday of the month, the chapel opens from 11am to noon. Spend the late afternoon in the Bywater at Bacchanal (from 4pm Monday to Thursday, noon Friday to Sunday), then take the ferry from the foot of Canal Street to Algiers Point for the Old Point Bar, keeping an eye on the last boat back.

Three days

Add a morning taxi or rideshare to Dong Phuong Bakery in New Orleans East (closed Tuesdays) for bánh mì, and a king cake in season. Spend the afternoon Uptown with a po-boy at Domilise's and a ride on the St. Charles streetcar. On a Thursday, book Dakar NOLA's 5pm seating and finish a few blocks away at the Maple Leaf Bar for Johnny Vidacovich's trio.

When is Mardi Gras 2027?

Fat Tuesday is 9 February 2027. The Carnival season starts on 6 January, parades run on select days through January and every night from 3 February, and Lundi Gras is 8 February. The City Council sets official parade start times in late January, so confirm times then.

Is New Orleans safe for tourists?

Violent crime has dropped sharply: police counted 121 murders in 2025, including the 14 victims of the New Year's Day attack, against 266 in 2022, and armed robberies fell 28% and carjackings 35% from 2024. During Carnival 2026, police and National Guard troops limited night-time traffic into part of the French Quarter. Watch your bag in crowds and plan your ride home after late parades.

Where is the best place to watch Mardi Gras parades?

New Orleans & Company recommends St. Charles Avenue between Napoleon and Jackson avenues for families; the French Quarter is more crowded and better suited to adults. On Mardi Gras morning, the Society of Saint Anne's costumed walkers start in Bywater and head through the Marigny and the Quarter to Canal Street.

Do you need a car in New Orleans?

No. Airport taxis charge a flat $36 for one or two people to the French Quarter or CBD, streetcars and buses cost $1.25 a ride or $3 for a 24-hour pass, and the Algiers Point ferry is $2. A car only helps for New Orleans East or trips out of town.

Can you visit the above-ground cemeteries?

Yes, with conditions. St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 has been closed to the general public since 2015, so you need a tour; Lafayette Cemetery No. 1 reopened on 1 October 2026 for guided tours booked through the Preservation Resource Center; and the St. Roch chapel opens on the first Friday of each month from 11am to noon.

What are the parade-route rules?

Ladders must be no taller than 6 feet, free-standing and at least six feet back from the curb, and you can't set anything up more than four hours before a parade. Tents, ropes, grills, generators, upholstered furniture and confetti are banned, open cups are fine, and glass isn't allowed.