Four days in New Orleans

Jarvis Harris and Joe Foss are telling local audiences about their five-week, 4,600-mile tour of Black historical sites across the United States last fall. For additional insights into their journey and anti-racist work, please visit their website, AcceptingOthers.com. 

Although it was a nine-hour trip, our 4:40 a.m. train from Memphis got us into New Orleans before 3 p.m., so we had part of the afternoon to explore the city.

Jarvis:  I’d never before been to Louisiana. Unfortunately, I’d not slept before we got on the train, so I got caught up on that during the ride into New Orleans. Once there, we found a nice hotel within walking distance of Bourbon Street and all its activities.

On a walk, we spoke with a gentleman who suggested that we each get a trolley pass. The pass was only $3 and was good all day and took us to almost every place we wanted to go. 

With that, we were able to expand our trips to include a ferry ride (using that same pass) across the Mississippi to the Algiers Court House, across town. 

We caught the trolley the next day, went in the opposite direction, and found the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at the New Orleans Museum of Art. This place had walking trails to many different sculptures, statues and exhibits.

The museum that we found was small and unique.  It was different in that it was more focused on various forms of art. There was everything from fashions to murals. There were fabrics and maskings. There were also some artifacts and a focus on Black women artists.

New Orleans was great and had lots to see and take in. I was pleased with the wide variety of activities, shops and sites. The people were really friendly and everyone seemed to be really enjoying themselves. I called it the East Coast Las Vegas.

Safely home in Lacey less than two months later, I couldn’t help but feel my heart tighten when I heard about the New Year’s Day truck attack there, in which 15 people died, including two police officers, and more than 55 people were injured.

Again, our trip was one of discovery and learning. We were experiencing a side of America that’s bright, inclusive, joyous and memorable. I’m sure it was still happening for others when this attack happened. 

We can do better.  Let’s not let hate, anger or other negativities prevail in our lives. We are a better people and country than that. Let our love and appreciation be louder than those people that would hold us back or even destroy us.

Joe:  After being turned away at one hotel close to the train station we found the Wyndham Gardens was close by. So we made reservations online, then walked there and checked in.

A very strange thing that did not make sense to us was that without reservations, we could not walk into a hotel and check in at the desk, even if they had rooms available. So from then on, we made reservations on our phone, even if we were just in the lobby of the hotel that we were looking to be staying at, before we went to the counter.

Once again we had great accommodations that were walking distance to the train station, Canal and Bourbon streets, and many more New Orleans sights that we wanted to see.

We found only one Black history museum there, the New Orleans African American Museum so we planned to walk there on one of our days. And there were plenty of other interesting sights to see, so we just took things in as we went. (The New Orleans Jazz Museum was closed the day we were there.)

Since Jarvis had not been there before, we wandered Bourbon Street a bit the first night and ate at Willie’s Chicken Shack, which, of course, had really great chicken and delicious blended drinks served from very large premixed cooler and blenders. Great food and drink, and our first view of the all-night craziness of Bourbon Street.

Bourbon Street was mostly about drinking and partying, just crazy nightlife, and we wanted to hear some jazz music. We asked where the music scene was and were directed to Frenchman Street, which is where we went on our second day after taking a trolley ride to the Mississippi, where we took the ferry to Algiers across the river.

On Frenchman Street, we ate dinner at a bar that also had a backroom music venue, which was featuring one of the Marsalis brothers and his orchestra that night.

On our last day in New Orleans we treated ourselves to an excursion to the Whitney Plantation.  It showed various buildings and structures that were used and found on typical plantations, including slave quarters.

There were also cars in which people were housed in more recent years, as well as tools and instruments used for work, farming and living back then. It gave us glimpses of what life must have been like during earlier times.   

Jarvis Harris, of Lacey, is a retired U.S. Army veteran and former Pierce County corrections officer who now dedicates his time to personal passions and volunteering. Born and raised in Philadelphia, he settled in Lacey during his Army service.

Joe Foss, of Tacoma, is a Navy veteran and retired business owner who has been actively engaged in projects addressing racism in America since 2012.