On Friday, September 24th Chip and I headed towards New Orleans to see the damage from Hurricane Ida. New Orleans is about 45 miles south of Hammond, Louisiana where I now live. It’s also the city I was born and raised in! When we got to LaPlace which is on the way there, we got off the interstate to see the damage we had heard about there.
One thing lead to another and our tour of the actual New Orleans area turned into a trip down memory lane. Well that memory lane story turned into a really long one so I am separating that (with pictures of damage in those areas) from this one which will be about other areas (starting with LaPlace) we saw that didn’t include all my memories! So here we go with part one of our two-part trip to New Orleans.
New Orleans was in the direct path of Hurricane Ida. It’s the city most all of the media coverage is always about after the devastation along the Louisiana coastline in towns like Grand Isle and Lafitte. Having so many memories growing up in New Orleans I wanted to see how it looked almost a month after Ida.
Many people are still suffering from Ida’s destruction. They are without homes and are living with loved ones or someone in other cities. For some reason FEMA has not provided trailers for people to live in. The ones provided after Katrina caused cancer in many who lived in them. Maybe that’s why but I just read that some of the new and improved trailers will be available starting next week. My lack of television until last week kept me in the dark about those things. Many people that are in their homes still have no electricity. I am hoping my posts remind folks of the suffering and continued need for help.
First are some photos friends posted on Facebook of New Orleans.
We had heard that there was devastation in LaPlace which was on our way to New Orleans so we went there first. We only went through one subdivision but that was enough to see that almost every house had been flooded and the contents destroyed.
In the photo galleries below click on the first photo and then use your right arrow key to scroll through the gallery.
What hit me very early on was that it seemed like LaPlace was almost still totally shut down a month after the hurricane. Most businesses were still closed, few houses had cars in the driveway and it was all so sad to see. You could almost feel the loss and suffering so many experienced. The damage here was worse than anywhere else I’ve actually with my own eyes. Some photos may appear to show not much damage but look at the empty sign in the photo. Almost every sign in the city had been blown out and I took a couple of pictures of that. Sign companies are going to make a bundle. These next photos are from the main roads in LaPlace. When you get to the comments under two of my photos check it out!
Only in Louisiana would one of the very few businesses open with electricity be the Daiquiri Shop! 
So weird to see a dragon in someone’s yard. Wonder why it’s there!!??
As we drove down Airline Highway into Jefferson Parish and then Orleans Parish we didn’t see nearly the devastation there that LaPlace experienced. We drove to the first house Roy and I purchased in our 20s and the trip down memory lane started.
I moved the memory lane story to the next post and will get back to the damage we saw around there and some cool things we saw.
We saw a lot of artscapes around Metairie and Kenner on the neutral grounds. Really cool stuff and it brightened up our drive around there. These are just some of the ones we enjoyed seeing!
Some of the Hurricane damage we saw in Kenner, Metairie and New Orleans is seen in the photos below.
The difference between post Katrina and post-Ida in the actual city of New Orleans was amazing. Post Katrina, a lot of New Orleans and Metairie sat in over 9 feet of water for two weeks so everything was moldy and even worse. New Orleans itself wasn’t damaged anywhere near that extend by Ida. Wind and rain damage affected New Orleans to some extent but surrounding cities and parishes (we don’t have counties) were hit much harder with flooding, wind, and rain.
I was glad to see that much of what we started out to see was pretty okay. Those are the stops along our trip down memory lane I will share with ya’ll next!
Ya’ll have a great week! Rosalyn
BECAUSE HE LIVES 