A little French Market this morning?

"What?" B wailed. "We're walking? Again?" "Oh, come on," I urged him. "The distance we're walking isn't even as far as it is to walk to your school. Besides - maybe we'll find something fun to buy you on the way." Sure enough, we stopped at every gift shop between the hotel and the French Market - and there were TONS of stores! Okay, so we didn't stop at every shop but it sure felt like it. We even went into a hot sauce store with tasting booths. I spent my entire time there saying, "Don't touch that!" to B while hubby sampled the various exotic spices and sauces and condiments and snacks. At the French Market proper, we started our tour with an all fruit smoothie and carried on to the flea market portion. I wasn't terribly impressed: the wares sold resembled the gift store stuff: all made in China. Luckily, there were also some crafts people away from the centre aisle and I found some lovely bath salts as well as souvenir voodoo dolls, made in New Orleans for a change. "How'd you like New Orleans so far?" Asked the bath salts lady. "Do you really want to know or should I be polite?" I countered, grinning. She assured me that she did indeed want to know. "Well, the French Market seems pretty touristic. I was hoping for local fare, and they serve it - but it doesn't have that soul I expected it to have." She nodded. "I know just what you mean. Here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna grab yourself a cab and ask the driver to take you to City Park and drop you off at their café." "Really?" I asked. "Mmmmhmmm," she nodded again. "My husband's mom is a mean cook and her gumbo? It is SEN-sational! Well, he tasted the gumbo at City Park Cafe and he said, 'Mmmmmmmmmm. I'm gonna take my mother there to taste that gumbo.' And he did!" That sounded perfect! Now I just had to convince the other five members of the group that this was a great idea!