St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans

Update for 2025. This post references visiting somewhere in the United States. While I’ve had great visits to the U.S. in the past I don’t recommend travelling there at this time. This post is my current stance on U.S. travel. Information regarding prices, operating hours, or other details in may have changed since the original publication.

My first trip to New Orleans was in June 2012. I booked a flight to New Orleans before a travel blogging conference in Denver. New Orleans and Denver aren’t close to each other, but it was a good enough excuse to justify a trip to New Orleans. The second trip a few month like came from me winning a trip. I only got to spend a short 38 hours in New Orleans, but it was all-expense paid. Best of all I got to return to a city that I love.

I fell in love with New Orleans right away. The food, the music, the people, the culture, the sights, the sounds. Aside from wanting to visit The Backstreet Cultural Museum, New Orleans wasn’t a city where I had a bucket list of things to do. I was content just to wander around and listen to the music that filled the air, and pop into a restaurant for a po’ boy or some gumbo when I was hungry.

On my first day in the city, I wandered from my Couchsurfing host’s home to The French Quarter and came across the iconic St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square. Aside from the infamous Bourbon Street, this is probably the most known landmark in the city. It’s the oldest cathedral in the United States having been founded as a parish in 1720. The original church was destroyed and the current building was built in the 1850s. While I didn’t go inside the cathedral, I enjoyed the view of it from the outside.

Have you been to New Orleans?