Royal St

Walk over a little ways from Bourbon St and sober up; this is where you go to engage in the more acceptable vacation behavior of culinary and consumer indulgence rather than party-till-unconscious excess. Royal St, with its rows of high end antique shops, block after block of galleries and potted ferns hanging from cast-iron balconies, is the elegant yin to Bourbon’s Sodom-and-Gomorrah yang. Stroll past the beauty and its sense of patina-ed grace, have a chat with a local as they lounge on their porch, and get a sense of the fun with a dash of the…well…not reserve, but dignity that is the true soul of Vieux Carré