Zephyrs baseball and Audubon Park

Last night, My friend Lenny and I went to a New Orleans Zephyrs baseball game...

Flattering horizontal stripes, no? ha-ha

Len's former boss is married to the team's GM, and she left us home plate tickets at will-call. Awesome seats and it was also $1 draft beer night at the ball park. The Zephyrs beat the Albuquerque Isotopes, another AAA team, 4-0. Perfect night, especially considering that it stormed all day and cleared up just in time for the first pitch... the "year of Dana" rocks ;-) Nothing like eating a whole bag of peanuts to make your fingers swell up like sausages. I also determined that cotton candy looks like the contents of a vacuum cleaner bag... spray painted pink.

This morning, I had to mystery shop the Baja Fresh at Tulane University's food court, so I biked uptown 4-5 miles and finally got a chance to explore Audubon Park. It is a real gem in the city and sits on land that was purchased by the city in 1871. It is bordered on one side by the Mississippi River and on the other by St. Charles Ave., directly across from Tulane and Loyola Universities.

The park is named in honor of artist and naturalist John James Audubon, who moved to New Orleans in 1821. It was a plantation in Colonial days and hosted a World's Fair and the World Cotton Centennial in 1884. After that, park development began. The only notable reminder of the fair to remain in the park now is a large iron ore rock from the Alabama State exhibit. It has often been misidentified as a meteorite.

Audubon Park's present form largely follows a design drafted by John Charles Oldstead. The park features sports fields and picnic facilities along the Mississippi River. Riverview Park is known colloquially as the Fly, an almost-forgotten reference to the modernist, butterfly-shaped river-viewing shelter constructed in the 1960s and demolished in the 1980s, after severe damage one foggy morning from blundering river traffic. In 1898 the Audubon golf course opened in the park.

Early in the 20th century, part of the park became home to the Audubon Zoo. Numerous early- and mid-20th century park attractions like the miniature railway, the enormous Whitney Young public swimming pool, the swan boats in the lagoons, and the carousel were closed, dismantled and/or discontinued in the 1970s, though a small public pool was constructed in the 1990s. The ring road around the park was closed to car traffic at the start of the 1980s and became a popular 1.7-mile walking, jogging and biking route.

The park is full of enourmous old live oaks, and the paved bike/skate path, which circles the park a few feet inside the soft running path, winds through shaded areas, beside water, over bridges and past statues, sculptures, gazebos and stately old mansions that sit on the park's edge. It is truly a wonderful place and is used by all types of people from all parts of the city. Beautiful!