Louisiana
New Orleans at a Slower Pace for Women
Program No. 25116RJ
Discover New Orleans at a slower pace as you explore the city’s historic districts with other women, learn about Cajun cooking and visit the famed National World War II Museum.
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Protecting the Environment
We offset a portion of the emissions created by your travel. Learn more
6 days
5 nights
13 meals
5B 4L 4D
1
Check-in, Registration, Orientation, Welcome Dinner
New Orleans, LA
2
New Orleans History, City Field Trip, Jazz Performance
New Orleans, LA
3
New Orleans Authors, Cooking Class
New Orleans, LA
4
Architecture Lecture, Garden District Walking Tour, Jazz
New Orleans, LA
5
World War II Museum
New Orleans, LA
6
All About Mardi Gras, Program Concludes
New Orleans, LA
At a Glance
New Orleans beckons with three centuries of history and culture. On this special learning adventure for women, explore the city at a slower pace, discovering its rich heritage as expert instructors lead you on an exploration of its architectural styles, literary heroes, political figures, music and food. Learn about festivals, both self-expression and a celebration of life, from Mardi Gras to Jazz Fest. Take field trips to Lake Pontchartrain, the French Quarter, the Garden District, the Mississippi River, Congo Square and the Treme area. Enjoy the camaraderie of other engaging women as you take in the amazing Sculpture Garden in City Park and the world class National World War II Museum.
Activity Level
Easy Going
Moderate walking up to eight blocks, flat terrain.
Small Group
Love to learn and explore in a small-group setting? These adventures offer small, personal experiences with groups of 13 to 24 participants.
Best of all, you’ll…
- Bond with other female learners as you take in a live jazz performance, venture into the French Quarter and visit the National World War II Museum.
- Admire historic New Orleans homes as you ride along historic St. Charles Avenue and walk into the Garden District.
- Learn the tricks of Cajun and Creole cooking at a popular culinary arts school, complete with recipes for you to take home.
Featured Expert
All trip experts
Brian Altobello
Brian Altobello is a native of New Orleans with a Master’s degree in U.S. History and 29 years of teaching experience. He is an Army veteran and author of three books, most recently “Whiskey, Women, and War: How World War I Shaped Jim Crow New Orleans” (University Press of Mississippi, 2021). Married to a travel writing teacher, Brian currently works as a curriculum specialist in the New Orleans area.
Please note: This expert may not be available for every date of this program.
Brian Altobello
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Brian Altobello is a native of New Orleans with a Master’s degree in U.S. History and 29 years of teaching experience. He is an Army veteran and author of three books, most recently “Whiskey, Women, and War: How World War I Shaped Jim Crow New Orleans” (University Press of Mississippi, 2021). Married to a travel writing teacher, Brian currently works as a curriculum specialist in the New Orleans area.
Dave Roberts
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Dave Roberts was born in New Orleans and baptized in the same church as Louis Armstrong. He received his B.B.A. from Loyola University (New Orleans) and his M.B.A. from the University of New Orleans. For many years he worked at Loyola University as the director of student finance. Dave started working as a New Orleans group leader in 1997. His expeditions are a blend of history, architecture, food, music, writers, movies, and current events.
Ed Wise
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Ed Wise is a professional musician with over 50 years of experience. He has toured with Al Hirt, Delbert McClinton, and the Smothers Brothers. He has performed with world-famous musicians and entertainers, including Bob Hope, Phyllis Diller, Vic Damone, Diahann Carroll, Don Rickles, and many more. He has worked as a staff musician for the Delta Queen Steamboat Company. In 2005, Ed Wise received New Orleans Magazine’s Jazz All-Star award. Ed is on the faculty of Loyola University, where he teaches bass and music theory.
Nellie Watson
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Nellie Watson, a native New Orleanian, has always had a deep passion for the local environment. She has enjoyed sharing stories with Road Scholar for over 20 years, and is also a provider for aerial flightseeing tours of the endangered wetlands. With a background in architecture and a B.F.A. in environmental design, she began her career at two large international architectural firms, had her own residential design firm, and is currently is a professional model maker for major film productions like Marvel and Disney.
Clare Pierson
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Clare Pierson has taught literature and creative writing to all levels of students and teachers. She has been managing editor of the Tennessee Williams Journal, a periodical dedicated to works of and about America's premier playwright. She served on the editorial staff and wrote a regular column for The Double Dealer Redux, a quarterly dedicated to writers and their writings. She continues to serve on the executive committee of the Tennessee Williams / New Orleans Literary Festival.

Lauree Nunez
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Lauree Nunez is a lifelong native of New Orleans. Her career started with Road Scholar in September 1993 as an office staffer, and she progressed over time to manage all of the office functions, as well as being a group leader. In 1991, she graduated from Southeastern Louisiana University with a B.A. in business. Lauree's charity, Spaymart Kitten Foster, has placed over 7,000 animals over more than a decade. She owns a property management company, and lives with her husband, Derrick, and their two cats.
Wolf Kassmeier
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Wolf Kassmeier has enjoyed working as both a group leader and instructor since 2000, sharing time with guests in New Orleans, throughout Louisiana, and over-the-road ranging from National Parks in the West to Chicago. For approximately five years, he served onboard Amtrak trains as a regional expert. A native Nebraskan, Wolf has lived in New Orleans for over thirty years.
Suggested Reading List
(7 books)
Visit the Road Scholar Bookshop
You can find many of the books we recommend at the Road Scholar store on bookshop.org, a website that supports local bookstores.
New Orleans at a Slower Pace for Women
Program Number: 25116
A Streetcar Named Desire
This classic drama follows Blanche DuBois and the issues that arise when she moves to New Orleans to live with her sister and her husband.
Creole New Orleans Race and Americanization
This collection of six original essays explores the peculiar ethnic composition and history of New Orleans, which the authors persuasively argue is unique among American cities. The focus of Creole New Orleans is on the development of a colonial Franco-African culture in the city, the ways that culture was influenced by the arrival of later immigrants, and the processes that led to the eventual dominance of the Anglo-American community.
Life On The Mississippi
An invaluable companion to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi is Mark Twain's inimitable portrait of 'the great Father of Waters'. Part memoir, part travelogue, it expresses the full range of Twain's literary personality, and remains the most vivid, boisterous and provocative account of the cultural and societal history of the Mississippi Valley, from 'the golden age' of steamboating to the violence wrought by the Civil War.
All The King's Men
All the King's Men traces the rise and fall of demagogue Willie Stark, a fictional character loosely based on Governor Huey ""Kingfish"" Long of Louisiana. Stark begins his political career as an idealistic man of the people but soon becomes corrupted by success and caught between dreams of service and an insatiable lust for power.
Rising Tide
An American epic of science, politics, race, honor, high society, and the Mississippi River, Rising Tide tells the riveting and nearly forgotten story of the greatest natural disaster this country has ever known -- the Mississippi flood of 1927. The river inundated the homes of nearly one million people, helped elect Huey Long governor and made Herbert Hoover president, drove hundreds of thousands of blacks north, and transformed American society and politics forever.
Why New Orleans Matters
In the aftermath of Katrina and the disaster that followed, promises were made, forgotten, and renewed. Now what will become of New Orleans in the years ahead? What do this proud, battered city and its people mean to America and the world?
Award-winning author and longtime New Orleans resident Tom Piazza illuminates the storied culture and uncertain future of this great and neglected American metropolis by evoking the sensuous rapture of the city that gave us jazz music and Creole cooking; examining its deep undercurrents of corruption, racism, and injustice; and explaining how its people endure and transcend those conditions. And, perhaps most important, he asks us all to consider the spirit of this place and all the things it has shared with the world: its grace and beauty, resilience and soul.
Confederacy of Dunces
A Confederacy of Dunces is a picaresque novel written by American novelist John Kennedy Toole, published by Louisiana State University Press in 1980, eleven years after the author's suicide. The book, published through the efforts of writer Walker Percy (who also contributed a revealing foreword) and Toole's mother Thelma Toole, quickly became a cult classic, and later a mainstream success. Toole posthumously won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1981. It is now considered a canonical work of modern Southern literature, in the USA. The title derives from the epigraph by Jonathan Swift: "When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him." The story is set in New Orleans in the early 1960s. The central character is Ignatius J. Reilly, an educated but slothful 30-year-old man still living with his mother in the city's Uptown neighborhood, who, due to an incident early in the book, must set out to get a job. In his quest for employment he has various adventures with colorful French Quarter characters.