I’ve nearly died a handful of times on the road, and statistically speaking, Jamo is usually nearby when it happens.
So it feels right, inevitable, even, that we reunite in New Orleans on Halloween, a city that treats death less like an ending and more like a recurring character.
We rendezvous cautiously at Mr. B’s Bistro on Royal Street, murdering our hunger with their famous BBQ shrimp and priming the pump with absurdly cheap US$1.50 happy-hour martinis. The food here is so rich it might actually kill you if you don’t thin your blood with a near-constant trickle of ethanol.
Fortunately, it never takes more than a round to fall back into rhythm with Jamo, and soon we’re back on the street, hunting ghouls and goblins.
New Orleans needs no excuse to celebrate. Its mere existence, between a chequered history and the minor detail of being below sea level, is a daily miracle the locals celebrate hourly. While Mardi Gras gets most of the attention, Halloween is the more visceral, rewarding time for the discerning partier to let the city truly infect them. NOLA is hauntingly beautiful: decrepit, alive, and seductive, like a sexy zombie waiting to be dug up. Without hesitation, we grab a shovel and start digging.
We wander up Chartres Street to meet Adelai from New Orleans Secret Tours. Five-foot-four, with a shock of green hair and a thick Cajun accent, she’s the real deal, and she’s about to usher us into the city’s spectral underbelly. We drift through ancient saloons and historic restaurants, slipping behind the scenes into forgotten rooms and unused corridors. Drink in hand, under cover of darkness, Adelai unfolds stories of death, torture, and unfinished business, all soaked into these walls.
In a dark, velvet-lined room, we’re introduced to an audacious oracle. I’m deeply allergic to anything netherworld-adjacent, so Jamo confidently takes the seat, flashing that cocky half-smile that announces he’s “seen this before.” I have never seen him cry, but five minutes later, when this conduit to the other side announces that his deceased father is in the room with us, I decide we’ve had enough enlightenment for one night.
We took photos with groups of new friends, gawking at their incredible costumes, all while sucking down yardsticks of frozen Hand Grenades in the warm autumn sun. So this was what adult heaven looked like? Brilliant.
Emotionally wrecked like we’ve just done a short tour of duty, we retreat to the Higgins Hotel, a luxury WWII-homage hotel right in the CBD. The Higgins is a full-throated love letter to America’s role in the war, presented wall to wall. Think brass-and-mahogany lobby bar, subtle patriotic bunting, black-and-white photos of servicemen and women, rotary phones, and tufted leather Chesterfields. I half expect Spam and Lucky Strikes in the minibar, but instead find truffles and electrolyte water, perfect for easing myself into oblivion.
We wake late, ravenous, and thankfully New Orleans always has a street festival ready to save your life. We inject ourselves into the Tremé Fall Jazz and Blues Fest, which is running at full throttle. Music bleeds through the streets as vendors hawk everything from handmade art to instruments to local food. We bury ourselves in bowls of yakamein – New Orleans’ beef noodle soup with African and Chinese-American roots, lovingly nicknamed “Old Sober” for its hangover-curing powers. The reputation holds. We’re back in fighting shape.
As night nears and we’re fully costumed, it’s time for the main event. We head to Frenchmen Street and climb upstairs above a music bar for the Krewe of Boo pre-party. Krewes are essentially good-time gangs: they throw parades, balls, and aggressively fun parties. Rex, Endymion, Chewbacchus, Red Beans, and Orpheus are just a few of the many organised ways to get gloriously obliterated. Krewe of Boo is led by chief spookster Brian Kern of Kern Studios, son of Mardi Gras legend Blaine Kern. Netflix, call me. It’s a wild story.
Painted, plastered, and ready, we’re led outside to a lineup of massive floats. We’re actually in the Halloween parade. Unreal.
We board and immediately tear into boxes of chips, coins, cups, and beads, stacking them like bell-tower gunners awaiting an enemy battalion. Around us, costumed dance troupes stretch between sips of White Claw as the energy swells. Then the convoy moves, slowly slicing through thousands of screaming, laughing people. Hands up. Bodies bouncing. Joy everywhere.
It’s a cinematic cross-section of humanity: backpackers chasing a memory they’ll spend years trying to recreate; locals angling for another commemorative cup; families with kids on shoulders reaching impossibly into the night for MoonPies. All of it bathed in pulsing rainbow LEDs, soundtracked by classic rock, zydeco, and the occasional Bruno Mars. I fall in love and get my heart broken with the frequency of scrolling TikTok. After two hours of what feels like hot yoga for the soul, I’m emotionally loose and open, just in time for New Orleans to turn the heat up again.
We’re eventually dumped near Generations Hall, a massive music venue. On the way, we wisely grab porchetta sandwiches from Cochon; fuel before diving into the beast. Inside, it’s chaos in the best way: multiple rooms of jaw-dropping performances, wild costumes, sweat-soaked dance floors, lasers, drinks, and food circulating like a party catered by Caligula. Everyone’s there to fulfill someone else’s fantasy.
It’s chaos in the best way: multiple rooms of jaw-dropping performances, wild costumes, sweat-soaked dance floors, lasers, drinks, and food circulating like a party catered by Caligula.
The rest of the night becomes a flipbook of drinks and dancing. A stop at the Dungeon, a quick one at Fives, laughs at the Golden Lantern. We demolish a platter-sized muffaletta across from Lafitte’s Blacksmith Bar, washing it down with something aggressively blue. We even help judge a Full Moon contest at the Corner Pocket, which is easier to understand via photo than explanation.
Eventually, we wake in our rooms. New Orleans as a city is the king of the Irish exit: if you do it right, you don’t remember ever saying goodnight.
What we do remember is that it’s game day with the New Orleans Saints taking on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.. There’s no better hangover cure than the hair of the dog at a tailgating party, so we head to Coppervine and claim a spot on the balcony overlooking a car park full of pick up trucks and beer. Tri-tip sandwiches, brick-oven pizza, crab cakes, and two cold pints later, Jamo and I raise a final toast behind dark sunglasses as a river of fans surges below and the roar of the crowd echoes across the street.
To get into the game even more, we head downstairs to Walk-On’s, a traditional American sports bar. Feeling our energy return, we dive into local brews while munching on exotic delights like fried alligator, devils on horseback, and crawfish étouffée. Not sure where we find room for it all, but we do.
As the game ended and night descended we decided to dip one last time into the darkness of Halloween and try out The Mortuary, one of the world’s best haunted houses and for good reason. The 150-plus-year-old Grand Victorian mansion once served as a funeral parlour and crematorium, and it’s surrounded by the famed “City of the Dead,” a quarter-mile cemetery holding more than a million souls. If any place earns the title haunted, this is it.
The line snakes around the block, so VIP fast passes are the obvious move. Within minutes, we’re shoved through the front doors, which slam shut behind us, leaving us to fend for ourselves. Inside, you’re trapped in a maze of insanity, each room a different nightmare, with random ghouls and monsters launching from dark corners to scare the life out of you.
I won’t go into much more detail, since I spend most of the experience crawling on my hands and knees, alternating between sobbing and laughing while calling for my mother, until I’m literally chased into an Uber by a very polite man wielding a chainsaw and wearing no face.
At this point, having died and been resurrected, I can say we truly embodied the spirit of this grand American holiday in the most haunted city in the country.
I briefly think how damn difficult it will be to define this place and the feeling of NOLA during Halloween. I’ve always felt like other cities have clear identities; New York happens to you, LA you have to make happen, but in New Orleans, it’s hard to say what you will happen upon here.
Tour There
Hot Halloween Tip:
No need to pack a costume, NOLA is amazing with amazing shopping. Either grab some vintage garb on Magazine street at Funky Monkey or the likes, or, hit up one of the many couture costume shops in the Quarter like Maskarade on Royal.
For further NOLA inspiration, visit neworleans.com, to explore more experiences in the state of Louisiana, go to explorelouisiana.com
Stay There
Stay at the Higgins Hotel in the artsy-chic CBD. It’s sandwiched between the beautiful chaos of the quarter and the serene sanctuary of the Garden District. Rooms are elegant, the bar is fun, and rooftop lounge gives you killer views. Starting at $US120 a night is a bargain.
1000 Magazine St. New Orleans, LA 70130
504-528-1941
higginshotelnola.com.
If you wanted to stay somewhere else, you can book your New Orleans hotel at book.neworleans.com. Or, if you need to book 10 hotel rooms or more, go to neworleans.com/groups.
Get in the Know
Folklore says a ghostly figure called the Vieux Carré Phantom roams the French Quarter streets on Halloween, haunting anyone who disrespects local spirits.
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