Last week we got the chance to go to New Orleans for an amazing photography conference, Pictage ParterCon, and a nice vacation to celebrate Denise’s birthday.  It was so much fun!  We met tons of great photographers from all over the country, and that “strange country” above us.  We took way too many photos to show in just one blog post, so lucky for you, we will spread this out over the next few days.

Part one begins on Sunday morning.  We arrived in New Orleans two days before the conference started.  Our plan was to enjoy the sights of the city before everyone else got there.  However, If you know us at all, you know that we are not morning people.  The alarm clock sounded that morning in Phoenix at 4:30 am for our early flights.  Needless to say, the bed that you see in the background of our hotel room at the Astor Crown Plaza was soon occupied.

When we awoke from our nap, we looked out our window and saw this beautiful view of the city and the Mississippi River peeking out from behind the Hotel Monteleone.

Our hotel was on the corner of Canal and Bourbon St.  Downstairs, there was this sweet little balcony overlooking Bourbon St.  We wanted to take a quick peek at the action before braving the crowds.

After a good nights sleep, day two was off to a great start!  Denise is showing off her new colorful flats that she bought for the trip.

For lunch we headed up to Jackson Square where the locals were all over the place.  Mostly trying to get us tourists to spend money and give them tips, which we did of course.  It was pretty awesome to always have N’awleans style music playing as we walked around.

I love the framing of this next shot of the Saint Louis Cathedral.

New Orleans had tons of great details to shoot.  Kind of a photographer’s dream : )

Great culture and architecture around every corner!

We did get the chance to shoot some portraits of each other too.  More of those to come in later posts.

That’s my new pea coat that I got for the trip thinking it would be cold . . . which it wasn’t . . . but I wore it anyway.

I think that guy on the horse was probably Saint Louis.  Not sure though.

Later that night, we met up with our friend Melissa and some other awesome photogs to eat at a great restaurant called NOLA. The head chef at NOLA, is none other than the world famous Emeril Lagasse.  Unfortunately, we left our camera’s in the hotel so we don’t have any proof, but the food there was truly amazing!

This was our first chance to get to meet some of the way cool and super fun photographers that were in town for the confrence.  We all hit it off immediately and started sharing our facebook and twitter names before dinner had even been served.  It was such a fun night!  A shout out to: Ben, Jennifer, Rhonda, Melissa, Cassie aka Canada, Laura, and Lauren. Great restaurant choice Cassie!  We miss all of you guys already!

After dinner most of the crew headed in for the night.  We’re total night owls so we decided to head back out for another adventure.  Ben had told me about this awesome jazz club that is very popular with the locals called Preservation Hall.  So we decided to check it out.  It was so frickin’ cool!  REAL New Orlean’s people and musicians.  It was standing room only.  We had so much fun in there.  Thanks for the recomendation Ben!

This is a shot of Bourbon street from our room at the Crown Plaza.  It was during the New Orleans Saints Monday Night Football Game so the streets were pretty empty.  Everyone was inside watching the game.  We later went down on Bourbon St. to watch the fourth quarter at a bar.  Things did get a little crazy though.  A fight broke out one table away from us.  They are pretty crazy about their football in NO.  BTW Go Cardinals!

I love all the colors down the street from the clubs and bars in this next one.

So much more to come . . . stay tuned for Zack & Jody’s awesome bridal session, courtesy of the amazing workshop led by Jeff and Erin Youngren. Did I mention that the ridiculously good looking Zack & Jody are ridiculously HOT and totally amazing photographers out of Nashville?  Also, Denise and I break into an above ground cemetery; some more locals; touristy stuff; and some really fun shots of us livin’ it up, New Orleans style.