Rayne or Shine: Vampire Bars exist, and they are located in New Orleans... down an alley way off of Bourbon Street

Hey Everyone! I apologize for the delay in writing another post... I spent last weekend in New Orleans with my barn-mate and wasn't around enough to write.

SO, let me start off by saying, New Orleans is a beautiful/funky/sketchy city full or life, culture, and some weirdos. I feel as though I may stick out due to my normal clothing choices and non-hipster look, but I am ok with that (ESPECIALLY the "non-hipster" part. Barf.). Everyone there is an individual in there own right. I feel as though many of the NOLAians, if in a regular town or city, would actually be committed to a mental hospital for acute schizophrenia or psychotic behavior, but in New Orleans, THEY are the normal ones. Scary, huh? I found it intriguing.

Also, apparently there is more to the city than Bourbon St. and flashing your boobies for beads! WHO KNEW!? On Friday night I went out with some of the medical students to a few swanky bars in the town, keeping it as classy as one can in the great city of New Orleans. However, we still ended the night in a bar called "The Saint" which had blacked out windows and reeked of cigarette smoke. Hey, at least we tried to keep it classy?

Disclaimer: there may be one too many TrueBlood references in the remainder of the post...

But.... now we get to the meat of this blog post... VAMPIRES EXIST! No, I am not "shitting" you. I know that is what you are thinking. I went to a bar called "The Dungeon," which was located off a side street from Bourbon St. First, to get into the bar you have to creep your way through a narrow passageway and over a little man-made creek to get to the front door. So basically, picture this, your only way out is the same passageway and you are currently behind a stone wall and located in a bar full of people who could quite possibly try to bite you... First, you are greeted by a bouncer who has dark, coarse hair down to his shoulders and a scraggly beard. When he grabs your I.D. his slightly too long finger nails graze your hand. I am pretty sure he is a Werewolf at this point. Chilling. Anyways, clearly the first thing I needed to do when I arrived at the night-crawlers bar was use the ladies' room. But, I couldn't find the bathroom... when I was directed to where it was I just saw some book cases with a bunch of old books on them. A closer look revealed that these were actually fake book cases and the bathroom door was hidden among them. This was a bit curious... (those who watch TrueBlood know that the vamps take victims into the bathrooms to feed on them... convenient that these bathrooms were hidden).

Obviously, I made it out of the bathrooms with all of my blood. Inside the bar I find my friends sitting in a booth that is surrounded by a dungeon cage. They try to take a picture of themselves in the cage only to have the bouncer (aka a werewolf) yell at them and say, "NO PICTURES ALLOWED!" WHAT!? That's weird. One would think at this point I would leave this bar, but no... I am entirely too intrigued and want to go upstairs and see what else this bar has in store. Upstairs they have angry, screaming, metal blaring and even more of those weird cage surrounded booths. But, oddly enough there were mirrors behind the bar, which I was too afraid to look into, afraid I may not see some of the attendants reflections in the mirror. On the walls were some weird S&M paintings and dragon heads... Then, my friends and I meet Ace. Ace has lived in the French Quarter for 30 some odd years. Ace also had long, silky. black hair to his shoulders and a much more trimmed goatee. I believe Ace was the "Eric" of this bar. (for those of you who don't get this reference, Eric was the owner of the bar Fangtasia in TrueBlood).

Anyways, we made it out of there scratch and bite-free. Needless to say that was the COOLEST bar I have ever been too! Haha

The rest of the weekend was pretty uneventful, but very fun. I am definitely enjoying my time in Louisiana. The Frog Festival is in Rayne this weekend and I am sure that will be another experience all-together. I will write more tomorrow.

I think my imagination has gone a little too wild :)