A brilliant service from you. The holiday was amazing and everything went to plan!
Our thanks to Donovan who gave us first class service arranging our latest trip.
Zoe could not have been more helpful here and abroad..
A very professional approach. Highly reliable and giving me the options I required.
Matilda and the team are first class and go beyond to provide a 5 star service.
Roy is always professional and tries to help.
I look forward to flying again with Virgin Atlantic
Many years of complete satisfaction
Very disappointed with British Airways - staff on plane very helpful but the service very poor
Recommended flying Air Canada for my trip and have to say one of the best airlines I've flown with!
Excellent service by Isla as always
Excellent and efficient service as ever - Danny never lets us down
Kept up to date with any changes. Called prior to trip offering advice and allowed for any concerns or questions on our part. Very approachable.
Fantastic service as always
Lloyd is always helpful and we recommend him and his team to all our friends.
Flights and rental all went well. Simply the best
Tara has arranged two trips for me to USA. She has been amazing as have other colleagues I have dealt with.
Always get what we expect and often more
Olivia has been amazing sorting and rescheduling our flights as needed
Always an efficient, informed and reliable response from DialAFlight with a touch of flair.
Thanks Kylie and Robert - the trip was amazing! We loved the car. Hotel Esme Beach superb. I’ll be back in touch to book something later on in the year
Everything went well
Reece was a great help. Great hotel recommendation. We’ll definitely be back!
DialAFlight (Elizabeth) has delivered again and been a great help with making our travel stress free.
I received very helpful advice from you, given in a very friendly and non judgemental way over my hesitancy with IT.
The staff were excellent
The fact that I could speak to a person was key! Not everyone can master the complexities of a fully automated system, me included! The help and support received was excellent and no question was irrelevant. When I next wish to fly I will be returning to use a service that's professional, supportive and is there for you!
Wonderful service, thank you so much. We've already recommended to friends and colleagues.
Your service is excellent - I am always kept updated
The booking was handled in a competent manner and Kennedy's team were very helpful.
The evening slams into action with a long blast of brass. Ronell Johnson has swung to his feet and is squeezing every last bit of jazz out of his trombone.
Rickie Monie, meanwhile, is tinkling the ivories at frantic speed. I'd been told the Preservation Hall in New Orleans was the place to see live jazz, but never realised it would be as moody-blues as this.
All the local jazz legends have blown their trumpets here, from Punch Miller and George Lewis to Sweet Emma Barrett and The Humphrey Brothers. The Preservation Hall continues to attract the best acts.
FINDING THE MUSIC
Jazz is everywhere in New Orleans - in the bars, in the streets and in the psyche. This, after all, is the city of Louis Armstrong, who played his way to fame on the paddle-steamers that plied the Mississippi river.
This, too, is where the early jazz legends Buddy Bolden and Jelly Roll Morton once jammed through the night. Their local haunt, the Little Gem Saloon, has recently reopened and serves cocktails and food along with the music. Even those paddle-steamer river excursions still serve up jazz with their Creole cuisine.
PRESERVATION HALL
'Welcome to New Orleans,' whoops the compere at the Preservation Hall in a pause between acts. Welcome indeed. New Orleans has to be the funkiest city on earth, where the
streets are filled with buskers and the back-alleys packed with cocktail bars. They even have drive-thru daiquiri bars where - I kid you not - the daiquiris are sold by the gallon. A visit to Louisiana's most beguiling city ought to begin with a government health warning: this is a place that takes partying very seriously.
The wildest district is Bourbon Street, the setting for some of America's most outlandish clubs, strip-joints and cocktail bars. It's about as raw as it gets.
Women dressed in knickers and nipple-tassels parade the street touting for photos ($1 a snap) while men hang out in doorways drinking 'hand grenades', a Bourbon Street speciality that will blow your socks off. It comes in a yard-long vessel that's tinted green and shaped like a grenade at the bottom. The recipe is a guarded secret.
FINDING THE CALM
Apart from Bourbon Street's excesses, the rest of the city winds down to a gentler pace at around midnight. Then it's back to the hotel - in my case, the historic Maison DuPuy - where the party continues in the inner courtyard at a more subdued pace.
In 2005 Hurricane Katrina caused catastrophic devastation. More than 1,200 people died and 400,000 left homeless. An excellent (if sobering) exhibition in the city's Presbytère - a branch of Louisiana State Museum - recounts the horror as the levees collapsed and a tidal wave hit the residential quarters.
THE FRENCH QUARTER
The only part scarcely touched was the historic French Quarter, home to many of the oldest buildings, jazz clubs and museums. 'New Orleans is not an American city,' explained John, my guide. 'It's half European, half African. It's unique.'
Founded by the French, ceded to the Spanish, sold to the Americans and besieged by the British, it was populated for much of its history by slaves from Africa. Allowed one day off work each week, they would congregate in local parks and improvise the musical riffs of their African forbears. This was how jazz was born.
Jackson Square is home to fine museums: the 1850 Museum, the Cabildo - the old town hall - the Presbytère and nearby Gallier House, with a preserved mid-19th century interior.
In the French Quarter, head to the Gumbo Shop restaurant to sample typical New Orleans fare: shrimp Creole, seafood gumbo (a thick Creole soup) and deep-fried alligator (straight from the swamps surrounding the city).
COCKTAIL HOUR
But I'm in need of a cocktail and take myself back to Bar Tonique, which serves the best sazerac in town (New Orleans's signature cocktail: cognac, absinthe and a shot of local Peychaud's bitters.) As the sun oozes itself into the Mississippi, I down a couple before taking myself back to Preservation Hall.
There's no Ronell Johnson on tonight's programme. But local star Clint Maedgen is on the sax, and that'll do for me.
First published in the Mail Online - April 2018
More articles below...
Not quite what you're looking for?
We can easily customise an offer to suit your exact requirements