Celebration in the Oaks at City Park

The roommate and I decided to check out this event after the Disney exhibit at NOMA Sunday evening. Not knowing what to expect and seeing a wide variety of ages attending the event, we figured it had to be great for the young to very old. However, we should have taken the fact that the museum curator that is our age had no idea that Celebration in the Oaks was even occurring in the museum's backyard as a red flag. However, the roommate and I have yet to learn this lesson.

Before leaving the museum, we found a security guard that was able to give us directions to the festival from the Museum that were WRONG and led us to the Christian Brothers School in City Park, instead of the festival. After some driving around the park in an incredibly thick and eery fog, we found the festival by the tennis courts on the complete opposite side of the park from where the security guard told us to go.

After finding the location of the festival, our next obstacle was finding the entrance to the holiday event. By now, we probably should have just given up and gone home, but we were determined. Eventually, we found the entrance between the tennis courts. Unlike what our NOMA security guard told us, there was a complete lack of signage as to where the event was and how to enter it.

The festival takes place in the Storyville section of City Park, which is a permanent amusement park for children and ironically named after the city's "experiment" with legalized prostitution - great name for a children's park! Not that we were planning to ride any of the rides because we were there for the light show, but they were all for children.

After moving through the childrens' park, the festival flowed into the botanic gardens. Seeing the botanic gardens was definitely worth the ticket price to get in because neither of us had previously been there. The two highlights of the light display were definitely the model train and Cajun Night Before Christmas displays.

The model train display was definitely a lot more impressive than the model train set that my brother and I played with in the basement as children and the model train shows that we went to. (Yes, this is what children that live in a city where it snows six months out of the year do!)

The Cajun Night Before Christmas display was a set of multiple light displays that were set to an audio recording of the story. So, to answer a previous blog of mine: Yes, the Cajun Night Before Christmas is an actual Louisianan Christmas classic!

Other than the two mentioned displays, the light show was not anything spectacular, just lights hung on bushes. However, we may have missed something at the laser light show. When we got to the designated area, there was a laser but no show. If you were there and saw something different, let me know!

The carolers were also festive and so were the trees that were decorated by school children. In fact, I think this event would have been magical if I had children with me. Then again, I am neither asking for my own nor to borrow anyone else's for an encore of this event any time soon. This is simply a suggestion that if you have children, then you should attend this event. Considering none of my friends have children, I can't recommend this to anyone that I'm friends with. JUST KIDDING, the red head has two little ones, but he's probably not allowed to come to New Orleans without supervision! HA!

http://celebrationintheoaks.com/

Excerpt of a Cajun Night Before Christmas:


Location of City Park: