Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop

A bar built in 1722 is supposed to be a little seedy. A little run down. A little scary. And down on the quiet end of Bourbon Street--away from the hip-hop, the rowdy tourists, the gunshots that echo soundless through the crowd of boisterous revelers--you can find just that.

A group of men, boys really with baby faces flush with booze and sandy hair, sing along with bad American 80s music in German accents at the entrance of Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop, arm in arm and laughing. But don't let them fool you, just inside, in the dark shadows of the 275-year-old bar, tucked into wooden benches between walls of crumbling brick, couples sit, friends sit, among the clatter of beer bottles and the haze of cigar smoke. They speak quietly, intimately, smiling at private jokes and smirking at the harmless antics of the European tourists.
Inside, your companion can only be seen by swaying candlelight, the flicker bouncing from glass to face to the tired brick in a wall standing only by the grace of borrowed time. The sounds from the juke box fade away into the back of the tavern, disappearing under the sweet, sultry sounds of a crooner and her piano, hidden in the dark recesses, candles dimly lighting the music she knows by heart.
The quiet audience gathers around the piano, one of John Lennon's if the legend holds true, leaning lightly against it, sharing secrets and bottles of wine. The night is cold, for New Orleans, and as people hustle in through the open shutters--used in lieu of doors in the old shop--they breathe frozen breaths and rub hands together while waiting for gin and tonics. They stand close together and pull shawls and jackets around shoulders and waists, touching just slightly, a hand or an arm or the shift of a hip, as to convey a gentle intimacy. Despite being on Bourbon Street, they all seem to know each other and know the place and know the music.
You can feel the ghosts of history, the spirit of Jean Lafitte, in the walls, in the candles, in the bottles of aged alcohol, dusty with decades of disuse. You can hear pirate chatter and smell the fires of 200-year-old iron furnaces and taste the sweetness of smuggled rum.