Visiting New Orleans and Louisiana: how many days do you need?

Allow three full days to visit New Orleans, and a fourth if you want to see both a plantation and the bayous. The city is explored on foot and by streetcar: the French Quarter, the Garden District and an evening of jazz fit into two days, and the third goes to the museums or the swamps. For the rest of Louisiana, the Cajun country around Lafayette, add two or three days and a car.

The best months are March, April, May and the second half of October: summer is very hot, and hurricane season runs from June to November.

How many days to visit New Orleans?

Here is a breakdown that works for a first stay. It is a suggestion to adapt, not a tour we sell as it stands.

Day	Morning	Afternoon	Evening
1	Jackson Square, St. Louis Cathedral, the Cabildo	French Market and Royal Street	Jazz on Frenchmen Street
2	National WWII Museum	Garden District by streetcar, Magazine Street	Steamboat on the Mississippi
3	Bayous, half an hour from the city	City Park and its sculpture garden	Bourbon Street
4	A River Road plantation	Return, Magazine Street	Tremé or Frenchmen Street

With only three days, you have to choose between the plantation and an afternoon in the city: the plantations are an hour away by road, and the National WWII Museum alone takes a full half-day.

French Quarter, Garden District, Tremé: what to see in each neighborhood

The French Quarter, also called the Vieux Carré, is the district of cast-iron balconies and Creole courtyards.

• Jackson Square and St. Louis Cathedral, from 1794, free outside services.
• The Cabildo, where the sale of Louisiana was signed in 1803, and the Presbytère, devoted to Mardi Gras and Hurricane Katrina. A discount applies if you buy both tickets together, on site.
• The French Market, a public market opened in 1791, and Royal Street, the street of antique dealers.
• The Historic New Orleans Collection, free with a ticket, which tells three centuries of the city’s story.
• Bourbon Street, for the neon and the noise, to see once.

The Garden District is the neighborhood of mansions from before the American Civil War, under the live oaks. You get there on the St. Charles streetcar line, in service since 1835. Lafayette Cemetery No. 1, with its above-ground tombs, dates from 1833: at the time of writing, in October 2026, it is closed to the public for works and can only be visited on a guided tour, according to the city.

Tremé and the Marigny are the music neighborhoods. Tremé is the cradle of the brass bands. On Frenchmen Street, in the Marigny, three blocks of clubs play jazz every night.

Tip: On Frenchmen Street, the clubs do not charge an entrance fee but do impose a minimum spend on drinks. Keep some cash on you.

Further out, City Park is home to the New Orleans Museum of Art and a garden of more than 90 sculptures, with free access.

Louisiana plantations: which one to visit from New Orleans

The plantations line the Mississippi, along the River Road, an hour by road from the city. Three stand out, and they do not tell the same story.

Plantation	What you see there	Opening hours noted in October 2026
Oak Alley, Vacherie	The avenue of 28 three-hundred-year-old oaks and the big house	Every day, 8:30 to 17:00, tickets sold until 16:00
Laura, Vacherie	The documented story of a Creole family	Guided tours every day, from 10:00 to 14:20
Whitney, Wallace	A museum set on a plantation that produced indigo, sugar and rice from 1752 to 1975	9:30 to 16:30, last entry at 15:00, closed on Tuesdays

At Oak Alley, admission costs from $30 per adult with the guided tour of the big house, from $27 without, before tax. These prices and opening hours are those displayed at the time of writing, in October 2026: check them again on each plantation’s website. Oak Alley and Laura close on Mardi Gras day, for example.

Seeing the bayous: by boat, or on foot in the Barataria Preserve

The swamps begin half an hour from the center. There are two ways to approach them:

• By airboat or boat, with a private operator, in the swamps of Jean Lafitte or the Barataria basin: alligators, bald cypresses and Spanish moss. Departures are early in the morning, when the alligators are active, and are booked online.
• On foot, in the Barataria Preserve, the part of Jean Lafitte National Park located near Marrero: about 10,500 hectares of bayous, swamps and forests, with free entry.

Watch out: Since February 2, 2026, the visitor center and most of the trails in the Barataria Preserve have been closed to repair the damage from Hurricane Ida, for about two years. The Twin Canals Trail and, in Jean Lafitte, the Wetland Trace boardwalk remain open. Check the park’s “Current Conditions” page on nps.gov before you go.

Bring insect repellent: mosquitoes are plentiful in Louisiana.

To go further, the Cajun country is visited around Lafayette, Breaux Bridge, Eunice, Opelousas and St. Martinville. This is the region of zydeco, boudin and crawfish, and of the Atchafalaya Basin, the largest river swamp in the country according to the Louisiana tourist board, covering nearly 400,000 hectares.

When to go to Louisiana: heat, hurricanes and Mardi Gras

Period	Average temperatures (low / high)	Rainy days per month	Good to know
December to February	45 to 46 °F (7 to 8 °C) / 64 to 66 °F (18 to 19 °C)	6 to 7	Carnival from January 6
March to May	54 to 68 °F (12 to 20 °C) / 73 to 84 °F (23 to 29 °C)	4 to 5	The driest period
June to August	73 to 75 °F (23 to 24 °C) / 90 to 91 °F (32 to 33 °C)	10 to 12	Heavy heat, start of the hurricanes
September	72 °F (22 °C) / 88 °F (31 °C)	8	Peak of the hurricanes
October and November	54 to 63 °F (12 to 17 °C) / 72 to 81 °F (22 to 27 °C)	5	Hurricane risk falling

These averages are those of the city’s tourist board. Three things to remember:

• Hurricanes. The official season runs from June 1 to November 30. Its peak falls on September 10, and most of the activity is concentrated between mid-August and mid-October, according to the US National Hurricane Center. For that period, buy changeable tickets.
• The heat. From June to August, it is 90 to 91 °F (32 to 33 °C) in the afternoon and it rains one day in three.
• Mardi Gras. Carnival begins on January 6 and ends on Mardi Gras day, February 9 in 2027.

To place Louisiana in a wider trip, see when to go to the United States.

How to get to New Orleans from Nashville or Memphis

From Nashville, by car. Allow about 8 hours 30 minutes of driving due south on the I-65 then the I-59, across Alabama and Mississippi, which means around ten hours with breaks. Leave early and fill up before rural Mississippi, where gas stations become scarce. Birmingham, halfway, allows a stop at the Civil Rights Institute. This is the road followed by our 18-day itinerary from Chicago to New Orleans, via Nashville.

From Memphis, by train. Amtrak’s City of New Orleans links Chicago, Memphis and New Orleans every day. According to the October 2026 timetable, it leaves Memphis at 4:55 or 6:55 depending on the day and arrives at 13:47 or 15:47, a little under nine hours of travel.

If you rent a car to return it in New Orleans, check the one-way drop-off fee when you book. The subject is covered in detail in renting a car in the United States. And as everywhere in the country, a visitor from abroad has entry formalities to settle before flying, which depend on their passport: see the ESTA for the United States.

So, how long for New Orleans and Louisiana?

• Three days: the city alone, with a morning in the bayous.
• Four days: the city, the bayous and a River Road plantation.
• One week: add the Cajun country, by car.

Go preferably between March and May, or in the second half of October. Avoid the period from mid-August to mid-October if your dates cannot be changed.

Étaperia does not sell a stay devoted to Louisiana alone: New Orleans closes the Chicago, Midwest and South stage of our 88-day crossing of the American East. The other regions are on the United States page.