St. Louis Cemetery (Elective Post)

Throughout our trip to New Orleans, we were able to attend a tour that took place within a very famous cemetery here in New Orleans called the St. Louis Cemetery. It was very rainy the day we arrived, but the tour was still a blast and was very educational as well. As we arrived at the cemetery, the first thing I noticed is that all the graves are put above land instead of under the land. Our tour guide explained to us that the reason for this is because it is easier to have the graves above land due to all the flooding that occurs multiple times in New Orleans. While we were here, we were able to see many different graves including graves that belonged to Marie Laveau and the future grave of Nicolas Cage. I really found the grave of Nicolas Cage interesting because the grave marker is set up almost like a pyramid. It was really interesting to see the different grave markers and how each of the family had decided to remember their relatives. One fact that I found very interesting was that every year the families of the deceased family members come out and clean the graves and celebrate their life. I thought this was very interesting and really showed how close the culture truly is here in New Orleans. I also noticed that there was different graves with a marker that had the words "perpetual care" on it. Our tour guide explained to us that those graves that had the perpetual care marker meant that those graves had been paid for and had money set aside to be well kept and taken care of. Overall, the tour was very fascinating to me and I'm very glad I got to experience it! 

Until next time,


Hannah