-I'm in a destination that I have returned to eight times, but I could come a hundred more and not begin to exhaust its possibilities.

It's a city that has no equal, with total originality in food, music, history, and a people who exuded generosity rarely associated with the city.

It could not be compared to or substituted for any other place in the world.

I'm in New Orleans, Louisiana.

♪ [ Upbeat tune plays ] I'm Samantha Brown, and I've traveled all over this world.

And I'm always looking to find the destinations, the experiences, and, most importantly, the people who make us feel like we're really a part of a place.

That's why I have a love of travel and why these are my places to love.

Samantha Brown's "Places to Love" is made possible by... -Since 1975, we've inspired adults to learn and travel to the United States, and in more than 100 countries, from exploring our national parks to learning about art and culture in Italy, we've introduced adults to places, ideas and friends.

We are Rhodes Scholar.

We make the world our classroom.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -Oceana Cruises is a proud sponsor of public TV and "Samantha Brown's Places to Love," sailing to more than 600 destinations around the globe, from Europe to Asia and Alaska to the South Pacific.

Oceania Cruises offers gourmet dining and curated travel experiences aboard boutique-hotel-style ships that carry no more than 1250 guests.

Oceana Cruises -- Your world.

Your way.

-This is my very first time to City Park.

Where have I been?

It's over 1,300 acres large, and it gives you the feeling of having stepped back into time.

It has the largest collection of mature live oaks in the world, some over 800 years old.

And there are these bridges, so many bridges, that lead you over an ancient bayou.

And this bridge leads me to Café du Monde.

This outpost of the famous cafe in Jackson Square serves up the same excellent housemade beignets and chicory coffee, but in a more peaceful setting.

-There's your beignets.

-I'm not going to tell you they're any less messy, though.

I could easily spend the entire day here in City Park, but there are -- What?

[ Beep ] I could easily spend the entire day here in City Park.

But there are so many experiences I want to have with this great city, and none of them will be in the French Quarter.

My first stop is the gem of the Warehouse District, an absolute must-see for any visitor to New Orleans.

-One of the questions that most of the visitors ask us is, why is the National World War II Museum here in New Orleans?

Because it started out as the D-Day Museum to recognize the Normandy invasion, June 6th, 1944.

Higgins industries built the landing craft, called Higgins Boats, here in New Orleans that allowed us to make landings across unprotected beaches all over the world.

I'm Mike Alexander, a volunteer here at the National World War II Museum.

My father was a World War II veteran, and I'm also a veteran of the United States Army.

-So the Higgins boat essentially changed the strategy of the war?

-Yes.

It allowed us to make amphibious operations all over the world, over any kind of beach.

And they were able to run up on the beach, discharge the cargo, reverse prop, back out, and go back and get another load.

-Wow.

-The mission of the World War II Museum is to give the American perspective of World War II.

Encompasses seven buildings with many different exhibits in each building.

-We have about 250,000 artifacts or so, and about 9 million pages of archival material.

All of them tell the story of the American experience of World War II.

It's quite a special archive, I think.

-And it's your job, along with a great team of people, to curate those objects and create stories around them.

How do you choose which ones get to be shown?

-It is an arduous process.

I will say there are very lively discussions about it.

I do have a very, very good team of curators, collection managers, oral historians, exhibit designers.

Often, it's a really tough call.

Fortunately, we sometimes, you know, rotate objects so that we can tell new stories.

-Do you have some favorites?

-Of course.

This was a dress that was sewn by a woman named Antoinette Tony Silbert.

She was a young woman on the home front whose fiancé was a pilot, and his plane was was shot down, and he was actually missing for a period of close to 29 days.

But he survived, returned, and they were married.

And she took this parachute, the one that had saved his life, into her wedding gown.

The rope from the parachute created the braid that's around the neckline of the gown.

For her, it symbolized resilience and strength under very, very difficult circumstances.

-Exactly.

And I think what your museum does so well is personalize it because it is overwhelming -- the imagery, the tanks, the machinery, the planes.

And yet when we talk about a wedding dress, it brings it home that these were real people.

They had real lives and they hopefully had a real future.

-Absolutely.

-The museum may focus on events from 80 years ago, but it also uses dramatically modern technology to tell its stories in imaginative, interactive ways.

-Voices from the Front includes 18 individuals from the World War II era who you can actually have a conversation with while you're here.

They were asked about a thousand questions apiece, and then those answers were fed into a software program that recognizes the questions visitors might ask and pairs them with the appropriate response from the veterans.

-How old were you when you enlisted?

-I must have been 22 years old, if I remember correctly.

-What did you do in World War II?

-Most of the girls worked night and day on the mail, issuing it to the country, to the place where the soldiers were.

-Ms. Davis was part of the 6888, the first battalion of black women ever to serve in the U.S. military overseas.

She and her fellow WACs processed two years worth of undelivered mail to the soldiers in less than four months.

What advice do you have for young people?

-I learned many.

To keep going and do the best you can, and behave as best you can, and treat other people as best you can.

-Thank you, Miss Davis.

-I don't have the answer for that question.

-[ Laughs ] -Would you please ask me another question?

-When I said I wasn't visiting anything in the French Quarter of this trip, I wasn't kidding.

Here in the West Riverside district, I've come to a very specialized shop that's been a New Orleans institution for over 85 years.

-My grandfather invented the first electric ice shaving machine.

It's special because it shaves the ice better and finer.

It's really beautiful.

So you put the ice in, and it's really a series of simple machines.

There's a motor and a pulley and a wedge, you know, inclined plane, like everything you learn about in school.

He just put it together better, in a way that shaves the ice finer.

-Oh, my gosh.

-Oh, it's snow anywhere in New Orleans.

♪ -Oh, my gosh.

-Look what we get.

-And it's what you put on the snow that really makes a Hansen's snowball.

How many syrups do you make and have on the menu?

-I don't know, I've never counted.

-[ Laughs ] -But this is our menu.

We have these flavors every day.

My grandmother was Mary Hansen.

It was my grandmother's business.

She made her syrups fresh every day because there was such little refrigeration.

So that is what we do still today.

Everything is made fresh every day, just like my grandmother did, with Louisiana cane sugar.

We don't use corn syrup.

-Even the vanilla bean syrup is made using real vanilla beans.

Who taught you how to make these syrups?

-So my grandmother was not the person that was going to have a recipe for you.

-Okay.

-You had to sit and watch.

She wasn't giving anything away.

You had to walk the walk and talk the talk.

You know, you had to -- She would give you that look like most grandmothers give.

And you knew when you were doing something right and you definitely knew when you were doing something wrong.

-Ashley goes to her grandfather's ice shaving machine three times for one snowball, and the syrup isn't just poured on the top, but each layer gets soaked as she goes.

You can choose any number of flavors in whatever combination you want, but I'm going with the homemade vanilla and satsuma orange.

Is this ready to eat?

-Yes.

-This is my very first New Orleans snowball.

-You have not lived until this moment.

♪ -Oh, my God.

That is beautiful.

That is so good.

You are also a James Beard recipient for the snowball.

-For snowballs.

We're in their category called American Classic, which I feel like Mary and Ernest Hansen were American classics.

A snowball to me is very reminiscent of the given moment.

You have to enjoy it right away.

It won't last.

You have to stand in line.

You have to wait in the heat, and then you take your first bite.

It's really that you get to enjoy it with your friend or your daughter or your grandfather.

Then it's back to work or back to your life.

So for me, a snowball is about the present moment and enjoying it.

♪ ♪ -So there are 1,500 restaurants in New Orleans, and Cafe Reconcile is different than any other restaurant here.

When people come through the doors and sit down to eat, do they understand there's a mission above just having a good meal?

-Our mission here at Cafe Reconcile is to support young people through personal and workforce development.

I'm Brandy Trepagnier.

I am the general manager here at Cafe Reconcile.

My responsibilities are training our young people and giving them all of the hospitality and life skills that I've learned along the way, so that they can either get a thriving career in the hospitality industry, or use it as a stepping stone to whatever they want to do.

-The youth program, how long is it?

-It's a 16-month engagement.

Young people are in training with us and our life skills portion of our program, and on-the-job training in the cafe, which is our learning lab.

-So when you walk through these doors, you will not be the same.

-Do you feel that when you walk through these doors that you're a different person?

-Yes.

-What kind of person are you when you walk through these doors?

-I am a professional when I walk in the door.

-Nice.

And how do you work here?

Because there are so many jobs to have in a restaurant, so many roles to fulfill.

-I host.

So I greet people, and it's my favorite thing.

I love to -- I love people, so that's where I get all my energy from in the morning.

Yelling "good morning."

-Yelling "good morning?"

-Yeah.

Do you want to hear it?

-Yeah.

-She means it, okay?

So you might want to adjust your volume.

Ready?

-Good morning.

I said good morning everyone.

[ Laughter ] -You come by Cafe Reconcile as a chef in your own right.

What made you want to all of a sudden take the helm of this restaurant?

-I really wanted to be able to affect the quality of life of young people entering the hospitality industry.

It is a fully functioning restaurant, and we want our guests have a great time.

But at the end of the day, we are all putting the intern experience first in what we do.

-Everyone in the world wants to come to New Orleans, and they want to come and do two things.

They want to listen to jazz, and they want to eat.

-Yes.

-Yes.

-Do you feel that?

-Yeah.

We definitely have a very unique culture.

Like, you come to New Orleans, you feel like you at home.

Like, because it's a mix of everybody.

Because when you get here, you, like -- you kind of blend in because it's a mix of culture.

That's basically what New Orleans is.

-And any restaurant you go to, you will never see crispy turkey necks on the menu.

[ Laughter ] -Ever.

♪ -I love being back in New Orleans, but just like anyone with a big case of wanderlust, I'm always thinking, huh, I wonder what's over there?

And so I've come all the way across Lake Pontchartrain to the North Shore, starting in the city of Covington.

And here's where I found a perfect "I wonder what's over there" kind of place.

-Hello.

Welcome in.

-Wow.

Thank you.

Beautiful.

-I'm Marianne Angeli Rodriguez.

I'm an artist and owner of Rodriguez Gallery in beautiful downtown Covington, Louisiana.

So I'm originally from the Philippines, and due to my parents working with the United Nations, that brought us all around the world, I made my way from the Philippines to West Africa.

I was in Burkina Faso and Senegal, and then we moved to England, Guatemala, back to the Philippines, and then ended up here in the United States.

-Marianne's latest collection, titled "The Tree of Life," is inspired by a verse in the "Book of Proverbs" as well as things that bring her joy.

Her studio in the back is where she creates her paintings, and always with an audience.

-I kind of just let the color guide me first, okay?

And then you kind of see the shapes come through, the composition comes through.

You may want to add like some accents with different lines.

I will let it kind of do its own thing on the canvas and let it travel.

And then as it dries, it will kind of allow the next step.

-I love it.

And you don't know what that next step is until that dries.

-I do not know, yes.

You just let it move how it wants to.

-So these canvases represent how far you can reach, is that it?

-Oh, it can be.

I can go even bigger.

That's why there's a ladder there.

-Nice.

-You know, and I like to move my whole body when I work.

So that's why I love to paint large.

It's a release, you know?

So having lived all over the world, I made my way down to Covington.

And I really enjoy living here because I get the small town feel, and I just feel so relaxed.

And you really feel like you're a part of a fabric of a tight-knit community.

-Covington was billed at one point as the healthiest place in America.

People would come from Chicago, the Midwest, up north in the winter.

Covington, you could cross that beautiful Lake Pontchartrain, which already kind of sets you apart as you decompress getting here.

It was the idea of a resort.

It was the idea of a spa, and people needed that back then, just like we need it now.

-And this is the Southern Hotel, which was built in 1907 to receive all of those guests from all over year round.

And you now own it.

-Yes.

Thankfully.

-The Southern Hotel was the centerpiece of Covington for over 50 years, but after it closed in the 1960s, the building was used for all sorts of other purposes -- office space.

FEMA used it after Hurricane Katrina.

It was even a dollar store for a while.

And to Lisa's eyes, that meant that basically, the Southern Hotel was abandoned.

-You know, I'm a historic preservationist, so I love the building.

I wanted to save the building.

And I think that was the initial impetus.

And then at some point, you know, knee deep into it, I realized, okay.

Now I'm going to run a hotel.

-But it's interesting.

You look around and you've really created this beautiful balance of the past, but with the more modern and really recognizing the the origins of this hotel.

These murals are beautiful.

They really tell a story.

-They do.

This is a little steamer that people would use to come over from New Orleans, but it also carried a lot of goods because this was an agricultural area that supplied the city.

-Is there something that you learned about the city that you lived in, owning a hotel that you never knew?

-A lot of the older people in the community who grew up when the hotel was in its heydays, the little 90 year old sweet, sweet ladies, "I had my sweet 16 here."

I had -- you know, all their memories and how much this hotel had meant to the community decades ago, and they still they still had that feeling for it.

-Well, that makes a great hotel.

-Yes, yes.

♪ -A great way to see the entire North Shore is to rent a bike and pedal along the Tammany Trace Rail Trail.

It was originally a corridor for the Illinois Central Railroad, and now runs 31 miles through several communities along Lake Pontchartrain, like Abita Springs.

And if the name Abita sounds familiar to you, that's because Louisiana's most famous beer is brewed right here on the North Shore.

So, Abita, I've seen this beer everywhere.

I didn't know it was actually a place.

-Yes.

Abita Springs.

-So does that mean that the water that, you know, is used to brew this beer is actually from the springs?

-Correct.

So all the water that we use for our beer comes from up to 3,000 feet below the surface, the biggest component in any beer that you drink.

And for us, that magic comes from the Abita spring water.

-And then this is, I feel, like, really special -- fresh brewed root beer.

-Yeah, there's a lot of sugar in it.

So that might actually be good for the ride home, but it's very delicious.

It's actually distributed around the world.

-This will get me to Lake Pontchartrain in no time.

-100%.

-And across that lake back in New Orleans, there's a shop in its Mid-City neighborhood that's been selling a signature local sandwich since 1929.

You actually have it spelled both ways -- poor boys and then po boys.

-We stay true to the roots of the spelling, because that's what it was called -- a New Orleans poor boy.

This sandwich right here, it's culture you can eat.

I'm Justin Kennedy, and I'm the GM and one of the family members at the world famous Parkway Bakery and Tavern.

Back in the '20s, you know, the main way to get around the city was the streetcar.

And those guys weren't getting paid.

So they striked.

And some former conductors who had left the industry and opened up a coffee stand and grocery store on North Peter Street.

And they said, look, you come to our coffee stand, show your badge, we'll feed you.

We'll feed our poor boy sandwich.

And the original poor boy sandwich was what you have right there.

-I have roast beef here.

I've got some French fries tucked to it.

-That's it.

-Okay.

And I've got it dressed, and dressed is?

-Is dressed is lettuce, tomato, mayo, and pickle.

-Okay, so I know the history of the sandwich here.

Now I gotta know, how do you eat it?

-We don't want to mess up your garment.

So what you do, you put your elbows on the table.

-Brace yourself.

-You bend forward.

-Yep.

-You hold it.

You hold it towards that point.

-Okay.

Over.

-And you dig right in.

-Dig right in.

-Mmm.

-That's delicious.

-After the nearby American Can Company factory shut down in 1988, Parkway's owners at the time had to reluctantly shut its doors.

But Justin's uncle loved the shop, bought the building, and spent eight years refurbishing it.

Parkway reopened in 2003.

-My uncle dropped a lot of money into this place and when Katrina hit, we had six-seven foot, just like most of the city.

We were demolished.

You never thought the city was coming back.

Right.

-We were open when it hit August 29th.

We were open in December.

I got six foot of water.

-Oh, my gosh.

-We reopened this place.

It was 5,000 people here.

And, uh -- shoot.

It chokes me up.

What I love about this place, too, I get to meet the city.

The city of New Orleans comes to me, my living room, every single day.

And I get to talk to all kinds of folks.

-Poor boy, but a rich man.

-That's it.

So while in New Orleans, you know, go sit down at a table and order food for two if you're by yourself.

You know, walk down the street, find a local brass band.

And while you're at it, you know, drop at on the Dew Drop Inn.

They just reopened.

♪ -So right now, we are standing on the stage of the Dew Drop Inn.

And even though you opened a little more than a month ago, this stage, this venue is of a musical legends.

-This business started in 1939.

And you have the likes of Ray Charles and Little Richard, people like Marvin Gaye and Tina Turner, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, for instance -- a lot of these people have come through this building.

-What made it so important to New Orleans is that it was a safe haven for a lot of those earlier musicians.

This wasn't just a music venue for them to play at.

It was so much more.

-Oh, yeah.

Well, so we were listed in the Green Book, and a lot of the artists would come and stay here.

So back in the day, pre-integration, they could maybe have a gig downtown, but they didn't have a place to stay.

-Right.

-This provided that.

As a New Orleanian, I'm super proud of that history.

As a black person, I'm proud of this history of black ownership.

And I just wanted to carry that forward.

And I didn't want to see it go away.

And I wanted to have an opportunity to tell those stories from the perspective of the people who created the history.

-I'm looking up at what looks like are balconies to rooms?

I mean, I've never had a balcony room that looks down onto a stage.

-Yeah, this is the ultimate VIP experience.

So when there's a big show going on, you can't get a better seat.

-What are we going to hear tonight?

♪ -Joining me tonight is my friend since elementary school, Michael De Resto, who has been in Louisiana for 25 years.

-So I hope that people come to New Orleans and they really gain a better appreciation for those places that are off the beaten path.

-You do, you want to see the French Quarter.

You want to see downtown.

But where you're at right here, Mid-City New Orleans is where we live, we breathe, and we eat.

And you know we have to love it if we live here.

So that's why you want to venture out and come share this space with us, because this is our home.

♪ -New Orleans has a long and varied history.

It's lived under many flags.

I would encourage everybody to learn more about the city and its history, and not just Bourbon Street.

-And we have created this wonderful community through creativity and through art, culinary art, music art, um, art art.

-And you know what?

A lot of New Orleanians are fly birds who moved into town and never left.

And you know what?

You just might be the next one.

-Whether it's your eighth trip, first trip, or 100th, New Orleans, Louisiana is a place to love.

♪ [ Cheers and applause ] -For more information about this and other episodes, destination guides, or links to follow me on social media, log on to placestolove.com.

Samantha Brown's "Places to Love" was made possible by... -Since 1975, we've inspired adults to learn and travel to the United States, and in more than 100 countries, from exploring our national parks to learning about art and culture in Italy, we've introduced adults to places, ideas and friends.

We are Rhodes Scholar.

We make the world our classroom.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ -Oceana Cruises is a proud sponsor of public TV and "Samantha Brown's Places to Love," sailing to more than 600 destinations around the globe, from Europe to Asia and Alaska to the South Pacific.

Oceania Cruises offers gourmet dining and curated travel experiences aboard boutique-hotel-style ships that carry no more than 1250 guests.

Oceana Cruises -- Your world.

Your way.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪