ACTIVITIES

In addition to quality continuing education, unlimited networking opportunities will be available.  Tuesday evening will feature the Conference’s Welcome Reception with our vendors at the historic Ritz-Carlton, New Orleans. 

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday mornings include optional Power Walks for those who would like to kick start their day with some exercise while taking a brisk walking tour of the French Quarter.  Participants should meet in the Gallery Foyer on the first level each morning for a 6:00 a.m. departure.  Walkers will return to the hotel in plenty of time to prepare for the day.

Wednesday evening, guests will participate in AAA’s Evening Out at Mardi Gras World.  The evening will be complete with fun, networking, a delicious dinner, awards and entertainment that can only be had in New Orleans.  Participants will be able to walk the few short blocks to the Museum for a casual evening filled with fun. Conference registrants will be captivated – a night out you won’t want to miss.

The Venue
Mardi Gras World is the most unique attraction in America’s most uniquely attractive city. It’s a world of wonders, created especially for AAA Conference goers by the people who bring Mardi Gras to life every year—the artists of Blaine Kern Studios.

The colors, the lights, the music, the joie de vivre. It’s all in one magical place where attendees can peek behind the curtain and see Mardi Gras in the making. You haven’t truly experienced Carnival until you’ve explored Mardi Gras World.

Since 1947, Blaine Kern Studios has been as much a part of Carnival as the parades New Orleans loves. In fact, Blaine Kern Studios create most of those parades, from concept through completion. They’re the world’s leading makers of floats, sculpture and props and Mardi Gras World is their treasure chest.
As any local will tell you, there are certain essential things to experience in New Orleans.  One is Mardi Gras, the most unique expression of our culture and spirit.  And there’s no Mardi Gras experience like Mardi Gras World.

The tour of Mardi Gras World attendees at the 2010 AAA National Practice Management Conference will receive is truly magical.   Because Mardi Gras World is literally the place where Mardi Gras magic is made.  Nowhere else can you watch the artists of Blaine Kern Studios—the world-renowned masters of Carnival sculpture and floatbuilding—at work in their shops, weaving spells of wonder.

We’ll be able to walk among towering figures of fantasy while marveling at the skill and technology that animate mega-floats.   We’ll be entertained by a band with sounds unique to New Orleans and acquire an insider’s appreciation of the history and traditions of Carnival.

The AAA Evening Out is included for full Conference registrants.  Guests are welcome and encouraged to attend.  Guests may register for a fee of $169 each which includes Tuesday’s Welcome Reception and the AAA Evening Out.

Optional Post-Conference Tour

This tour will provide participants an overview of the city, its rich and unique history, and the events, both past and current, that have shaped New Orleans.  We will visit the French Quarter, the Garden District, the Port & Warehouse District, and learn about the devastation created by Hurricane Katrina and the excitement of the city’s rebirth.

Tour goers will learn about the bold and courageous French Canadian, known as Bienville, as he explored the exotic Gulf Coast and established a city in a location his engineers thought to be "unfit for human habitation." Dynamic men and women "grew" the old city and who at various times rescued it from ruin.
Participants will also learn the history of the original city, the French Quarter, and why Bienville selected this particular location along the Mississippi River. Everyone will be able to absorb the sights and sounds of historic Jackson Square, and St. Louis Cathedral, the oldest in the U.S.   Unique too is the opportunity to see the historic cemeteries, referred to as "Cities of the Dead," and learn about this unique above ground burial system.

The port of New Orleans is the second largest in the U.S. and those participating be amazed at the volume and variety of products "offloaded" in the multi-purpose port and warehouse district. Amazing, 30% of the seafood eaten in the U.S. comes from Louisiana wetlands.

Those touring will enter the Garden District via St. Charles Avenue, modeled after the grand avenues of Paris, where Antebellum mansions with their Greek Revival and Italianate architecture line the street with historic rumbling streetcars, 150 year old live oaks, and world-renown restaurants. Travel past the historic Loyola and Tulane universities and the marvelous Audubon Park.

Throughout the tour, the guide will discuss the social and economic factors that have shaped New Orleans and its place in the history of the American South. The guide will also provide a local residents chronology of events leading up to Hurricane Katrina and the days immediately following August 29, 2005. Learn the factors that contributed to this cataclysmic event; how oil and gas pipelines, manmade levee protection, and America 's disappearing coastline combined to create this massive hurricane destruction.

The tour will also include some walking in the French Quarter including Jackson Square, Moon Walk and other sites that will be of interest with a stop in City Park for a picnic-style lunch.

The optional tour is $75 per person and will fill quickly!