City Park is 1,300 acres of live oak trees, lagoons, gardens, and museums that makes it 50% larger than Central Park — a fact that surprises everyone who associates New Orleans exclusively with the French Quarter. The park's collection of mature live oaks is the largest in the world, with some trees estimated to be over 800 years old, and walking beneath their canopy — branches reaching 80 feet in every direction, draped in Spanish moss that moves in the breeze — is one of the most atmospheric experiences in the city.
The New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) sits at the park's heart, and the adjacent Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden — 11 acres of outdoor sculpture by artists including Henry Moore, Louise Bourgeois, and Claes Oldenburg, set among lagoons and live oaks — is free to enter and is one of the finest sculpture gardens in America. The garden's design integrates the art with the landscape so completely that the sculptures appear to have grown out of the ground alongside the trees.
Storyland, a children's playground featuring sculptured scenes from fairy tales and nursery rhymes, has been a New Orleans childhood tradition since the 1950s. The Botanical Garden, the Carousel Gardens amusement park (with a vintage wooden carousel from 1906), and the park's extensive network of walking and cycling paths make this a destination that could fill an entire day. The park was devastated by Hurricane Katrina — floodwaters stood six feet deep for weeks — and the restoration, funded partly by the Besthoff family, has been one of the city's most successful recovery stories.
Verified Facts
City Park covers 1,300 acres, making it larger than Central Park
The park contains the largest collection of mature live oaks in the world
The Besthoff Sculpture Garden is free to enter
The park was flooded with six feet of water during Hurricane Katrina
Get walking directions
1 Palm Dr, City Park, New Orleans, 70124, United States
