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New Orleans: 3 Plantation Tours & Gourmet Lunch on River Road

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Free cancellationExcellent qualityLikely to sell out

1/13

Duration8h

GroupUp to 13

LanguagesEN

PickupAt your hotel

Four Plantations, One Day: The Hard History & River Road Beauty

You visit four plantations in one day without arranging transport, tickets or timing yourself — the van handles the drive, the guide handles the history, and lunch is already paid for. You'll see the intact grounds of Destrehan and St. Joseph, walk through Whitney's slavery museum at your own pace, pass Evergreen and Oak Alley from the road, and eat a full gourmet buffet at Houmas House overlooking the Mississippi. Hotel pickup and drop-off are included.

Step-by-step itinerary

Travel to Destrehan Plantation
Guided tour of Destrehan Plantation
Pause and view Evergreen Plantation
Self-guided audio tour at Whitney Plantation
Pass by St. Joseph Plantation
View Oak Alley Plantation from River Road
Drive to Houmas House Plantation
Enjoy gourmet lunch at Houmas House
Guided tour of Houmas House
Stroll Houmas House gardens and visit gift shop

The Experience

The van pulls out of New Orleans early, heading east toward Lake Ponchartrain and the Old Mississippi River Road. You're in a small group — no more than 14 passengers — riding through sugar cane fields that still work the same land where hundreds of enslaved people labored for generations. The narrated drive itself is part of the story: the guide points out Evergreen Plantation as you pass, its 37 buildings and double-row of original slave cabins visible under a canopy of centuries-old oaks. You don't stop there, but you see it — the scale of it, the intact complexity of a working plantation that's been standing since before the Civil War.

Your first real stop is Destrehan Plantation, where a historical interpreter walks you through the main house and the grounds. You'll see the Jefferson Room, with an actual document signed by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. But the weight of the tour is elsewhere: in the Miller-Haydel Museum on the property, where exhibits cover the 1811 German Coast Slave Revolt and the lives of enslaved people who worked here — their skills, their families, their resistance. It's not soft history. Then you move to Whitney Plantation Museum, which is different: a self-guided audio tour through slave cabins, a freedmen's church, a detached kitchen, and 14 memorials honoring people held in bondage. The museum's focus is explicit and unflinching — the raw facts of slavery in pre-Civil War Louisiana, told through the people who lived it.

St. Joseph Plantation comes next, built in the 1830s and still mostly intact — the manor house, original slave cabins, blacksmith's shop, schoolhouse. You get the physical layout of a sugar plantation as it actually was. And then, before lunch, you pass Oak Alley: you see the famous alley of 28 oaks from the River Road, the 1830 Greek Revival mansion framed by that tunnel of trees. It's the postcard version, but you're seeing it in context, not in isolation.

Lunch happens at Houmas House, in the grand dining hall. The buffet includes gumbo, fried catfish, crawfish étouffée, red beans and rice, and white chocolate bread pudding — all included, along with drinks and coffee. After you eat, a guide in antebellum dress leads you through 16 rooms of period antiques and Louisiana artwork. The house itself is stunning: Greek Revival, topped with a belvédère overlooking the Mississippi. You walk the gardens afterward, the shaded grounds, and browse the gift shop before the van takes you back to your hotel. The whole day runs about eight hours from pickup to drop-off.

What’s included

Hotel pickup and drop-off with confirmed pickup time, transport in an air-conditioned 14-passenger van, guided tour of Destrehan Plantation including the 1811 Slave Revolt Exhibit and Jefferson Room, self-guided audio tour of Whitney Plantation Museum with admission, guided tour of Houmas House with 16 rooms and grounds, unlimited gourmet buffet lunch at Houmas House with non-alcoholic drinks and coffee, and narrated scenic drive past Evergreen and Oak Alley plantations along the Old Mississippi River Road.

Good to know

Easy physical levelPets welcomePublic transport nearby

Operated by Tours by Isabelle

Is this one for you?Best for travelers who want to understand Louisiana plantation history — both the architecture and the enslaved labor that built it — without arranging their own transport or spending the day piecing together separate tickets and timing.