New Orleans' Carnival season marks Fat Tuesday with celebrities and pretend monarchs

NEW ORLEAN (AP) — New Orleans’ Carnival season is nearing its “Fat Tuesday” climax, with the last lavish Mardi Gras parades set to roll through historic neighborhoods while narrow streets of the old French Quarter host a raucous, continuous street party of revelers overflowing its bars and restaurants.

Two of the city’s favorite parades — the processions of Rex, King of Carnival and the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club — were set to roll Tuesday morning on major thoroughfares. Monday night featured the parade of the Krewe of Orpheus, co-founded by home-grown musician and actor Harry Connick Jr. In addition to elaborate floats and marching bands, scheduled participants included Connick himself, actor Neil Patrick Harris and Harris’ husband, David Burtka.

New Orleans has the nation’s largest and best known Carnival celebration. It's replete with cherished traditions beloved by locals. But it's also a vital boost to the city’s tourist-driven economy — always evident in the French Quarter.

“No strangers down here,” visitor Renitta Haynes of Chattanooga, Tennessee, said as she watched costumed revelers on Bourbon Street over the weekend. “Everybody is very friendly and approachable. I love that.”