New Orleans | Christina Ricci | actress | Sheriff

As it turns out, New Orleans and Christina Ricci have plenty in common. She's not the typical Hollywood starlet. It's not the typical U.S. city. They're both quirky, and both have what you might call a unique appearance - New Orleans with its shabby-chic Creole cottages and ornate cast-iron balconies, and Ricci with that heart-shaped face and those saucer-shaped eyes. Both actress and city are more than just a little mysterious, too. Plus, they're both short. Much of New Orleans is below sea level and Ricci's only 5-foot-1.
Is that taking the comparison too far? Probably. Point is, the Big Easy was the perfect fit for an actress looking for a little time off. And Ricci is more than happy to share what she learned about having fun while getting nothing done.

Tip One: Walk The Dog
In any other city besides New Orleans, it might be unusual to see a diminutive movie star walking down the street with a diminutive miniature pinscher named Sheriff Steve Goldberg. But in topsy-turvy New Orleans, where unusual sights are the norm - yes, that's a giant papier-mâché cow being pulled down Bourbon Street by a tractor - hardly anyone noticed. "I wasn't recognized too much," says Ricci, who has, in the past, professed to her own shyness. "It was really great, because my little dog and I walked all over the French Quarter and saw all the old buildings there."

When she and The Sheriff weren't wandering the Quarter, they headed up to the city's Garden District. Reachable on the oldest continually operating streetcar in the world, the St. Charles Avenue Streetcar line (please don't call it a trolley!), the Garden District is home to grand mansions, one of New Orleans' fabled aboveground cemeteries, and the famed Commander's Palace restaurant. Writer Anne Rice still owns a home there, too, though it's now on the block for just under $4 million if you're interested.