New Orleans is bidding a typically joyous farewell to Carnival season with Mardi Gras parades and street parties.

Carnival season 2024 is entering its final days in New Orleans with big parades on the city's main thoroughfares and smaller, offbeat walking clubs strolling the old French Quarter.

With their purple, gold and green colors and toy babies hidden inside, king cakes are staples of Mardi Gras celebrations in New Orleans.

Some restaurants in the Star City are celebrating “Fat Tuesday,” or Mardi Gras.

The lead-up to New Orleans’ annual Mardi Gras celebration is intensifying with events big and small.

Alabama’s port city is holding a main event of its Carnival season, a quirky bash honoring the man credited with helping make the nation’s first Mardi Gras celebration what it is.

New Orleans' health director says she won't take part in a satirical Mardi Gras-season parade, one of the season's earliest, citing threats since COVID-19 restrictions were resumed.

New Orleans is bringing back an indoor mask mandate to fight the spread of COVID-19 while preparing for an influx of visitors for the Mardi Gras season.

New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell helped usher in the city's Carnival season by sampling a city delicacy — king cake — at a morning event.

(AP Photo/Channi Anand)NEW DELHI — Health officials in India say cases of the coronavirus variant first detected in South Africa and Brazil have been found in India. Over 150 cases of another variant first detected in the United Kingdom have previously been found in India. ___SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea is reporting 621 new coronavirus cases. State health officials on Tuesday reported 1,132 new COVID-19 cases and three additional deaths. Spain has officially reported more than 3 million virus cases -- just over 6% of the population -- and attributed more than 65,400 deaths to the virus.

Tourists from Brooklyn take photos on a nearly deserted Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2021. “We were expecting a little bit lower key than the normal Mardi Gras,” Wheeler said. Coronavirus-related restrictions in New Orleans included canceled parades, closed bars and a near shutdown of rowdy Bourbon Street. That, and unusually frigid weather, prevented what New Orleans usually craves at the end of Mardi Gras season: streets and businesses jam-packed with revelers. To the east, Mobile, Alabama, which boasts the nation's oldest Mardi Gras celebrations, had also canceled parades.

People walk past parts of Mardi Gras floats past and present, at Mardi Gras World, where Kern Studios creates and stores some of their floats, in New Orleans, Friday, Feb. 12, 2021. New Orleans' annual pre-Lenten Mardi Gras celebration is muted this year because of the coronavirus pandemic. Mardi Gras joy is muted this year in New Orleans as authorities seek to stifle the coronavirus's spread. Mardi Gras joy is muted this year in New Orleans as authorities seek to stifle the coronavirus's spread. None of it is worth putting people's lives in danger.”AdNew Orleans' Mardi Gras has had hard times before.

Parts of Mardi Gras floats created by Kern Studios sit stored inside Mardi Gras World in New Orleans, Friday, Feb. 12, 2021. New Orleans' annual pre-Lenten Mardi Gras celebration is muted this year because of the coronavirus pandemic. Mardi Gras joy is muted this year in New Orleans as authorities seek to stifle the coronavirus's spread. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)NEW ORLEANS — New Orleans’ annual pre-Lenten Mardi Gras celebration is muted this year because of the coronavirus pandemic. AdLouisiana has registered 9,276 confirmed coronavirus deaths, 16th highest in the U.S.___THE VIRUS OUTBREAK:Tight supply creates reluctance over federal vaccine sites.

Mardi Gras, also known as Fat Tuesday, is Feb. 16. As a French café and bakery with multiple locations throughout the region, Our Daily Bread in Blacksburg has been baking king cakes all season long. Usually, during carnival, there are parties, the person who finds the baby in their piece of cake is king for the day, hosts the next party and brings the king cake. Our Daily Bread has been baking king cakes the Mardi Gras season for years while this is the very first year Evie’s Bistro and Bakery in Roanoke is getting in on the celebration. Mardi Gras is Tuesday, February 16th and it just isn't Mardi Gras without the King Cake.

COVID-19 is tamping down the joy — and the revenue — associated with Carnival season in New Orleans. Live music is all but dead. The lounge was becoming popular for live music and Brazilian food. They cautiously reopened after Labor Day at restricted capacity and without live music. They also understand that live music will probably be one of the last things to return after the virus is fully defeated.

FILE - In this Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2020, file photo, Mondo Kayo parades down Chartres Street during Mardi Gras, in New Orleans. A subdued Carnival season begins Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, after the coronavirus pandemic put an end to the crowd-heavy balls and street parades that draw thousands of people to the city every year. The Mardi Gras season always starts on Jan. 6 and ends on Fat Tuesday, which this year falls on Feb. 16. The season is usually marked by extravagant balls and parades where costumed riders throw trinkets to the mobs of people packed along the parade routes. The Krewe de Jeanne d’Arc is a club that annually pays homage to the fallen French hero with a parade through the French Quarter on the official start of the Carnival season.