It’s finally here: Super Bowl Week.

Yes, the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles will dominate the internet and the airwaves as the big game returns to New Orleans – site of the New England Patriots first of six Super Bowl championships.

Security will be extremely tight on Bourbon Street and around the city after the tragedy that took place on New Year’s Day, and those victims should be remembered.

The last time the Super Bowl was played in New Orleans was when the Baltimore Ravens beat the San Francisco 49ers in one of those Harbaugh Brothers affairs, 34-31. It also featured a mishap, a 34 minute blackout after Beyonce’s halftime show. The Ravens came to Foxborough and beat the Patriots in the AFC title game, ruining a chance for a lot of us in the media to return to the Big Easy.

We were bummed. Why? New Orleans is the most media friendly city to host the event. A lot (team hotels, press conferences, etc.) is within walking distance if the setup is similar, who knows. But a New Orleans Super Bowl certainly brings back memories for yours truly, because it was where the first of 10 Super Bowls your humble scribe was able, thanks to Telegraph management past and present, to cover in person.

And that wasn’t New England’s win over the Rams. It was instead the Bill Parcells-coached Patriots vs. the Brett Favre quarterbacked Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl XXXI, won by the Pack 35-21. That was the favorite team of late former Nashua mayor Don Davidson, and we remember talking to him on the phone the day after for a column.

It was our first introduction to Bourbon Street, and safe to say what happens on Bourbon Street stays on Bourbon Street. The amazing thing was seeing how it wasn’t crowded at all early in the week but by Friday and Saturday one could barely breathe. No doubt there will be strong security.

This was also the Super Bowl when Bill Parcells basically had one foot out the door. The rumors of Pete Carroll being the Krafts’ choice to replace him was already making the rounds by Thursday.

The other thing was, well, yours truly at that time had a lot more hair and a fuller face, and was told by many we bore a resemblance to Parcells – so much so the New York media couldn’t believe it, pointing our way during a media breakfast. And some fans late that Friday night when yours truly was sitting at an outdoor cafe in the French Quarter and suddenly heard the cry “Tuna! Tuna! Tuna!” with them looking my way. See, we weren’t kidding.

Ah, but that’s not the case now. The return to New Orleans came five years later, in late January/early February of 2002, after 9/11. Security was tight as a drum. There was only a week in between the conference championships and the Super Bowl. We arrived on Wednesday to 85 degree weather and left the following Tuesday in 40 degrees. U2 was the halftime guest. And the Patriots pulled off a huge upset. We can remember seeing Patriot players arrive, walking from one end of the field where their entrance was down the field to the locker room entrance — the media that year was above an end zone. There weren’t many fans there, it was four hours before the game, but there were enough early arrivers to give them a cheer. Who knew we’d see the birth of a dynasty? Oh yeah, we remember getting lost trying to get to the press room on deadline to write the story after the postgame interviews. But we did it.

We left New Orleans a couple of days later – it was always best to leave two days after the game — as the parade floats were lined up in the streets to begin Mardis Gras. Oops, better check to make sure the cab can go to the other side of the hotel.

There’s a lot of stories to recall, and then the concern when Hurricane Katrina hit the city a few years later. We had become an occasional guest in the few years to follow on a New Orleans sports talk radio station and thankfully the talk show hosts there survived.

Monday night there will be the media event, what used to be the crazy Tuesday “Media Day”. Then players will be available on Wednesday and Thursday at the team hotels and that’s it until Sunday.

Giants fans (like yours truly) will have to cover our eyes and ears when Saquon Barkley relives his much publicized departure from Big Blue to its chief rival. Ugh. And of course there will be the usual Patriots-Chiefs comparisons.

Enjoy, New Orleans, and be safe. Your game has returned.

Tom King can be reached at tking@nashuatelegraph.com, or on X at @Telegraph _TomK.