NEW ORLEANS -- On a sunny spring afternoon, as the humidity rises and the temperature creeps toward 80, New Orleanians are enjoying a Sunday in their City Park.

Rowdy young men in shorts and T-shirts play a friendly game of volleyball on the front lawn of the New Orleans Museum of Art. Couples walk hand in hand through a sculpture garden. Fathers push their sons and daughters on the swings of a playground. Families picnic. Joggers pace along the sidewalk.

Isn't this how life is supposed to be?

Less than three years ago, 90 percent of City Park was under water, incurring $43 million in damage when Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans.

Like the rest of New Orleans, the 1,300-acre park still bears scars from the storm. Some sections of the park remain closed. But many of the wide lawns are as green as ever. The botanical garden has reopened. The City Park railroad chugs along narrow tracks, its open cars filled with laughing children. Massive live oaks still drip Spanish moss, a symbol of New Orleans' old beauty.

But this spring, new trees are growing alongside the ancient oaks. They are replacing some of the 1,000 trees lost in the storm. Skinny young crepe myrtles and live oaks flank the road leading to the art museum, attached to stakes by guy wires so they will grow straight.

Although it will be years before these young trees provide much shade, like the volleyball players and picnicking families, they are a powerful symbol of determination.

Little by little -- tree by tree, gallery by gallery, neighborhood by neighborhood -- New Orleans is coming back.

Late in the evening, music and revelers pour out of French Quarter nightclubs. Along bawdy Bourbon Street, where strip clubs, bars and shops with names like the House of Voodoo dominate, high-spirited visitors walk shoulder to shoulder, carrying cocktails in plastic cups and following the energy.

The French Quarter didn't flood in the days after Hurricane Katrina, but like everywhere in New Orleans, it felt the consequences.

''A lot of places closed in the French Quarter even though they weren't affected by the storm. It was because of the lack of tourism,'' said Tony Faia, whose family owns some art galleries on Royal Street, one block south of Bourbon. ``It's a lot better this year because of Mardi Gras and the NBA all-star game (in February). It's noticeable that a lot more people are coming.

``The stock response here, and what everybody is saying, is that the French Quarter is cleaner than it's ever been.''

This spring Faia's family opened a gallery called All Amzie All the Time, showcasing the art of longtime New Orleans artist Amzie Adams.

Adams, 63, is a New Orleans character. His sleeveless black T-shirt features a self-portrait. He wears a black top hat and a Santa Claus beard, and his wire-framed, green-mirrored glasses reflect the image of a skull.

Before Katrina, Adams' work -- he calls it Celtic Tribunal Apocalyptic art -- hung at another gallery on Esplanade Avenue.

''Right before the hurricane, we moved all the art up to the second floor,'' he said. ``We survived Katrina, but then Rita came and blew the roof off. It rained for three days. Everything turned into mold and rot. We lost a lot.''

Adams' home was spared, but he still left town for 2 ½ months.

''I lost a refrigerator because the electricity was off,'' he said. ``I got molded, but my gallery was five blocks away and it got creamed.''

Now he's at home in the new gallery, on a re-emerging street lined with galleries, antique shops, jewelry stores and boutiques.

''Everything here has been done in the last couple of minutes except for one piece from 1977, so that's pretty cool,'' he said.

About New Orleans: ``It's coming back. I'd say it's getting back to abnormal because we're abnormal. There's no other place I can live in the United States.''

For some artists on Royal Street, Katrina has even provided opportunities.

At the Painted Alive gallery, New Orleans native Craig Tracy displays and sells his own distinct art -- body painting. His canvases show subtle nudes that have been painted with images of, among other things, birds, jazz musicians, lizards, flowers and leopards. The focus on the subject is so strong that on many paintings it's hard to tell there's a body there.

The gallery opened two years ago.

''What happened was a lot of mainstream businesses moved out, opening the way for us,'' said Tracy, 40. ``This used to be a dog bakery.''

He says the area has more independent galleries than ever.

``We believe in ourselves I think is the thing. I would guess it's at a halfway point from before the storm. We still have a ways to go, but we're not dead.''

One sign of how far things have come: Tracy's landlord just raised his rent $1,000 a month.

Everybody has a story. It's a unifying element in New Orleans because everybody was affected by Katrina. Of 185 square miles in New Orleans, 145 square miles flooded.

Leah's Pralines, a French Quarter fixture, was closed for three months after the storm, said Kenny Stokes, who operates the family business with his mother, Elna Stokes.

''For a whole year, we didn't pay ourselves,'' Stokes said. ``Business was down 75 percent. Just this spring, business has come back to nearly what it was.''

Carol Strauder, a guide for Gray Line, which offers a Katrina bus tour of New Orleans, was away from the city for only a few weeks. But she said her home had no running water for 11 months.

Bus driver Kevin Dandridge, his fiancee and his extended family were gone for seven months, moving to Nashville, Tenn.; Toledo, Ohio; and Jackson, Miss. They're still living in a FEMA trailer.

Gray Line's Katrina tour, offered since January 2006, is one way visitors learn the stories about what happened to New Orleans. As the bus meanders through neighborhoods, the extent of devastation comes into sharp focus.

''People say a picture is worth a thousand words,'' Strauder said. ``Being here is worth a thousand pictures.''

In some neighborhoods, the sounds of construction create an atmosphere of real progress. New houses are common, many of them built with raised basements to protect their owners from flooding. But they often sit next to houses that remain empty and unrepaired or next to empty lots, where the houses have been torn down. Supermarkets, fast-food restaurants and gas stations remain closed.

Many homeowners have covered over the X's that National Guard members spray-painted on their houses to tell they were there and whether they found any bodies. Some remain, a painful reminder for everyone who passes by.

Even the city's most-blighted areas have bright spots. About 70 colorful Musicians Village homes are going up in the Ninth Ward, where floodwaters pushed homes off their foundations and crashed them into one another. The new houses, built by Habitat for Humanity, were conceived by musicians Harry Connick Jr. and Branford Marsalis. Actor Brad Pitt also has been leading efforts to rebuild the Ninth Ward.

The Katrina tours -- $35 for three hours -- have come under sharp criticism from people who think the tour company is taking advantage of a tragedy.

Not so, insists Gray Line's Strauder. For many visitors, the tours are the only way to really understand what happened.

''What we do is education,'' she said. 'We educate people. A lot of people get off the bus and say, `I just did not realize.' ''

New Orleans likes happy endings.

''In New Orleans we dance when we die,'' said Quint Davis, producer of the annual Jazz and Heritage Festival. ``You cannot stop us from dancing.''

So you can imagine the celebration when the penguins returned.

The Audubon Aquarium of the Americas, a gleaming green-glass structure on the banks of the Mississippi, should have been safe from the hurricane.

''The building had some roof damage and we lost some windows, but we did not flood,'' said the aquarium's Melissa Lee.

``We had staff staying during the storm. We have a very comprehensive hurricane plan. But then the police came and told the staff they had to leave because they could no longer protect them.''

Staff members left on Wednesday after the hurricane and returned as soon as they could -- Sunday. By then the temperature inside was more than 100 degrees and the generators, which produced air for the aquariums, had clogged.

''The first thing they did was to run through the building and triage what they could,'' Lee said. But it was too late for most of the fish.

``Some estimates are that between 7,500 and 10,000 animals were lost. . . . Anything that could breathe air or gulp air survived. About 90 percent did not.''

Among exceptions were some tarpon, birds, sea otters and the penguins.

''In the penguin exhibit they counted 19 little heads staring back at them,'' Lee said.

The penguins and otters eventually were shipped to the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California, where they were taken care of for nine months.

''Then they were FedExed back. We chartered a FedEx jet to carry 19 penguins, two otters, two sea-otter keepers, a veterinarian and the pilots. It was all at FedEx's expense,'' Lee said.

``When the truck pulled up, there were hundreds of people out on the plaza just to see the penguins. Because it was something happy.''

The aquarium reopened in 2006. Today its tanks are filled with fish from all over the world -- and from aquariums throughout the country.

''We had a lot of zoos and aquariums send us fish after the storm,'' Lee said. ``The school of blue runners came from the Tennessee Aquarium. The stingrays came from Sea World. Some of the others came from the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago and the Mall of America.''

Visitation remains slightly lower than before but is on the rise. Lee said she's especially gratified by the reaction of New Orleanians.

``A lot of locals have come back, many because they thought they had lost their aquarium. ... People want to be here. This is a happy place.''

THINGS TO DO

• Gray Line Tours. Three-hour tours explore devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. $35 for adults, $28 for children. Other bus and walking tours available. 800-535-7786 or www.graylineneworleans.com.

• The Audubon Aquarium of the Americas, 1 Canal St. Tickets cost $17.50 for adults, $10.50 for children age 2-12, $13.50 for seniors 65 and older. Ask about combo tickets that include admission to the IMAX theater at the aquarium or the Audubon Zoo. The aquarium is closed most Mondays. 800-774-7394, www.auduboninstitute.org.

• On Friday the Audubon Institute opened the Audubon Insectarium at the Historic Custom House, 423 Canal St. It features more than 75 live animal exhibits and thousands of mounted specimens. www.auduboninstitute.org.

• The National World War II Museum, 945 Magazine St., which opened in 2000, is undergoing an expansion that will quadruple its size. Admission is $14 for adults; $8 for seniors 65 and older and students with ID; $6 for children 12 and younger or active or retired military and spouse with ID; free for children younger than 5 or military in uniform. 504-527-6012 or www.nationalww2museum.org.

• The 1,300-acre City Park, one of the largest municipal parks in the country, is home to, among other things, the New Orleans Museum of Art. For museum info, see www.noma.org or call 504-658-4100. For more on City Park, see www.neworleanscitypark.com. For an authentic New Orleans experience, ride a streetcar from Canal Street to the park. The fare is $1.25.

• Royal Street, a block south of Bourbon Street in the French Quarter, is filled with art galleries, antiques shops and boutiques. All Amzie All the Time, 832 Royal St., features the works of longtime New Orleans artist Amzie Adams. 504-872-9232, www.allamzieallthetime.com.

Across the street, the Painted Alive Gallery, 827 Royal St., showcases the body painting works of New Orleans native Craig Tracy. 504-592-9886, www.paintedalive.com.

INFORMATION: New Orleans Tourism Marketing Corp., 504-524-4784 or www.neworleansonline.com.

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