We travelled from New York to Washington by rail - comfortable,you don't have to sit for hours - well - three, and best of all, we arrive at Washington's beautiful Union Station!
When it opened in 1907, it was the largest Railway station in the world. And so beautifully constructed that it looks like an upmarket Shopping Centre.
Washington, the city area around the White House, is spacious - wide streets and footpaths. All the commercial buildings are around the same height, and mostly plain and square, with a few exceptions - mainly some older buidings. Monuments are everywhere - statues, buildings, plaques but the streets are not named after people - they are numbered!! And Washingtonian designers seemed to like pillars, - many of the government buildings feature these. More about these when I get my pics up.
Our most favoured place we visited during our brief visit was the Smithsonian Museum of Air and Space - everything you could imagine about those topics were featured - including moonstone which you could touch, rockets, and some stunning art by Alan Bean - one of the first Astronauts on the moon.
We then visited the Museum of Natural History. You may recall the "Night at the Museum" movies - you can actually spend evenings there but I do not know if the animals come alive. I kept looking over my shoulder waiting for Robin Williams to appear on his horse...
One of the most recent museums to open in Washington was the National Museum of the American Indian. Housed in a beautiful purpose built building the museum tells of the struggles and survival of the Indian peoples - very touching, forthright and forgiving. The whole place is a work of art.
Like many cities, Washington pulled down many old buildings until their history and heritage was realized. The Old Post Office, thanks to a very outspoken Lady called Nancy Hanks rallied around and saved it. Today it is a well maintained and dramatic multipurpose building, and visitors may ascend to the clock tower and have a view of the city - which is not a view to die for - but the building is worth the visit!!
So after the necessary tours around the Capitol, Lincoln and Korean Monuments the Reflecting Pool and the War Memorials it was time to travel back by rail to NewYork
Showing posts with label statues. Show all posts
Showing posts with label statues. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Our winter Adventure in Rome
Today was the day we booked to see the Sistine Chapel in Rome. I will find out the website, but there is one on which you book the time and date.
This morning we took the local bus to the meeting point, outside where a tour organiser checked our tickets - there were about 20 of us, and took us over to the main entrance.
There I had a bit of a surprise. Instead of a chapel, which I had assumed that was all we would see, we were at the Vatican Museum, or series of Museums. Our guide checked us in, gave us maps, made a couple of brief explanations, then told us that we were on our own!
So off we went. Along corridors, into rooms, and more corridors, long hallways, rooms within rooms within rooms. The Vatican has museums of everything!! Museums of art, sculpture, modern religious arts, mosaics, animal statues, maps.....
The Vatican has recently turned 500 years old. According to wikipedia, there are 54 galleries, or salsas, and the visitor route through the museum takes one through almost every one. Naturally the Sistine Chapel is at the very end, so we saw many other famous and beautiful items, including many paintings and frescos by Raphael. has a detailed writeup of all the famous items here. After our visit, which took a leisurely two hours we went around to St. Peter's Square and Basilica. We spent a little time wandering in the peaceful square and inside the basillica, in which there is a lot to see - and well worth it - we spent a considerable time in the cathedral when we were here several years ago.
The best thing about our visit to Rome this time, was that being winter, there were not many people about. So we saw everything in the museum and churches at our leisure. Just imagine trying to see everything while shuffling along in a huge queue!! No thanks....
We spent the rest of the day strolling and bussing around Rome, enjoying a the Pantheon and the beautiful Trevi fountains. Again, we could do so at our leisure, without pushing through crowds and joining queues.
Then it was off to stroll along the Tiber River. Oh look - are they flowers on the riverside trees? In the middle of winter? Oh, no, its not flowers, it is hundreds of plastic bags and rubbish - all caught in the trees during the recent flooding. And its a good thing we decided not to to do a riverboat tour - the Wharf is all smashed to bits!!
Never mind, I might check out the shops instead - are the winter sales still on??
This morning we took the local bus to the meeting point, outside where a tour organiser checked our tickets - there were about 20 of us, and took us over to the main entrance.
There I had a bit of a surprise. Instead of a chapel, which I had assumed that was all we would see, we were at the Vatican Museum, or series of Museums. Our guide checked us in, gave us maps, made a couple of brief explanations, then told us that we were on our own!
So off we went. Along corridors, into rooms, and more corridors, long hallways, rooms within rooms within rooms. The Vatican has museums of everything!! Museums of art, sculpture, modern religious arts, mosaics, animal statues, maps.....
The Vatican has recently turned 500 years old. According to wikipedia, there are 54 galleries, or salsas, and the visitor route through the museum takes one through almost every one. Naturally the Sistine Chapel is at the very end, so we saw many other famous and beautiful items, including many paintings and frescos by Raphael. has a detailed writeup of all the famous items here. After our visit, which took a leisurely two hours we went around to St. Peter's Square and Basilica. We spent a little time wandering in the peaceful square and inside the basillica, in which there is a lot to see - and well worth it - we spent a considerable time in the cathedral when we were here several years ago.
The best thing about our visit to Rome this time, was that being winter, there were not many people about. So we saw everything in the museum and churches at our leisure. Just imagine trying to see everything while shuffling along in a huge queue!! No thanks....
We spent the rest of the day strolling and bussing around Rome, enjoying a the Pantheon and the beautiful Trevi fountains. Again, we could do so at our leisure, without pushing through crowds and joining queues.
Then it was off to stroll along the Tiber River. Oh look - are they flowers on the riverside trees? In the middle of winter? Oh, no, its not flowers, it is hundreds of plastic bags and rubbish - all caught in the trees during the recent flooding. And its a good thing we decided not to to do a riverboat tour - the Wharf is all smashed to bits!!
Never mind, I might check out the shops instead - are the winter sales still on??
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Winter Holiday in Florence and more about Museums.
Gosh, I am so please that we decided to spend some of our Italain Winter Holiday in Florenza!
Here is was a little warmer than during our stays at Milano and Venice and it was very pleasant exploring the streets. Even though the skies were clear and the sun was shining, I have to say, I felt a little claustrophobic. I suspect it was because the sun was low, being winter, and it did not reach the streets. Also there are not many open spaces in the city centre. But we did note that a large area, near to the railway station was being refurbished.
There is not much traffic in Florenza - some of the streets are for walking only, while others seemed to be for servcive vehicles only. In fact when we viewed the city from the top of the Duomo belltower,which was over 400 steps to get there, it was apparent that the limited traffic zone extended for quite a large area. So it was ideal for exloring the city on foot, and to admire the old, but very neat and tidy variety of buildings. It was interesting to note that on some of the older buildings, all of which seemed to be in perfectly restored condition, had areas of the outer walls exposed so we could view the construction methods.
More by accident than by design, we ended up spending a lot ot time in museums during our stay in Florence,
We had made a reservation to view the Galleria at the Uffuzi Palace, and it took all morning to view the beautiful artworks on display. Most had been restored, as had a good part of the building.There was an interesting Exhibtion by Giovanni Francesco (Guecino) - 1591 - 1666, of his sketches and watercolours in brown wash.
Artwork in the Gallerail had been collected since the 17th century by the Medusa family, and feature was a special Medusa exhitibition was the famous Medusa Head with the snakes emerging from it.
We also visited the Museo d'ell Opera di Santa Maria del Torre, then a museum dedicated to the history of the Duomo. It has been in existance since 1891.
Even though the first stone was laid in 1296, the facade was not finished until the early 1900's due to various political reasons over the years. Many architects submitted designs for the facade, all of which were on display. There were also many statues and artifacts all of which were in the Duomo at some time or other.
Michangelo and Brunelleschi were two of the many famous artists who worked on the Duomo during its 700 years of construction.
We visited the Accadamea where the statue of 'David' resides, along with his 4 unfinished slaves. The Accadamea had much of the art collected during thte Medusa Dynasty, including a musical instrument collection and the worlds oldest violin. The exhibition was great until we entered a large hall chocker full of replicas of statues, including hundreds of busts lining the very high walls! A bit of overkill, we felt, as we quickly wandered through and on to other things.
Before I move away from talking about exhibtitions and museums, I have to repeat that there were few few people and tour groups around, so we could see everything at our leisure, in particular, the statue of David, around which everyone would spend hours gazing at. Winter is such a great time to do the 'indoors' of European Cities - museums are warm and comfortable.
As in all the other cities we visited during this winter holiday, the winter sales were on and lots of people were shopping. But that is another story.....
Here is was a little warmer than during our stays at Milano and Venice and it was very pleasant exploring the streets. Even though the skies were clear and the sun was shining, I have to say, I felt a little claustrophobic. I suspect it was because the sun was low, being winter, and it did not reach the streets. Also there are not many open spaces in the city centre. But we did note that a large area, near to the railway station was being refurbished.
There is not much traffic in Florenza - some of the streets are for walking only, while others seemed to be for servcive vehicles only. In fact when we viewed the city from the top of the Duomo belltower,which was over 400 steps to get there, it was apparent that the limited traffic zone extended for quite a large area. So it was ideal for exloring the city on foot, and to admire the old, but very neat and tidy variety of buildings. It was interesting to note that on some of the older buildings, all of which seemed to be in perfectly restored condition, had areas of the outer walls exposed so we could view the construction methods.
More by accident than by design, we ended up spending a lot ot time in museums during our stay in Florence,
We had made a reservation to view the Galleria at the Uffuzi Palace, and it took all morning to view the beautiful artworks on display. Most had been restored, as had a good part of the building.There was an interesting Exhibtion by Giovanni Francesco (Guecino) - 1591 - 1666, of his sketches and watercolours in brown wash.
Artwork in the Gallerail had been collected since the 17th century by the Medusa family, and feature was a special Medusa exhitibition was the famous Medusa Head with the snakes emerging from it.
We also visited the Museo d'ell Opera di Santa Maria del Torre, then a museum dedicated to the history of the Duomo. It has been in existance since 1891.
Even though the first stone was laid in 1296, the facade was not finished until the early 1900's due to various political reasons over the years. Many architects submitted designs for the facade, all of which were on display. There were also many statues and artifacts all of which were in the Duomo at some time or other.
Michangelo and Brunelleschi were two of the many famous artists who worked on the Duomo during its 700 years of construction.
We visited the Accadamea where the statue of 'David' resides, along with his 4 unfinished slaves. The Accadamea had much of the art collected during thte Medusa Dynasty, including a musical instrument collection and the worlds oldest violin. The exhibition was great until we entered a large hall chocker full of replicas of statues, including hundreds of busts lining the very high walls! A bit of overkill, we felt, as we quickly wandered through and on to other things.
Before I move away from talking about exhibtitions and museums, I have to repeat that there were few few people and tour groups around, so we could see everything at our leisure, in particular, the statue of David, around which everyone would spend hours gazing at. Winter is such a great time to do the 'indoors' of European Cities - museums are warm and comfortable.
As in all the other cities we visited during this winter holiday, the winter sales were on and lots of people were shopping. But that is another story.....
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Travelling to St Petersburg - best time to holiday in Russia
I know you all thought we were mad to visit St Petersburg in the winter. And maybe, after reading this, you may still think so. However, I still recommend travelling to St Petersberg at this time, especially when there is snow about.
Sure, when you visit the Summer Palace of Katherine and other museums in winter you won't see the beautiful marble statues outside, because they will be covered up by wooden casings, to protect them from the cold. But there are plenty of photos of them about. And you won't see the gardens and parks either because they will be blanketet with pristine white snow, and trees will be black, and outlined with white. The fountains will not be going either. There will be no blue skies or much colour outside, apart from various shades of grey, white, light brown or black, which gives everything a dramatic, winter look. And colours of the beautiful old buildings will feature in pale pastels in the winter palette.
But there will be no queueing for 2 hours outside anywhere, no shuffling along in huge crowds and no noisy tour groups. Instead you will be able to gaze at all the beautiful areas inside the palace and other St Petersburg museums and palaces at your leisure,with no interruptions. You will be scrutinised by security guards in every room, disguised as short square bodied, middle aged women, plainly dressed, except for the ones at the Hermitage Museum and Russian Art Galleries. They are better áttired, as apparently these are the places where one can 'catch' a man. Inside all the buildings it is very warm, perhaps a bit too warm for those of us who are not used to the extremes of freezing outdoors and hot indoors.
I strongly believe that the cathedrals, museums and palaces in St Peters burg are best visited in winter. The beautiful buildings are warm and stunning inside. Outside the colours are dramatic and the magic rather surreal. In addition the snow, cold and dramatic colours gives you a better sense of Russia, and the tumultuous journeys its people have been through until today.
Sure, when you visit the Summer Palace of Katherine and other museums in winter you won't see the beautiful marble statues outside, because they will be covered up by wooden casings, to protect them from the cold. But there are plenty of photos of them about. And you won't see the gardens and parks either because they will be blanketet with pristine white snow, and trees will be black, and outlined with white. The fountains will not be going either. There will be no blue skies or much colour outside, apart from various shades of grey, white, light brown or black, which gives everything a dramatic, winter look. And colours of the beautiful old buildings will feature in pale pastels in the winter palette.
But there will be no queueing for 2 hours outside anywhere, no shuffling along in huge crowds and no noisy tour groups. Instead you will be able to gaze at all the beautiful areas inside the palace and other St Petersburg museums and palaces at your leisure,with no interruptions. You will be scrutinised by security guards in every room, disguised as short square bodied, middle aged women, plainly dressed, except for the ones at the Hermitage Museum and Russian Art Galleries. They are better áttired, as apparently these are the places where one can 'catch' a man. Inside all the buildings it is very warm, perhaps a bit too warm for those of us who are not used to the extremes of freezing outdoors and hot indoors.
I strongly believe that the cathedrals, museums and palaces in St Peters burg are best visited in winter. The beautiful buildings are warm and stunning inside. Outside the colours are dramatic and the magic rather surreal. In addition the snow, cold and dramatic colours gives you a better sense of Russia, and the tumultuous journeys its people have been through until today.
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