8-20-11 Kenilworth Gardens & Franciscan Monastery

Probably our last weekend for touring. We picked two places that we had heard something about but they had not been on the list. The first was the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens, on the east side of DC, by the Anacostia river. We got an early start but it was already hot when we got to the place. It is many acres of ponds with various types of water plants growing. The growth is very lush, with huge fields of water lilies. We say several animals and insects and lots of flowers. The cicadas were truly deafening and their sounds would come in waves. We spent about 2 hours there. It wasn't quite a get-away - civilization noises could intrude, but when they were quiet, no planes were flying overhead, and the bugs sounded off, it did feel like one was in the middle of boonies.

After the gardens we went to another out of the way place that took us awhile to find. This was the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land. It is in a residential neighborhood. There is a large church, an attached museum/shrine and a large outdoor garden area. The church is on cathedral-scale. The attached museum area is devoted to the holy land, with replicas of the shrine that is the tomb of Christ, Calvary and several other events/places. There is also a replica of the Catacombs. Outdoors, the garden are is sunken below the level of the church and has a replica of Lourdes, and other miraculous places. Very interesting.

8-17-11 Scottish Rite Masonic Temple

Today the NA22 folks had a lunch for me. Jan Cerveny gave me my clock and certificate. I said my thanks. The end is near.

After the lunch, Sue and I went to see one of the more intriguing sites in DC - the Scottish Rite Masonic Temple. This is the place that featured in the final scenes of Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. It is a fascinating place. The interior was set up like the Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, at least on the first floor. But this place had a large magnificent meeting room for the gatherings. The table in the center of the room that figured so crucially in the book, was covered with religious books from around the world. Overhead was the skylight talked about in the book. It was a very interesting visit and one I am glad we did before we left town.

8-13-11 Pope-Leighy House & Woodlawn

A grey day and we are looking for something to do and maybe some things to check off. During our trips south, I had seen that there were two historic houses close to us but we hadn't stopped there yet, so that's what we did. The Woodlawn mansion just off of Hwy 1 by the Gristmill is part of Washington's properties. He gave this to his nephew and his bride. It was designed by the same person that designed the Capital building. It is a bit run down but still interesting. And it was a grey day. Sold out of the Washington line, it developed into a place where blacks were shown by the Quakers how to be farmers before the Civil War. And during the Civil War, it was an island in the South, surrounded by hostile parties.

Close by is a Frank Lloyd Wright house, called the Pope-Leighy, after the people that owned it. The story goes that the person who commissioned it (Pope) was fairly well off but FLW could bust any one's budget and was adamant about not cutting corners. Wright did agree to scale back some things but they still wound up spending much more that they thought they would. It is a very small house, only 1200 square feet. Sue thought it was claustrophobic particularly in the bedrooms, The main room was very open with lots of light (or there would have been light if it hadn't been drizzling outside). The house had been in Falls Church and was moved here when a main road project threatened it. In the picture below you can see the trademary FLW designs over the windows.

Two interesting items. Check, check.

8-6-11 Plymouth, Back to DC

We had been debating for the past two days what to do with this day. The plane back to Baltimore doesn't leave until 7pm. We had talked about going to Plymouth but it just isn't that far away. I had a bad stomach in the morning and Sue was not feeling so hot either. So we dismissed the idea we had yesterday of getting a late start after a pancake breakfast at Pancake Man. I proposed we cover the one section of the Cape we had not been to, the southwest corner. So off we went at about 8. We got hungry as we drove but couldn't find anyplace to eat - other than Dunkin Donuts which now seemed to be every mile along Hwy 28. Finally Samantha (the Garmin) told us about a place called Cape Cod Bagels in Falmouth. Got there about 9:30 - it was very crowded but this is the sort of place we had been looking for. Had a good breakfast and bought lunch bagels and a muffin for later.

Drove into Falmouth and towards Woods Hole and soon realized that this was the place to come back to spend some time. The town is very nice, the downtown is very reminiscent of Alexandria, but not touristy at all - probably the influence of all the high end earners at Woods Hole. We drove out to the Nobska Point Light to get some pictures and see what the beaches looked like. I thought they were good for walking - Sue wasn't so sure. Drove into Woods Hole, around the community and stopped to see the NOAA free Aquarium. It was 10:30 and it didn't open until 11 so we walked to the visitor center for MBL - the Marine Biological Laboratory. This is one of five private or public funded organizations doing research here. Got some stuff at the shop ( a shirt for Gavin). Back to tour the small NOAA aquarium. While there, we saw this clever picture about Global Warming.

Then off for Plymouth - I decided to forgo the lighthouse on the western shore (Great Neck) - I had read it was private and a rental and was not sure how close at all I could get to it. Sue was worried about having time to see Plymouth and get to the airport if there was a traffic mess. So we pushed on - we did run into traffic when we got to the Canal, and it was both onto and off of the Cape. Figured that a lot of people must rent places from Saturday to Saturday and thus leave on Sat like we are doing. We pulled into Plymouth at about 12:30. Walked around, ate our lunch, saw the Rock (what a comedy of errors that story is), walked through the park. It was pretty warm again and the humidity was back up. We left at 2pm.

The drive to the airport was no problem, got there about 3:30 - drove on the the Warwick Mall to kill some time. Sue said this "Mall" reminded her of Anchorage. Pretty small. We got a Subway sandwich for dinner, found a gas station for the car and got to the airport at about 4:30. Bought shakes and had our lunch. Flew back to Baltimore - rough ride on the way - the crew didn't have to serve anything due to turbulence. Cloudy weather.

8-5-2011 Nantucket

Very early day. We were at the parking lot for the Nantucket ferry at 6:30. The ferry boarded at about 7 and we ate the yogurt, muffins, bananas we had brought. There were maybe 150 to 200 people on board. The ferry we were on was the slow one and the fast ferry passed it on the way over. I got pictures of lighthouses as we left the harbor. There was one right in the harbor but it was not clear if it was just part of the house next to it, like a decoration, or an old out-of-service light. I'll look it up when I get home. Saw a huge three legged mast or pole in the open water, far off in the distance. Read my book some. Wish I had brought the laptop since there was free Wi-Fi. The trip took 2 1/2 hours.

The Brandt Point lighthouse was on the way into Nantucket Harbor. When we got off the boat we rented bikes right away, being worried that they might be gone later - not a concern, it turns out. We rode off - both of us had baskets on the front - and stopped at the post office so Sue could mail a card to the boys. Getting out of Nantucket was very sporty - dangerous even. While the bike paths between towns on the island are very nice, they do not extend into town or the little communities. And the roads are very narrow. It was scary.

We rode the trail to Sconset. No water - we had forgotten to get a bottle before we left. It was hot and sunny but there was a nice breeze. We made it fine (though Sue's bike was in bad shape - very bad brakes and the gear shift didn't work in third so she had to pedal like mad). I got a cup of water from a nice waitress in a cafe in Sconset and we found a place to buy water also. Rode around the little community, very quiet, very much a beach town. The beaches here were also narrow - we didn't walk on them. Sue spotted a little yellow songbird - found out later it was a male Bullfinch.

It took us a awhile to find the next bike trail - we had a map but it didn't quite square with the real world and there were no directions. Stopped to take a picture of the Sankaty Head Light - couldn't get close without doubling back on a road so I took pictures from the bike path, across a golf course. We stopped next at the LifeSaving Museum - to make a potty stop we paid the $10 admission. It was worth it! The museum was very small - all about the US Life Saving Service that rescued people (and dogs) from shipwrecks in the Nantucket shoals. Found the story of how the Lightship Nantucket (#117) (the replica ship that we had seen in Newport harbor - you can see the small model below the lifesaver) had been sliced in half in the fog by one of the Titanic class ships - the Olympic. The lightship had many close calls - its job was to anchor in the fog bank and warn off these huge ships. 7 people died in the wreck.

We rode back into town and walked our bikes in the final 6 blocks. By this time it was 2:00 so we stopped and had lunch - Sue had a hamburger, I had a grilled bass sandwich and a local brew. We next walked up the Main Street, with all the little high-end shops. Then up into the local houses - most very old and large. The streets were tree lined and it was most pleasant. We noticed that many of these houses had slats on the front and shake shingles on the other sides of the house. Some houses were all shingle sided. There were many houses with widow's walks on the roofs - turns out they were up there to allow chimney fires to be put out by pouring water down the chimney - I'll bet that was a mess.

We walked out to the Brandt Point lighthouse in the harbor and took pics. Then walked back to town - it was really hot now. Stopped for ice cream and then went over to the ferry pier to wait for the 6:00 fast boat back to Hyannis. The ride back was very fast, seemed like less than an hour. - We really liked Nantucket - it was quaint, had a really nice downtown (but pretty touristy), pretty streets, wide open spaces outside of town.

After getting off the ferry we walked to the parking lot, drove to the hotel to make sure we got a new room for the extra night and then went in search of dinner. We both felt full and vowed we would only eat lightly. We had done so last night and then wound up pigging out. We went to Skippy's Pier 1 which was a fairly nice place. We both had Clam Chowder and salad. Sue had a big bowl and I had a bread bowl. Sue pointed out the soup was really rich - just can't win. The salad was just iceberg lettuce, with two baby tomatoes and two zucchini strips. Jeez. While we didn't pig out, we both had indigestion later. Best of intentions.