Vermeer Road Trip Day 3

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January 17, 2014

We were up about 8am and had a very hearty breakfast. Embassy Suites does a good job and we made breakfast and lunch of it! We went back up and brushed our teeth, packed and checked out. We put our bags in the trunk of the car and then came up the elevator back through the atrium and out into the cold for the long walk to the Metro station at Dupont Circle.

We hadn't done any homework and didn't find buying Metro tickets as intuitive as we had remembered it being before. Also prices had gone way up! We ended up wasting about $1.60 each on Metro tickets. That was annoying. Also, we followed the directions of the woman at the Embassy Suites desk and walked about 45 minutes instead of the 20 minutes we remembered and expected. This is what comes of winging it! Or having all your prep work stored on the Internet when there is none available to you or it is too slow or you have the wrong device, etc. Anyway.

The National Gallery of Art is free! It opens at 10am. So, we were in no hurry anyway. I believe the Metro rides cost us about $2.60 or $2.80 pp each way. We arrived and departed at 2 different stations near the Mall. We got there shortly after it opened and saw our last 4 Vermeers of the trip. We quickly went through the Impressionists after that, had a look at the Dying Gaul on loan from Rome and left.

We walked over to have a look at the Capitol and stumbled on the National Law Enforcement Memorial on the way to the closest Metro station. We rode the Metro back to Dupont Circle arriving just as the giant up escalator broke. We squeezed into the tiny elevator with the mob and started our chilly walk back to the car.

I won't bore you with the nightmare of the GPS's Miss Bossypants latest misdirection disaster, but we circled downtown DC/Georgetown aimlessly for over an hour before finally finding our way out and across the river headed for I-95 south. This is what comes of not using maps! There was no good reason for it. Clay is accepting the blame for this catastrophe, but I put it squarely on Miss Bossypants.

As we headed down the Interstate, Clay asked me to use Road Ninja to find somewhere to eat. I blame slow Internet on his smartphone (or else it was operator error!), but I couldn't find anything useful on there. Realizing finally that our speed was greater than that of the flow of information (which is usually a problem in situations like this!), Clay asked me to just find a restaurant in Rocky Mount where we would change highways. The first place I brought up had Philly Cheesesteak on the menu and I was in! It was Highway Diner. I keyed the address into the GPS and although I could see it was one exit back from I-95 on 64, Miss Bossypants got us off the Interstate early and drove us through the country side aimlessly to get there. Another GPS fail as far as I am concerned. I enjoyed another cheesesteak (this time with American cheese, but still good!) and Clay had fried fish. We both stuffed ourselves with huge portions and then pigged out by sharing an enormous slice of Red Velvet Cake. Delicious and an excellent stop. We filled up the gas tank and headed for home. We got back a little before 5pm.

It was a whirlwind tour of East Coast Vermeers and an excellent road trip.

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Vermeer Road Trip Day 2

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January 16, 2014

We have another busy day before us. Since it is Thursday, sadly the Guggenheim is closed. We hadn't take it into account when we planned this trip, not realizing how nearby it was and that it is a Frank Lloyd Wright building. We had hoped to just make a quick buzz through, but here is the exterior anyway.

We were up about 7am and went down to the included continental breakfast by 8am. It was adequate. We went back upstairs and brushed our teeth, packed and then checked out and left our bags for pickup later.

We set off with the Guggenheim our first stop. The Metropolitan Museum of Art doesn't open until 10am anyway. So, we had some time to kill. We got there early and got in a line of other early arrivers to await entry and buy our tickets. Museum tickets are expensive! Lucky that Clay is a senior and saving us a little money. The Met was another beautiful building. We decided to limit ourselves to just a few items of interest beyond the collection's Vermeers so we wouldn't wander in there all day! We went first to the Vermeers. Then to the Temple of Dendur. A Roman temple from Egypt that was a gift from that country to ours when it would have been lost to the Aswan Dam project. Amazing! Beautiful installation! To the Impressionists for Clay and then the Gift Shop on our way out. I got a crazy detailed jigsaw puzzle of the museum.

Mission accomplished for NYC. We have viewed 9 Vermeers in the last 24 hours. Now on to Philadelphia for Vermeer number 10 and cheese steak sandwiches!

So, in no time at all we were back to The Franklin picking up our luggage and car and on our way to Philadelphia. We decided to try to spend the night tonight in Washington, DC. See the Vermeers at the National Gallery tomorrow and get on home. There are new winter weather advisories out for the East Coast and it looks like the nice, though colder weather will not hold through the weekend.

We were at the Philadelphia Museum of Art by midafternoon. We parked out front and walked up all the steps! They were in sets of 13. How odd is that? There was a Rocky statue out front too which was funny. Clay reenacted the scene at the top of the stairs on our way out. We saw our Vermeer #10 and some modern art before leaving. I was delighted to find Duchamp's fountain/urinal! Who knew Philly had a very large Marcel Duchamp collection? Surprise! We asked a couple of door guards about where to find a Philly cheesesteak nearby and got a great recommendation for City View on Spring Garden. Too far to walk, but we have the car. So, off we went, starving!

It was easy to find City View and we found onstreet parking about a block away. We each got an enormous sandwich and we devoured them. Clay got his with onions and provolone. I got mine without and with the traditional Cheese Whiz. Mine was better than Clay's. The Cheese Whiz is the key! We can't wait to try making these at home.

We set off for the longer than expected drive into DC. We used Clay's smartphone to make a reservation at the Embassy Suites near Dupont Circle because it was the only place we could remember being reasonably priced and conveniently located that we had stayed at before. It was still more expensive than NYC, but it was a LOT bigger room and better breakfast too! We got in about 8pm, missing the complimentary cocktail hour once again. Once checked in and parked, we crashed into bed. Our room was very conveniently located near the elevators on the 2nd floor. We could leave the car parked in their underground garage for up to 24 hours for the extra $42 parking fee! I should point out that it was more reasonably priced the last time we were here, before the Ritz Carlton opened on the next corner! I guess the neighborhood was more marginal then and much more upscale now and the prices reflect it.

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Vermeer Road Trip

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January 15, 2014

This trip came about because of a New York Times article that Clay read and shared with me before Christmas. Now the main reason for the trip was Girl with a Pearl Earring because it would be leaving the USA after January 19, 2014. We missed it when it spent a month in Atlanta last September! But, as the article pointed out, there were going to be 14 of 36 known works by Vermeer on the East Coast until January 19th 2014. We were in. Now we just had to wait for a clear & nice few weather days to occur in January! I still remember when there were 20 Vermeers at the National Gallery in DC during the winter of 1995-1996 and we missed that due to a combination of bad weather and government shut downs. I got out my big hardback book of the catalog from that show which was my Christmas present that year and wallowed and waited.

We finally picked the 15th to drive up to NYC to start with Girl with a Pearl Earring at The Frick. It was a string of fairly clear and warm winter days sandwiched between winter storms. Lucky! We set out about 3am and drove in heavy traffic from southern Virginia all the way to The Franklin Hotel on East 87th Street. We found a parking space in a garage almost directly across the street. Lucky again. It was $39 for 22 hours, plus they tore a good sized gouge in the rear bumper while they had the car. The Franklin was great for us for one night at a base rate of $168 that ended up being $208.28 for the night. We got the last room, 96, at the end of the hall on the top floor. They have an antique Otis elevator so it was cool. The room was advertised as 200 sq. ft. which makes us question our booking of Oceania's Insignia at 216 sq. ft. for 6 months next year! But, that's another story for another day. The room was small but adequate with a shower over full size tub that beyond having no where to sit and open our suitcases was the weak point due to a billowing clinging shower curtain. It included a complimentary evening cocktail hour, which we missed. And a complimentary continental breakfast which we enjoyed. There was a complimentary 24 hour coffee/tea machine available in the same space that was nice.

We stopped once on the way up for gas and I used the restroom in Maryland and then we stopped again and ate breakfast. We ate at Friendly's in Crofton, MD. It was disappointing and the place was nearly empty. We got to The Franklin on the Upper East Side by early afternoon. They didn't have rooms ready but did let us check in and they took our bags. We walked to The Frick at 70th and Fifth Ave. It was a very upscale neighborhood and beyond the gourmet food shops and Starbucks shops we didn't see a place for dinner later and made a mental note to take a different route back.

We arrived at The Frick around 2pm and were directed around the corner of 5th to get in line. The line was about a block long and we were in it for about an hour. We got tickets for 3:40pm, but they let us in immediately. It was crazy crowded. But, mission accomplished. The building was beautiful and it would have been nice to spend more time in there but, it was so crowded that we saw the rest of the special exhibition and finally found the 3 other Vermeers in the collection and the gift shops and left. Clay got a very cool rock star world tour type t-shirt and I got a coffee mug. I also got a Starbucks New York City mug. One of the new style that looks like colorful collages of cities. I don't really like these and wish they had kept the old style. Plus I like the size and shape of those better. Anyway. 13 hours after we left home, we left The Frick with our primary goal accomplished. Girl with a Pearl earring is a stunning work of art. The literature inserted in my souvenir mug describes it as a type of painting known as a "tronie". It is a painting of a face usually sporting some type of exotic costume. I didn't know that before. I knew Girl with a Pearl Earring was unusually for the stark undetailed background that is in most Vermeers but I didn't know it was a style of painting with a name.

We did take a different route back to The Franklin along Lexington and at 73rd and came upon Casimir & Co., a French bistro. It was small and warm and quiet and we went right in and were told to seat ourselves anywhere.  We did and eventually we ordered drinks and got menus. I think we arrived at the shift change for the evening and as we were the only customers not seated at the bar, we got overlooked and forgotten before being shuffled among waiters. It was fine as we eventually ate and we weren't in any hurry anyway. Clay had the steak frites and I had roasted chicken with garlic mashed potatoes. It was more than we could finish, especially mine. But, Clay ordered us a floating island to share for dessert anyway. It was light! We walked on back to The Franklin and an early bedtime since we had such an early start. We were without Clay's camera all day today since it was in his suitcase. Sorry! Below are some photos of our hotel room, #96 The Franklin.

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Belated Happy New Year

I can't believe how long it has taken me to get to this. I have no good excuse. Here is January 2014 nearly gone. I am posting about our December trip to Florida for the holidays. We were gone 2 weeks. We started out renaming the trip the BAH run for all the Big Ass Holes in the pavement of I-95 through South Carolina. Not only an acronym, but also the noise that you make when the car hits one at 60mph! Traffic was heavy in both directions of the trip, going down in December and returning on January 3rd.

We had a good trip with great weather and really enjoyed our stay and had enough time to also relax. We ate out a lot. We shopped a lot. Matt gave the most generous and thoughtful Christmas gifts this year. He gave Mom new large clay pots for beside her garage. He gave Clay and I a Go Pro 3 Hero Black camera. It is packed with an amazing amount of features in such a small package! We used to shoot video at the Naples New Year's Eve fireworks, which were amazing. We tried it out underwater on a walk at Bonita Nature Place, which is a new trail along the Imperial River. Pretty cool!

Our last Sunday was a rainy day and rather than sit inside, we took a trip up to visit Judy, Mom's travel buddy in Lake Placid. We learned that Lake Placid was voted most interesting town. I don't know about that but I believe they surely most have the most public art per capita in America. It was a good day even with the rain.

Next up, Vermeer Road Trip.