Friday 21st October

Today we decided to stay in Baltimore with Lizzy who had taken a day off work again. It was another lovely sunny day, so we walked down to the Inner Harbour to go up to the 27th floor of the World Trade Centre building for some spectacular views. We then waited for a water taxi to take us to Fell's Point. This is a pretty area with lots of cafes and restaurants some way around the harbour area - it took about 20minutes with one stop at Locust Point and it was nice to see some of the buildings from the water. We had a nice lunch/brunch with Lizzy before walking to the Art Gallery and Sculpture Garden. The Sculpture Garden was much better than the one in DC and had both modern pieces and some by Rodin, Henry Moore and others. By the afternoon the clouds had started to roll in and we had just finished before the rain started. We really enjoyed the Art Gallery, especially the Asian and African, Modern and Contemporary sections. They also displayed several Mattisse, Van Gogh, Picasso, and lots of others. What I liked about it was the fact that it wasn't too huge and there were plenty of places to sit down while you looked at the pictures.

The rain had stopped by the time we left and got an uber back to Lizzy's flat. Lizzy and I then made Spanokopita and a nut/dried fruit/honey/boozey concotion to use up the rest of the filo pastry!

Saturday 22nd October

Today was 'Open Doors' in Baltimore which meant that a lot of buildings were open to the public. We walked around the corner to join a tour at 10.30am of the Hippodrome Theatre. The theatre covers what used to be three buildings and has an interesting mix of modern building and Victorian ornateness in the auditorium itself. Scantily clad women were posturing on the stage in a Body Building Competition which looked more like a beauty contest. All male judges, of course! Unfortunately, because of this, we weren't able to see backstage.

We then took the light rail up to the Mount Vernon area of the city and went to Enoch Pratt house and Maryland Historical Society building before visiting the grand Peabody Library. We walked several blocks admiring the varied architecture before visiting a strange little three storey house near where Wallace Simpson lived, stuffed full of artefacts and memorabilia from that era..

We had great sandwiches for lunch at the Fat Belly sandwich shop around the corner before calling an Uber to take us to the Aquarium. Ryan is a member so we got reduced rates but it is a large place and we needed all the three and a half hours to look round. I loved Lizzy and Ryan's favourite fish - the Look Down fish (very flat, silver with big eyes) and Long Horned Cow Fish but also the dark blue little Cardinal fish and the Striped Burr fish. We were lucky to catch a feeding session at the Australian exhibit and a feeding display as Archer fish shot water to knock crickets off a branch. At least one got away! We also saw two male dolphins and heard a talk about them as they played with their keepers. They also have six females but keep them separate. They are also preparing to send them to a larger, more natural area and not to replace them, which is good. 

We got back about 6.30pm and went out for an excellent meal at the Helmund (Afghan).