Baltimore 2014!

This year is turning out to be the year of the East coast! :) 

I've made several trips to the Northeastern coast so far this year, but this one was one of the most special. I was headed to Baltimore, Maryland, a place I had never been, to present at a conference. Best of all, Mom got to come along, see me present, and we had a fun girls' weekend. 

 

We began our adventure in Austin. Ready to go! We had no idea what to expect, but had done a little research to find out what things we would do while I wasn't in the conference. We enjoyed the flight because we both got to read books and enjoy time together. (I finished reading Wonder and Mom read Me Before You on my recommendation.)

Our first stop was for some yummy food! We had a major craving for seafood and nothing is better than seafood straight out of the Atlantic Ocean. We ate at a fun little restaurant that was very trendy - oysters Rockefeller, crab cakes, and cinnamon cake! :) After eating that much food, we needed a nice walk and strolled around the inner harbor. 

We got to see lots of people, sea lions, and statues of Frederick Douglas. 

We love animals! (Obviously, we have plenty around.) On Friday, the first thing we did was go to the Maryland Zoo of Baltimore. It was a great zoo. Pretty large with a special safari themed set-up, penguins, and polar bears. We were in Heaven. We got to see the penguins dance around and perform, and were mesmerized by the giraffes. 

To continue our animal-themed day, we went to the National Aquarium. This was a very large aquarium, and one of the best I've seen. (Mom wasn't nearly as impressed, but it was still cool.) Mom loved the mega-jaws and wanted to stand in them. :) 

We watched a cute 4D movie about how salmon travel down rivers to feed grizzly bears. Then, we watched the dolphins swimming around, saw plenty of fish, birds, and sharks. What a fun day exploring animals! For dinner, we ate in Little Italy and had pasta that was to die for. 

Saturday was the conference day. I was presenting twice, once as a roundtable and once as a formal presentation. I told Mom she could enjoy the day off, but she wanted to come see me "do my thing". It was really fun to have her there and she was a huge hit among the other academics. 

Sunday was our final day and we spent the day doing as much as possible. We were pretty tired after all of our adventures, but wanted to see as much as possible. Our first stop was the Maryland Historical Society, a recommendation from someone at the conference. This was a great museum devoted to Maryland history - the war of 1812, the Star-Spangled Banner, and a huge quilt exhibit. Mom loves quilts so she went crazy for it. I love history, so this was a good stop. 

After getting schooled in a bit of history, we hopped next door to the Walter's Art Museum. This was a free museum with some really interesting displays. It was full of prints of famous pieces I remember from my art history course, and had a special display of artwork done by famous explorers. This place was massive, and it would certainly take us more than one day to get through. 

Finally, our literature-loving hearts wanted to see the Edgar Allan Poe house. This house was the one Poe lived in upon his death and his grave is not far from the house (but I'm not really into graves, so we didn't go). The city of Baltimore fought to keep the house and restore it to a museum, and it had only been open for 5 weeks! Crazy. It was very tiny, but fun to see where he did a few of his great works. 

That evening, we walked around by the Orioles stadium. Mom is a huge baseball fan. We wanted tickets, but the team was playing out of town that night. We also got to see the Ravens stadium. 

Baltimore was a great adventure! :)