Travelrific® Travel Journal
Picture postcards in prose.™ Check out the blogroll on the front page for official merchandise and other resources!Archive for U.S. travel
Longest Suspension Bridge in the Americas
By Linda Tancs
Connecting Brooklyn with Staten Island, New York’s Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is the longest suspension bridge in the Americas. Now over 50 years old, the gateway bridges the Narrows, the mile-wide channel at the entrance to New York Harbor. Its span reaches four-fifths of a mile (making it the 11th longest in the world), punctuated by two towers 70 stories tall and four cables spun with enough steel wire to reach halfway to the moon. The bridge is named for 16th century Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European to discover New York and Narragansett bays. Eagle eyes will notice the discrepancy in spelling between the bridge and its namesake (the explorer’s surname being spelled with two Z’s). This typo persists since the bridge’s inception, allegedly resulting from an error in the building contract.
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Pinball Wizardry
By Linda Tancs
The world’s largest pinball collection is housed at the Pinball Hall of Fame in Las Vegas. It’s a museum of sorts but quite interactive; fun is mandatory here. Close to The Strip, it’s run by a veteran arcade operator. You’ll find 152 machines: Gottlieb, Bally, Williams and other makes. Solid-state and electro-mechanical. It’s all there, including the 1975 Bally Wizard, featuring pinball score glass art work with Ann-Margret and Roger Daltrey of The Who’s “Tommy” musical.
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A Museum for Spam
By Linda Tancs
A museum for spam. No, not the electronic kind. The facility in question celebrates a more welcome variety—the canned delight that has Americans all aflutter since its introduction in 1937. Located at the Hormel meat plant in Austin, Minnesota, the SPAM Museum includes a production toteboard (over 6 billion cans and counting), a mock assembly line and exhibits recounting everything from the can’s evolution to its role during wartime America. Don’t try to sample the exhibits. You can buy any of the 12 varieties in the gift shop.
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A Salute to Early America
By Linda Tancs
With an inheritance from George Washington, granddaughter Martha Washington and her merchant husband Robert Peter (Georgetown’s first mayor) built a Neoclassical house on over eight acres of farmland on Georgetown Heights in Washington, D.C. Completed in 1816, Tudor Place has overlooked Georgetown and the Potomac River ever since. Occupied by the same family for six generations, it was dedicated to the public in the 1980s following the last owner’s death and remains one of the nation’s few historic urban estates retaining the majority of its original landscape. Viewable today by hourly guided tours, the grand residence remains as the Peters lived in it, showcasing over 15,000 items dating from the mid-18th to the late 20th centuries, including early land records, maps, photographs, moving pictures, diaries, household receipts, correspondence and one of only three letters extant from George to Martha Washington. The garden is equally storied, sporting native trees and shrubs that date back centuries. Enjoy four seasons of color with a self-guided tour.
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Japanese Woodworking in Pennsylvania
By Linda Tancs
Descended from samurai families, Spokane-born George Nakashima is recognized as one of America’s most eminent furniture designers. The George Nakashima Woodworker Complex, a National Historic Landmark located in New Hope, Pennsylvania, was his home until his death in 1990. The 12-acre complex has 21 buildings, all designed by Nakashima in the International Style infused with elements of traditional Japanese architecture. His brand of “organic naturalism” showcases the wood’s natural beauty in items such as table lamps, dining tables, wall units, desks and chairs that are coveted by collectors worldwide. The complex is open to visitors on Saturdays, and admission is free. Visitors may see examples of his work in the showroom and Conoid Studio and take a self-guided tour of three of the buildings.
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Twenty-Five Years of Holiday Magic
By Linda Tancs
The Holiday Train Show® in the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory at New York Botanical Garden is celebrating 25 years of its stunning exhibition of G-scale locomotives (the largest model train available) winding through replicas of New York landmarks such as the Brooklyn Bridge, Statue of Liberty and Rockefeller Center. The recent exhibition expansion features more trains, an all-new Queensboro bridge and a finale featuring a whimsical tribute to iconic Coney Island. Each landmark is re-created with bark, leaves and other natural materials in exacting detail. The show runs through January 16, 2017. Advance ticket purchases are recommended.
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The Crags of Santa Barbara
By Linda Tancs
California’s Rattlesnake Canyon trail moves north and eastward for nearly three miles up Rattlesnake Canyon and ends on Gibraltar Road. Besides the beautiful views of Santa Barbara, Montecito, birds and wildflowers, this part of Santa Barbara’s back country offers the intrepid the formidable Gibraltar Rock. Located next to its namesake road, the formation’s south face is akin to a bunny slope. Those desiring more of a challenge should head for the west face and the cliff’s subsidiary formations. There you’ll meet up with climbs bearing names like Sweating Buckets, The Nose, Toxic Waste Wall and The Bolt Ladder. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
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Denver’s First Block
By Linda Tancs
Denver, Colorado, was officially chartered in 1861, and Larimer Street (named after the city’s founder) became the city’s first street. Historically preserved for 51 years now, the site saw its fortunes fall with the crash of silver and rise again during Prohibition as host of the city’s hottest speakeasy. The luster quickly faded when the old street became skid row amidst rising development in other parts of the city following World War II. Community activism resulted in restoration beginning with the 1400 block of Larimer Street, now known as Larimer Square. Located in historic Lower Downtown (LoDo), the tony locale now boasts a lively mix of restaurants, clubs and shops. Its oldest retailer, Gusterman Silversmiths, is still a treasured tenant.
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Congregating in Salem
By Linda Tancs
The Town of Salem in North Carolina was founded in 1766 by the Moravians, a Protestant religious group that first organized in the 15th century in what is now known as the Czech Republic. It served as an administrative center for the Moravian missionaries who settled in the area, surrounded by five outlying congregations. Throughout the year, the old town offers a variety of historic workshops highlighting skills from hearthside cooking to pottery. Ongoing research continues to unearth the practices of the area’s earliest settlers. In particular, Old Salem Museums & Gardens is dedicated to continual learning and ongoing research in the areas of decorative arts, material culture, Moravian and Southern history, archaeology and architecture.
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America’s Oldest Restaurant
By Linda Tancs
Along Boston’s Freedom Trail you’ll find America’s oldest restaurant, Union Oyster House. Housed in a building dating back to pre-Revolutionary days (1716), its stalls and oyster bars remain in their original positions since the opening in 1826. The brick structure was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2003 and is a rare surviving example of the city’s Georgian architecture. A favorite of statesmen, artists, travelers, inventors, athletes and theatre figures, it’s notable as the home of Isaiah Thomas (publisher of The Massachusetts Spy from 1771 to 1775) and the place where Louis Philippe, later King of France, taught French to prominent Bostonians. The toothpick (invented by a Maine family in the timber industry) also made its debut there. Not only is the Massachusetts eatery America’s oldest restaurant, but it’s also one of the world’s oldest establishments (the oldest being Botín in Madrid, founded in 1725).
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