We had been looking forward to visiting Washington, DC since neither of us had been since we were kids. Our friends Colin and Jon gave us great suggestions of what to see and where to eat. Here they are in front of their newly purchased townhouse.
They were in the process of moving in when we visited. Their bedroom has new furniture and lovely bay windows. The house is in great shape and has some of the original details from when it was built in about 1900.
We enjoyed champagne and appetizers in their backyard. Colin and Jon have travelled a lot, so we shared lots of travel stories.
We went for dinner at Cafe Belga.
We tried an interesting lambic (sour) beer.
The restaurant is known for delicious mussels. Kristina had moules diaboliques made spicy with jalapeños.
The museums in DC are free and they allow photography, so we were in heaven! This is the ceiling of the National Gallery of Art east building, with Alexander Calder's Untitled 76-foot long mobile.
In the lobby was this beautiful stone sculpture by Isamu Noguchi entitled Great Rock of Inner Seeking.
The west building of the National Gallery we saw this gentlemen working assiduously on recreating a portrait.
In the Hirshhorn Museum we saw Tomonori Toyofuku's Caelum ll, which means sky. It was recently taken out of storage and put on display, so we felt fortunate to see it. Made of painted wood, we were drawn to the raised-relief sculptural surface with its repeating carved holes.
The Hirshhorn also has a Barbara Kruger exhibit entitled Belief + Doubt = Sanity. It was powerful how she had covered the floors, walls and escalators with vinyl statements.
Mike Wilkins made Preamble in 1897 by ordering custom license plates from all 50 states, in honor of the US Constitution bicentennial. Because we’ve enjoyed looking at license plates this trip, we are including this piece in our blog. (Note: you can click on the image below or any images in the post to see them larger.)
At the Freer and Sackler Galleries we saw Asian art. This is Xu Bing’s Monkeys Grasping for the Moon. Based on a Chinese folk tale, a group of monkeys tries to capture the moon. Linking arms and tails, they form a chain reaching down from a tree, only to discover that the moon is a shimmering reflection on a pool below them.
The suspended sculpture is made of laminated wood with 21 interlocking pieces, each looking like a monkey and spelling "monkey" in a different language.
This painting of a rock cod was accompanied by a poem:
There are lots of outdoor sculptures in the Washington DC Mall sculpture gardens. This is Mark di Suvero's Are Years What?
Alexander Calder named this stabile for Tom Messer (who was the director of the Guggenheim Museum New York in the Frank Lloyd Wright building).
Roxy Paine was commissioned to create Graft for the National Gallery Sculpture Garden. We saw another of Paine’s impressive tree sculptures in Seattle at the Olympic Sculpture Garden.
Roy Lichtenstein's Brush Stroke was at the front of the Hirshhorn Museum. Made of painted aluminum, it is 32' tall.
The National Mall is nice to walk around. Here is the Washinton Monument by day.
We think it’s stunning at night.
The Lincoln Memorial was beautiful at night, too.
We took the DC metro everyday. The metro stations where designed by architect Harry Weese.
Colin suggested that we try Toki Underground for Taiwanese-style ramen. It was awesome!
We also ate their vegetarian tsukemen dish. Served with a citrus dipping sauce, it was exceptional.
They make their own pickles and kimchi, so we had to order them too.
The interior of Toki Underground is colorful and fun, with skateboard decks forming a wall, and Japanese cartoon figures that are lit up at night.
The cooks were hard at work in the compact and warm kitchen.
We went to the US Botanic Garden and saw beautiful plants.
The have a Bodhi tree, the type of tree that Sidartha Gautama sat under in India when he achieved enlightenment.
The Museum of the American Indian is incredible, from the building to the amazing exhibits. The exterior is made of curved limestone and evokes wind-and-water-sculpted rock formations.
In the lobby this 22' totem pole carved by David A Boxley was temporarily bathed in rainbows as the prism window channeled sunlight over the totem.
There are 19 Smithsonian Museums in DC, and we only visited a few. The Castle holds the Smithsonian administrative offices.
Inside the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery is the Kogod Courtyard. The glass canopy, designed by Norman Foster, was incredible.
Looking up we saw the beautiful wavy glass and steel ceiling that seems to float over the courtyard. It was nice to have both the natural light and air conditioning inside!
Washington is a great walking city filled with attractive row houses, some of which are brightly painted.
All too soon it was time to leave DC and drive to Philadelphia. As soon as we arrived, we headed to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
The museum has an incredible collection of masterpieces. This is Picasso’s Three Musicians. We have seen pictures of this painting, but hadn't realized it was so large (80"x75").
We stayed in a cute neighborhood called Queen’s Village that was decorated with lots of art.
We were close to the old city, so we walked a lot to see the historical buildings.
This is Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776 and the Constitution was signed in 1787.
Our friends Colin and Jon had lived in Philadelphia for over five years, so they gave us suggestions of where to eat. This is the classic Philly sandwich (besides cheesesteak); It is a pork and provolone with broccoli rabe hoagie.
Jake’s Sandwich Board also served fried pickles and we liked them!
We also checked out Reading Market, which was packed with hungry people.
We tried Tommy DeNic’s meatball sandwich. Shown here is a half sandwich. We were happy we decided to split one since they were huge.
We know Colin and Jon through Colin’s folks, Sean and Nancy. Nancy is a photographer, and we have been friends with them since Kristina helped Nancy create her first website more than 15 years ago. All of us were in Japan in 2001 (separately), so we got together to compare notes about our visits and cook Japanese food for each other a number of times. Nancy took this photo of a Japanese restaurant in Philadelphia that she and Sean had taken Colin and Jon to. We fell in love with Nancy’s photo of Morimoto restaurant and we bought a copy of it for our first wedding anniversary.
We have wanted to go to Morimoto since we saw Nancy's picture, and we heard from them about the amazing food. We were so excited about going there that we went by in the afternoon and asked if we could take some photos.
When we arrived at Morimoto later that evening it was packed.
We loved the food starting with the amuse bouche of house-made tofu created from seaweed.
This gobo and lotus root salad was a lovely accompaniment to fresh sea urchin sushi.
It has been great to have time to explore both these wonderful cities. Next we're heading north to Maine via New York.
They were in the process of moving in when we visited. Their bedroom has new furniture and lovely bay windows. The house is in great shape and has some of the original details from when it was built in about 1900.
We enjoyed champagne and appetizers in their backyard. Colin and Jon have travelled a lot, so we shared lots of travel stories.
We went for dinner at Cafe Belga.
We tried an interesting lambic (sour) beer.
The restaurant is known for delicious mussels. Kristina had moules diaboliques made spicy with jalapeños.
The museums in DC are free and they allow photography, so we were in heaven! This is the ceiling of the National Gallery of Art east building, with Alexander Calder's Untitled 76-foot long mobile.
In the lobby was this beautiful stone sculpture by Isamu Noguchi entitled Great Rock of Inner Seeking.
The west building of the National Gallery we saw this gentlemen working assiduously on recreating a portrait.
In the Hirshhorn Museum we saw Tomonori Toyofuku's Caelum ll, which means sky. It was recently taken out of storage and put on display, so we felt fortunate to see it. Made of painted wood, we were drawn to the raised-relief sculptural surface with its repeating carved holes.
The Hirshhorn also has a Barbara Kruger exhibit entitled Belief + Doubt = Sanity. It was powerful how she had covered the floors, walls and escalators with vinyl statements.
Mike Wilkins made Preamble in 1897 by ordering custom license plates from all 50 states, in honor of the US Constitution bicentennial. Because we’ve enjoyed looking at license plates this trip, we are including this piece in our blog. (Note: you can click on the image below or any images in the post to see them larger.)
At the Freer and Sackler Galleries we saw Asian art. This is Xu Bing’s Monkeys Grasping for the Moon. Based on a Chinese folk tale, a group of monkeys tries to capture the moon. Linking arms and tails, they form a chain reaching down from a tree, only to discover that the moon is a shimmering reflection on a pool below them.
The suspended sculpture is made of laminated wood with 21 interlocking pieces, each looking like a monkey and spelling "monkey" in a different language.
This painting of a rock cod was accompanied by a poem:
The brush of a true artist is alive.
His fish paintings will make you hungry.
There are lots of outdoor sculptures in the Washington DC Mall sculpture gardens. This is Mark di Suvero's Are Years What?
Alexander Calder named this stabile for Tom Messer (who was the director of the Guggenheim Museum New York in the Frank Lloyd Wright building).
Roxy Paine was commissioned to create Graft for the National Gallery Sculpture Garden. We saw another of Paine’s impressive tree sculptures in Seattle at the Olympic Sculpture Garden.
Roy Lichtenstein's Brush Stroke was at the front of the Hirshhorn Museum. Made of painted aluminum, it is 32' tall.
The National Mall is nice to walk around. Here is the Washinton Monument by day.
We think it’s stunning at night.
The Lincoln Memorial was beautiful at night, too.
We took the DC metro everyday. The metro stations where designed by architect Harry Weese.
Colin suggested that we try Toki Underground for Taiwanese-style ramen. It was awesome!
We also ate their vegetarian tsukemen dish. Served with a citrus dipping sauce, it was exceptional.
They make their own pickles and kimchi, so we had to order them too.
The interior of Toki Underground is colorful and fun, with skateboard decks forming a wall, and Japanese cartoon figures that are lit up at night.
The cooks were hard at work in the compact and warm kitchen.
We went to the US Botanic Garden and saw beautiful plants.
The have a Bodhi tree, the type of tree that Sidartha Gautama sat under in India when he achieved enlightenment.
The Museum of the American Indian is incredible, from the building to the amazing exhibits. The exterior is made of curved limestone and evokes wind-and-water-sculpted rock formations.
In the lobby this 22' totem pole carved by David A Boxley was temporarily bathed in rainbows as the prism window channeled sunlight over the totem.
There are 19 Smithsonian Museums in DC, and we only visited a few. The Castle holds the Smithsonian administrative offices.
Inside the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery is the Kogod Courtyard. The glass canopy, designed by Norman Foster, was incredible.
Looking up we saw the beautiful wavy glass and steel ceiling that seems to float over the courtyard. It was nice to have both the natural light and air conditioning inside!
Washington is a great walking city filled with attractive row houses, some of which are brightly painted.
All too soon it was time to leave DC and drive to Philadelphia. As soon as we arrived, we headed to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
The museum has an incredible collection of masterpieces. This is Picasso’s Three Musicians. We have seen pictures of this painting, but hadn't realized it was so large (80"x75").
We stayed in a cute neighborhood called Queen’s Village that was decorated with lots of art.
We were close to the old city, so we walked a lot to see the historical buildings.
This is Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776 and the Constitution was signed in 1787.
Our friends Colin and Jon had lived in Philadelphia for over five years, so they gave us suggestions of where to eat. This is the classic Philly sandwich (besides cheesesteak); It is a pork and provolone with broccoli rabe hoagie.
Jake’s Sandwich Board also served fried pickles and we liked them!
We also checked out Reading Market, which was packed with hungry people.
We tried Tommy DeNic’s meatball sandwich. Shown here is a half sandwich. We were happy we decided to split one since they were huge.
We know Colin and Jon through Colin’s folks, Sean and Nancy. Nancy is a photographer, and we have been friends with them since Kristina helped Nancy create her first website more than 15 years ago. All of us were in Japan in 2001 (separately), so we got together to compare notes about our visits and cook Japanese food for each other a number of times. Nancy took this photo of a Japanese restaurant in Philadelphia that she and Sean had taken Colin and Jon to. We fell in love with Nancy’s photo of Morimoto restaurant and we bought a copy of it for our first wedding anniversary.
We have wanted to go to Morimoto since we saw Nancy's picture, and we heard from them about the amazing food. We were so excited about going there that we went by in the afternoon and asked if we could take some photos.
When we arrived at Morimoto later that evening it was packed.
We loved the food starting with the amuse bouche of house-made tofu created from seaweed.
This gobo and lotus root salad was a lovely accompaniment to fresh sea urchin sushi.
It has been great to have time to explore both these wonderful cities. Next we're heading north to Maine via New York.
