Thursday May 5
I pick up Merle in Woodhaven at around 8:45 to head out for
the press trip to Annapolis MD. I have a
new GPS since “Clarice” passed on to the heavens beyond “the cloud”. I named the new GPS “Jessica” for Jessica
Fletcher as she is my favorite person in the world, because she would never do
anything so stupid, like going into a dark basement all alone at 3 in the
morning. So hopefully she will not lead
me into a dark alley or be sarcastic like “Clarice” was. We head out to the Verrazanno Bridge via the
Belt Pkwy and onto I95 toward Baltimore.
We make great time and arrive at Baltimore Coffee and Tea
in Annapolis at around 12:45. They have
a huge variety of teas (loose and bagged) and coffee, including more than 100
varieties of coffee beans that are roasted at their main facility each
weekend. There are 6 varieties of
freshly brewed coffee available at all times.
Kim and Becky provide us with a wealth of information. They also have a nice variety of sandwiches
and salads along with muffins, scones and other bakery products. I have the cranberry chicken walnut salad and
an iced mocha coffee.
We head to the Westin Hotel, which is just a few
miles away, to check in and freshen up before an early dinner. Merle is handicapped so she always gets the
handicapped room which has easy access to the shower, rather than a step in tub
and shower that most facilities have. My
room is a large room with two double beds.
Dinner is at Carpaccio's Tuscany Kitchen which is
right across the street from the hotel.
Merle and I share several delicious appetizers:
Burrata salad which is fresh mozzarella
Carpaccio di Tonno which is thinly sliced
filet mignon, baby arugula, fancy capers, shaved Parmesan cheese dirzzled with
Dijon mustard aioli.
Shrimp Arugula which is 4 nice sized shrimp
roasted in garlic sauce over arugula and cannellini beans.
For my entree I have the Branzino Mediterraneo. Fresh
Mediterranean Branzino (fillet) grilled and drizzled with lemon infused
extra-virgin olive oil, fresh herbs and escarole. Really delicious and tasty.
We get a couple shots of the “West Chicks.” The story behind the chicks, that are large
decorative chickens set up along West Street in Annapolis, is that in 2012
legislation was passed allowing Annapolis residents to have up to six chickens
in their backyards for fresh eggs.
A few of the local owners of
farm-to-table restaurants “hatched “ the idea for the public art campaign. Check out Merle's blog and her rubber
chickens blog to see more.
Now it's on to Wine and Design where I will embarrass myself by trying to
paint a pink rose. The easels are set up and they have drawn the pencil design
of the rose for the participants. Megan
leads the group through applying the different colors and instructs us how to
do the shading and highlighting. While
painting, you can purchase a nice wine and cheese platter and are instructed to
try not to dip your brushes into the wine instead of the water cup. I opted out of the wine as I can only focus
on one thing at a time and my flower was already looking more like a turtle, or
hedgehog, or something. The final
product was not horrible, but trust me, the photo of the painting looks much
better than my painting. But I had a
great time and it was a lot of fun.
We were going to check out one of the local pubs, but chose
to head back to the hotel instead. There
was entertainment in the bar lounge so I stopped to check it out, while Merle
went up to her room. Aaron Yealdhall ,
or “Skribe” was playing his guitar and singing a variety of songs, a kind of
bluesy folk rendition. A really nice way
to end the evening.
Friday, May 6
Breakfast is at the hotel.
They no longer offer a buffet so you can select from the full a la carte
offerings off of the menu. I had
Chibatta French toast. The Westin offers
several healthy food options including fresh juice blends and smoothies. I had the pineapple, lime, cucumber, coconut
drink which was really refreshing.
The Westin offers several other innovative healthy and
“green” options or projects. They offer
a program where, for a fee, you can have
New Balance sneakers and running apparel available for your work out so you
don't have to pack extra clothes. The
Westin Essence website gives more details.
They also offer a “Green Choice.” If you choose not have have housekeeping
service during your stay, you get a $5.00 voucher that can be used in the hotel
restaurant or for morning snacks. Why
anyone would need their linens changed for a one or two night stay, I could
never understand, so I think this is a great idea. It conserves water and energy.
The newest innovation is the Rooftop Beehive. They have installed rooftop honey beehives which can host up to
35,000 honey bees. It hopes to be a
haven for the depleted honey bee population and Chef Barnett plans to use the
honey in a wide variety of signature dishes once it is harvested.
After breakfast we are off to the Spice and Tea
Exchange. There is a huge selection
of fresh spices, teas, herbs, salts,
peppers, rices, and sugars. They
will make custom blends for you.
The weather isn't great and it's been raining on and off so
rather than walk around we drive around the area. I love driving but a hate
“roundabouts.” Even with the GPS I
always seem to miss the correct exit or turn or street or whatever they are
called in different places. I always
scream “the street has to be round about here somewhere!” In the dock area, the water is coming into
the parking lot and I'm glad for my Rav4 SUV.
We were scheduled to have lunch at Sophi's Crepes but Merle wasn't told
that there is no actually indoor seating.
I guess people either take out or go during the warmer months and eat by
the docks. We just picked a place that
had parking close by and wound up at Moe's which is like a Baja Fresh or
Chipolte's. It turned out to be pretty
good. I have the salad with grilled
chicken.
Merle has one of the blue handicapped parking hang tags
which is good for any car that the holder of the tag is in. In NY it can be used in Handicapped parking
spots. In Annapolis you can use it at
parking meters for twice the allowed time at no charge, which was helpful
throughout the trip.
On to the 3:00 Trolley Tour. It was still raining on and off but our
driver and tour guide Joe, did a great job of getting us around town and
providing us with interesting information about the area. I love hearing about the history of the early
port cities but I never remember any of it.
Highlights of the tour include the U.S. Naval Academy, St John's College,
the State House, and several Colonial mansions.
After the end of the tour, Joe drove us up to see a few more West Street
Chicks and dropped us right by our car because Merle was having a hard time
getting around.
Dinner is at the Hotel restaurant, the Azure.
Merle and I share the Fried oyster appetizer which was lemon
Parmesan breaded Chesapeake oysters, tomato preserve, house cured bacon and
micro lettuce. My entree is a delicious
Salmon Rosti which is potato encrusted wild salmon, Brussel sprouts, and white
bean ragout.
Home made ice cream and a milk shake for dessert.
After dinner, we walk across the street to the Compass
Rose Theater to see a performance of
“The Roar of the Greasepaint – The
Smell of the Crowd.” I
had never seen the play before and enjoyed it quite a lot. Probably the most popular song from the play
is “Who Can I Turn To?” Be sure to read
Merle's blog, if you haven't already, as she will have more to say about it.
Saturday May 7
Breakfast at the hotel again. I have the American Breakfast of two eggs
over easy, bacon and rye toast. For my
fresh juice drink I have the pineapple, cucumber, mint.
The weather is looking a little better. It stopped raining and I can even see a
little sun, which is great because we are heading out for our Harbor
Cruise. There are several cruises and
tours to select from but we choose the 40 minute tour of Annapolis Harbor and
the Naval Academy. The sun was in and
out but the rain held off, so it was a nice trip.
For lunch we head to Mike's Crab House, which is a
little out of Annapolis in Riva, MD. Our
waitress, Brandi is exceptional. She
helps us to select a few of the choice items on the menu. The place is mad busy as it was Mother's Day
weekend. People cracking crabs all over
the place. The most noticeable thing is it doesn’t smell fishy at all, which
mean fresh fish.
The final selections are:
Fresh Oysters from Virginia Bay. They usually have more local oysters, but
they go with the freshest and most available and that was what was on the menu
for today. Very sweet and not a lot of
briny taste.
Crab Cake. Lightly
broiled and pretty much only lump crab and light seasoning. One of the best I have ever eaten.
Soft Shell Crab. I would have had the broiled, but I shared
the fried ones with Merle and they were delicious.
Large Crabs which we just cracked and ate. Super sweet and tasty.
I have a local beer which is RAR Nanaco nectar. I'm not a big beer drinker but this went
really well with the crabs.
Everything was really exceptional. If I were back in the area, which I would
like to be, I would make a special trip back here.
Merle loves Alpacas and I found a farm which was on the way
back to NY. On almost every farm, there
is the resident “boss” cat. Painted
Sky Alpaca Farm was no exception. A
beautiful Maine Coon cat came out to greet us and show us around. Unfortunately the owners were detained and
couldn't make it back to meet with us, so we were only able to get a few shots
of the Alpacas from outside the fences.
Head back to Queens.
Pretty good trip with the exception of the always reliable traffic on the
Verrazanno, in Staten Island, and on the Belt.
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