Travelsmartplanet

What better place to learn a piece of Manassas history than with a Cemetery Tour. Learn about “Important Citizens who Influenced Prince William County History”. The Manassas City Cemetery tour is a biographical tour of our predecessors which allows you to discover their contributions to society. 

The Ladies Memorial Association of Manassas (later to become the United Daughters of the Confederacy) created the Confederate Cemetery in 1867 on one acre of donated land. The land was given to hold the remains of Confederate soldiers “scattered over the Plains.”

Although the Bull Run Ladies Association reburied the remains of soldiers found on the battlefield in the Groveton Cemetery, there were many other remains recovered throughout Manassas. In 1911, the Association placed a bronze statue of a Confederate Soldier “At Rest” on the brownstone monument that had been dedicated in 1889. Legend has it that the soldier faces east to guard against attack from Washington. 

Each year for the cemetery tour a different theme is used. Tragic deaths (murders or accidents), women, cemetery architecture are just a few from the past. This year focuses on County and Community leaders: Sheriffs, politicians, school administrators,… This tour is done with the greatest respect to the cemetery and its “inhabitants”.

To purchase tickets visit: manassasechoes.com, or call 703-368-1873

Location: Manassas Confederate Cemetery, 9317 Center St., Manassas, VA 20110
Date: Fri, March 17, 2017
Time: 8pm – 9:30 PM
Tel: 703-257-8265
manassasmuseum.org
For Regional Accommodations, Restaurants & Attractions: manassascity.org

If you’re a fan of architecture and design you’ll want to check out The Gropius House. Walter Gropius, the founder of the highly influential Bauhaus School and one of the most prominent architects of the 20th century designed this striking home in 1938 after moving from Germany to Massachusetts to teach at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design.

Modest in scale, the house was revolutionary in impact. It combined the traditional elements of New England architecture — wood, brick, and fieldstone, with innovative materials rarely used in domestic settings at that time: glass block, acoustical plaster, and chrome banisters, along with the latest technology in fixtures.

At the Gropius House, Bauhaus ideals remain alive, and throughout Gropius’s life, he and his wife Ise continued to add newly designed furnishings that reflected their belief in the marriage of design and industry.  In keeping with Bauhaus philosophy, every aspect of the house and its surrounding landscape was planned for maximum efficiency and simplicity of design. 

Two years after Mrs. Gropius’s death in 1983, the Gropius House opened as a historic house museum. The house contains a significant collection of furniture designed by Marcel Breuer  and fabricated in the Bauhaus workshops. The house also contains works by Eero Saarinen, Joan Miró, and Herbert Bayer that were given as gifts to Walter Gropius. With all the family possessions still in place, the house has an cohesiveness rarely found in house museums.

All images are “Courtesy of Historic New England.”

Location: Gropius House. 68 Baker Bridge Road, Lincoln, Mass. 01773
Dates: Sat and Sun, until May 31
Hours: 11 – 4pm, Tours on the hour
Tel: 781-259-8098
historicnewengland.org/historic-properties/homes/Gropius%20House
For Regional Information, Restaurants & Attractions: merrimackvalley.org

This is the statue of Bel Vizcaya, who was not actually a real person. He was dreamed up by James Deering, who designed Vizcaya in the early 1900’s, and he stands at the entrance to the grounds.

Ceiling detail in the entry hall of the Flagler Museum in Palm Beach. The carving was intricate, and the gold was real gold.

Here is the magnificent ballroom of the Flagler mansion, in its heyday and today. You can see carved moldings, electric chandeliers, arched doorways and windows and polished wooden floors.

Here is the magnificent ballroom of the Flagler mansion, in its heyday and today. You can see carved moldings, electric chandeliers, arched doorways and windows and polished wooden floors.

The Wittelsbach dynasty ruled the German territories of Bavaria from 1180 to 1918 – that’s 738 years,  pretty impressive.  Munich Residenz,  their former royal palace, is  located right in the center of Munich and very much open to the public. After 4 centuries of building it, the giant palace is made up of  many styles: late Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo and Neo-Classicism.

Though spartan on the outside, it is very opulent inside. You can tour it for its architecture, over-the-top room decor (130 rooms), and displays from the former royal collections. After WWII, the Cuvilliés Theatre was built into the Festsaalbau wing. You can also catch the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Hercules Hall. In his time, Mozart performed in this palace.

The Treasury houses the jewels of the Wittelsbach dynasty and spans 1,000 years, from the early Middle Ages to Neo-classicism, and includes: crowns, swords, golden objects, rock crystal, ivory, goblets, icons, tableware and toiletries.

The palace suffered huge damages during WWII, but the curators managed to store furnishings, art and  details of its architecture in mines. When you are wandering around the 10 courtyards, see if you can find this fountain with statues of  fire, water, earth and air on its corners.

The Wittelsbach family’s head, since 1996, is Franz, Duke of Bavaria, and he still hangs out in Munich. During WWII, the Wittelsbachs were anti-Nazi and were arrested when Franz was 11. He spent time in several Nazi concentration camps. After the war, he studied at the University of Munich and became a collector of modern art. Some of his collection is on loan to the Pinakothek der Moderne Museum (see other post).

www.muenchen.de/int/en/tourism.html

 Haus der Deutschen Kunst (“House of Aryan Art”) was the Third Reich’s first monumental structure of Nazi architecture and a showcase for  Nazi propaganda. It  opened  July 18, 1937 to highlight what the Third Reich regarded as Germany’s finest art.  Since Hitler thought Modern Art was crap, he intended this as an edifying contrast to it.

Ironically, since, 2002, it has housed the the National Collection of Modern and Contemporary Arts and is called the Pinakothek der Moderne.

Just to make sure we get it, crowning the top of the building are 20 words written in Yiddish such as “meshiginer or nudnick” – all words relating to the fact he was a fool.

www.muenchen.de/int/en/tourism.html

For those who are truly adventurous,there’s a tour Cycling the Castle Houses of Southern China. It’s always a tough decision to leave Hong Kong for a few days, but this two-wheel foray into the Guangdong Province offers one of the best ways of swapping the city lights for more rural delights.

The unique castle-like dwellings (diaolou) of Kaiping have UNESCO World Heritage status and display a flamboyant fusion of Chinese and Western architecture. Émigré Kaipings returning to their home country from overseas in the 1920s and 30s built these fortified towers in this distinctive style to protect against bandits.

This unique three-day cycling tour starts (and finishes) in Hong Kong, where participants board the ferry to Jiangmen and then take a coach to Kaiping, the location for saddling-up and setting off to spend the next few days travelling along rural country roads, village paths and forested tracks. The heritage sites of Kaiping and Chikan, as well as the diaolou clusters in Liyuan Garden, Zili Village and Majianglong, are all included on this fascinating itinerary. Arriving back in Hong Kong will provide an exciting contrast to a lovely rural trip.

www.discoverhongkong.com/eng/see-do/tours-walks/guided-tours/explore-hong-kong/kaiping.jsp

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The swooping architecture of the building and jaw-dropping 17 metre-high domed ceiling of Canada Hall are visions you will not easily forget after you have visited the newly named Canadian Museum of History (was Canadian Museum of Civilization), which covers Canadian life from AD 1000 to 2000.

From now until Sept 28, 2014,  you can enjoy the informative exhibit about Snow and the ingenious ways in which  Canadians have adapted to difficult winter conditions, from sleighs to snow removal. You can participate in a fun quiz at the end.

The museum is a playground for all, as the Children’s Museum takes the kids on travels around the world – including a passport to stamp in each country. All kinds of imaginative play from driving a bus, motorcycle, ship or camel to running a shop, putting on a puppet show, living in a pyramid, moving heavy boxes using a winch, or booking a trip can all be tried out.

In the main galleries, visitors see a Viking family arriving in Newfoundland around AD 1000,  discover New France through a farmhouse, inn, hospital, shoemaker’s shop and visit a voyageur camp, a lumber camp, a Métis campsite, British military living quarters and a Maritime shipyard. There’s a stroll past shops  along the main street of a small town in late 19th-century Ontario.

Learn about life in a turn-of-the-century prairie railway station and yard, a Saskatchewan grain elevator, an authentic Ukrainian church, a Chinese hand laundry and a 1920s Alberta oil derrick. You can even sit in Yellowknife’s Wildcat Cafe, the town’s first restaurant and a popular gathering spot for prospectors, bush pilots, miners and trappers.

If you love animals, leave time for the up close and personal movie, Kenya 3-D about a safari through Africa.

Location: 100 Laurier St., Gatineau, Quebec K1A 0M8
Phone: 819-776-7000 or 800-555-5621
www.civilization.ca