Baltimore Inner Harbor, etc...

[msoskil]

I'll be in Baltimore for a few days next week for the national soccer

coaches' convention. Lots of meetings, but I can find some time to

get some photography done. I'll be staying right in inner harbor.

I've been down there several times, but never really strayed from the

harbor itself (I was mostly there for baseball games.) Is there

anything other than the obvious (Boats, science museum, aquarium,

etc.) that anyone wants to suggest? Never been to Fort McHenry. Is

it worth visiting for photography reasons? I do want to get there

eventually for U.S. History reasons, being that I teach the War of

1812 in my S.S. class. Thanks!

[randy_santos]

Here's a view from Federal Hill if that interests you.<div></div>

[mathew_brady1]

Try the Fells Point area, which is just east of the Inner Harbor area. Plenty of good places to eat, drink, and photograph.

 

Yes, Fort McHenry is worth a visit. As is the Edgar Allen Poe grave, the Babe Ruth Museum, and the B&O Railroad Museum and roundhouse.

[J.W. Wall]

We were in Fells Point in November and were disappointed that lots of places seemed rather "touristy." You may want to stick with other areas at least as prime possibilities. Just MHO.

[scott_davis5]

Take a walk up Charles Street from the Inner Harbor to Mount Vernon... Baltimore is positively dripping with fantastic architecture. Take a bus up Charles Street to the Johns Hopkins campus at Homewood (34th and Charles). I'd say keep walking, but it is A: a long walk, and B: there are still some rough spots on Charles Street near North Avenue. From Mount Vernon, cut over to Mount Royal Avenue, and walk past the old B&O station and tour up past the Maryland Institute College of Art. The neighborhood around MICA is called Bolton Hill, and is also ripe with interesting houses. Go over as far as Eutaw Street (formerly one of the most elegant streets in the city) and wander past the giant synagogue (now home to a Masonic order). As long as you do these wanderings in daytime, you'll be safe, but I wouldn't wander around out of the main areas alone at night.

 

Fort McHenry is interesting, and certainly worth it from the historic perspective, but it is a typical 18th/19th century fort, built after the advent of (relatively) accurate and potent artillery, so there are some brick retaining walls holding back earthworks. In the center of the fort are some interesting buildings, particularly the brick powder magazine, but the architecture is not dramatic.

 

If you have access to a car, it would be worth the effort to find out if the christmas lights are still up on 37th Street in Hampden (one of Baltimores' more characteristic blue-collar neighborhoods). There's a stretch of this street where every neighbor competes to out-decorate and out-illuminate each other. Ask the desk staff at your hotel about it.

 

Little Italy is also worth a look, if it hasn't gentrified too much yet. There are some interesting city parks that are worth checking out, if you have the time - Patterson Park, Druid Hill Park, and Clifton Park. There are some neat city views from the Druid Hill Park reservoir, and Clifton Park is home to Johns Hopkins' mansion, now the residence of the City Parks program director. There is a famous multi-story pagoda in Patterson Park.

 

Greenmount Cemetery is a fascinating tour through history - see the resting places of John Wilkes Booth and his father, General Joseph E. Johnston, Johns Hopkins, and other persons famous, infamous and obscure. Definitely a daytime-only activity.