Yesterday I was playing tourist in New York again. I met a friend at the New York Historical Society where we saw a wonderful exhibit about the Marquis de Lafayette’s return to America in 1824 when he was 67 years old. He visited the 24 extant states traveling by road, in very uncomfortable looking carriages, and by water, and taking about 13 months. I decided I would like to retrace his journey. Any excuse to travel, right?

That was my first visit to the Society. I was impressed with their collections and the way they are showing them. They also have extensive documentation online of those collections that include many Tiffany lamps and Audubon prints.

I couldn’t walk around New York without going to the Met. We saw an impressive exhibit of tapestries, some of them 500 years old and still in great condition. They have set up a new gallery for contemporary photography. I always wonder how they select the artists; I certainly would have done it differently. Before I left the museum I spent a lot of time looking at books in the store. I didn’t want to carry them around with me, but there are a number of them, especially on Japanese Gardening, that I would like to own.

My blog about my trip to Japan has been written up today in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, in a great article by David Bear, Travel Editor. You can see it here. I was particularly pleased with the excerpt he chose to quote from the blog. I guess this is my 15 minutes of fame.