#708 Drama 2016

We witnessed plenty of drama in 2016 and a lot of it was on the stage!

We love seeing live actors performing for an audience rather than a camera.  And in 2016, we were lucky to catch 19 live performances - more than any other year.

Yours in the theater,
Mary

#607 El Ateneo book shop

On our first visit to Buenos Aires, we must go to El Ateneo book shop!

Built 100 years ago as a theater, the bookstore is now a major tourist attraction in the city with more than a million visitors annually.  The theater seating has been removed and replaced with bookshelves - as the roulette tables were removed and replaced with bookshelves on the MV Explorer!

Yours in enjoying theaters, bookstores, and the combination of the two,
Mary

#577 Dublin theater

Another quality of a favorite city is good theater.

So we tour the Abbey Theater, ie National Theater of Ireland, founded by Yeats and Lady Gregory in 1904.

And with some friends from the ship, we return to the Abbey Theater for a terrific production of Major Barbara, written about the same time by the Irish playwright Mr. George Bernard Shaw.

Also on our theatrical list is a walking tour of Once, a charming Irish musical film and one of my favorites.  We find Walton's Music Store, scene of the Falling Slowly song - winner of the Academy Award for best original song.  We learn that shopkeepers now ban the playing of Falling Slowly on store pianos!  So, we're not the only Once fans to find our way here.

Yours in falling quickly for Irish theater,
Mary

#551 Vacation Virginia Drive-Ins

Drive-in theaters are a fragile business, with only 357 remaining in operation in the US today according to the United Drive-In Theatre Owners Association.  We are lucky to have 9 operating drive-in theaters in Virginia  today - Abingdon, Christiansburg, Goochland, Keysville, Lexington, Marion, Moneta, Norton, Stephens City - all in the western half of the state. 

We like to use a trip to the drive-in as a pretext to visit a part of the state we might have otherwise missed.  So far, we've visited these four Virginia drive-ins: 

Sandy Hook - Goochland Drive-in
Opened: 2009 with a 40' x 80' screen
Ticket price per person for a double feature: $8
Digital projection: converted to digital in 2012
Thumbs up:
+ closest to home
+ the 2nd newest drive-in in the US
+ smoke-free outside the designated smoking area
+ enthusiasm shown for Goochdogs

Lexington - Hull's Drive-In Theater
This is our favorite Virginia Drive-In, so we've visited twice this summer to see Man of Steel and The Lone Ranger.   On the 4th of July, we watched The Lone Ranger in view of Lexington's fireworks and Mother Nature's lightning and we even got to fulfill my dream of watching an outdoor movie in the rain!  If you miss the good old days of the Fork Union drive-in, then this theater is for you.
Opened: 1950
Ticket price per person for a double feature: $7
Digital projection:  converted to digital in 2012
Thumbs up:
+ the nation's only non-profit, community-owned, drive-in theater
+ grass field rather than a gravel parking lot
+ tall parking levels, so no problem seeing over the car in front of you
+ no smoking in the first two rows
+ lots of locals hanging out before the show
+ can reach up and make bunny ears in front of the projector
+ beautiful setting

Keysville - Keysville Drive-In
Opened: 1952
Ticket price per person for a double feature: $7, can buy online
Digital projection: not yet converted
Thumbs up:
+ all grass field
+ casual attitude toward parking rows since there are no traditional pole speakers
+ long season, open April through November
+ bounce house for pre-show fun

Stephens City - Family Drive-In
Our weekend in the Winchester area included seeing Star Trek Into Darkness in Stephens City.
Opened: 1956
Ticket price per person for a double feature: $8, can buy online
Digital projection: will convert to digital on August 5, 2013
Thumbs up:
+ the only 2-screen drive-in theater in Virginia (240 cars and 144 cars)
+ open 7 days a week

Baltimore - Bengie's Drive-In
Technically (and geographically!), Bengie's is not in Virginia, but it is within driving range for us so we include it here.  When EVERY drive-in theater in Virginia is showing Iron Man 3, we decide a road trip to Baltimore is in order to watch '42' on the giant screen.  Bengie's Drive-In was made famous by John Waters (the director from Baltimore) in the film Cecil B. Demented.
Opened: 1956
Ticket price per person for a double feature: $9, but can vary
Digital projection: converted to digital in June 2013
Thumbs up:
+ the biggest movie theater screen in the US, 52' x 120
+ everyone stands outside their car for the national anthem

We haven't been able to visit the 5 theaters in southwest Virginia (Abingdon, Christiansburg, Marion, Moneta, and Norton) yet and we're keeping our fingers crossed that they're able to convert from film to digital so we can visit next summer!

Yours in enjoying open-air cinema,
Mary

#549 Vacation Virginia #9 - McCormick Farm

Vacation Virginia #9, in celebration of our fathers, is a day trip to Lexington, VA.

Kelly and I are both lucky enough to have grown up on Missouri farms.  These farms ultimately benefited from Cyrus McCormick's 1831 invention, the mechanical reaper - only 50 miles from Charlottesville, near Lexington. Cyrus was only 22 when he invented and built the reaper on his family farm.  Today, the Cyrus McCormick Farm is managed by our friends at Virginia Tech and is a beautiful place to spend the afternoon enjoying the outdoors, walking the trail, and visiting the blacksmith shop, grist mill, and museum.

The drive from Charlottesville to the McCormick farm is a beautiful trip through the George Washington National Forest, across the Blue Ridge Parkway, and into the Shenandoah Valley.  Luckily for us, our route takes us by the Wintergreen Winery in Nellysford and Ron King's kettle corn booth at Afton Mountain, offering important victuals for what is about to come.

The final stop of the day is Hull's Drive-In Theater in Lexington.  If you miss the good old days of the Fork Union drive-in, then this theater is for you.  It is the nation's only non-profit, community-owned, drive-in theater.  And like Fork Union used to be, it is more a field than a parking lot. The theater is packed to see Man of Steel, a fun movie to watch on a cool night under the stars, a bright moon, and fireflies galore. 

Yours in celebrating our fathers, men of steel both,
Mary

#545 Vacation Virginia #6 - Blandy Farm

On UVA finals weekend when Charlottesville welcomes 35,000 out-of-town guests, we drive north two hours to the Winchester area for Vacation Virginia #6.  When we veer away from the commercial corridor that is highway 29 onto the lovely highway 231 paralleling the Blue Ridge, the scene shifts.  So many rolling hills, clear streams, inviting driveways, and often a view of the mountains make us think this may be the prettiest drive in Virginia.  But then we remember Skyline Drive, the Blue Ridge Parkway, and all the other beautiful Virginia drives!

Our first destination is the State Arboretum of Virginia, UVA's Blandy Experimental Farm.   We give the secret librarian handshake and quick as a wink, we're inside the Blandy library.  

As cool as libraries are, we're really here to see the Ginkgo Grove.  The 300-tree ginkgo grove is the largest such grove in North America.  Seeds collected in 1929 from a single mother tree on UVA grounds were planted at the Blandy Farm and 300 of those seeds grew to maturity.  We enjoy the privilege of walking under the ginkgo canopy more than 80 years on. 

The Museum of the Shenandoah Valley is definitely a Michael Graves building.  Upstairs, the main gallery is topped by a stylized timber structure suggestive of a Shenandoah Valley barn.  I quickly remember another Graves-designed ceiling, the barrel vaults at the NCAA office.  Mr. Graves likes for us to look up.

Six acres of gardens surround the museum. We find the Chinese garden unexpectedly impressive.  Moss, stone, water, bamboo, and Koi are expertly stitched into this nearly hidden, serene, and superb Shenandoah landscape.

Our fun day ends with another drive-in movie, Star Trek Into Darkness at the Family Drive-In in Stephens City.  While Bengie's Drive-In had boasted of the largest screen in the country, the Family Drive-In boasts of being the only 2-screen drive-in theater in Virginia (and perhaps one of the smallest screens.)  The theater guy and UDITOA report 9 drive-in theaters are still operating in Virginia, but I can only find 8 (Christiansburg, Goochland, Keysville, Lexington, Marion, Moneta, Norton, Stephens City).  Does anyone know the 9th?

 

Yours in enjoying a weekend escape from the hustle and bustle of Charlottesville,

Mary

#543 Vacation Virginia #4 - Fort McHenry, National Air and Space Museum

To be precise, Vacation Virginia #4 takes us just outside our state borders into Maryland.

Our goals are to eat some crab cakes, see the movie "42" at a drive-in theater, and tour Fort McHenry.  We succeed in all these things and so much more!

O! say can you see that giant flag flying over the star-shaped Fort McHenry?  On the gorgeous morning of May 4, the winds are calm enough that the largest flag is flying proudly against a brilliant blue sky.  Yea for Baltimore's citizen soldiers nearly 200 years ago in 1814 and yea for Francis Scott Key!

After yummy crab cakes at G & M restaurant, we walk the mill race alongside Little Gunpowder Falls at Jerusalem Mill, a reassembled mill village that looks a lot like it did in 1772. 

The highlight of our evening is an outdoor movie, "42" about Jackie Robinson.  Drive-in theaters are a fragile business, with only 357 remaining in operation today - according to the United Drive-In Theatre Owners Association.  And the move to digital may put many more out of business.  So while every drive-in theater in Virginia is showing Iron Man 3, we see this terrific movie at Bengie's Drive-In, on the biggest movie theater screen in the US, 52' x 120'. 

For more fun on the way home, we stop at Green Acres Elementary School in Fairfax, VA.  Never heard of it, you say?  Though it is now a community center, Green Acres is where I kick-started my education. Gina, a proud Green Acres graduate who now works in the center, showed me around and let me peek in the classrooms and the old library a few decades after I'd last seen it! 

Finally, we opted for one more fun event - a visit to the National Air and Space Museum's Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles.  In preparation for our fall adventure with astronaut Kathy Thornton, we want to check out her typical ride, the space shuttle Discovery.

Yours in crossing the border into Mary-land and back again,
Mary