Limited Access Visit #6: New York Botanical Garden and Bronx Zoo Redo

On September 30th I took my first trip to the New York Botanical Garden. What it turns out to be is like a park that’s big and easy to walk around in. There are also greenhouses that weren’t included in my free ticket. Those greenhouses are probably full of interesting plants and flowers. Another thing is that before you go to the Garden you should check on a map where the entrance is because if you just walk there assuming where the entrance is you may be wrong and spend a lot of time backtracking looking for it.

The Bronx Zoo is across another street from the Garden, so I took advantage of being right by it to go check out the World of Birds which I didn’t go to on my first visit there.

Well I was quite impressed by the World of Birds, really it was rather terrific.

After the World of Birds I went and checked on my buddy Chestnut.

Passed by the lions, they were roaring.

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Then it turns out there’s a whole Bear Mountain that I completely missed on my first visit somehow.

AND there’s a spectacular Reptile House that I also totally missed on my first trip.

World of Birds, Bear Mountain and the Reptile House really improve my opinion of the Bronx Zoo, which I found a little overwhelming in size and underwhelming in exhibits on my first visit.

Limited Access Visit #5: American Museum of Natural History

On the 25th I went to the Natural History museum. I brought with me the prejudice that it was a pretty dull museum best used for grade school field trips. I was there to see the whole thing and see if that would change my mind.

I think this post will mostly be an image dump. We start at the entry, we go through the animals, we see some indigenous peoples, go see the dinosaurs, then more animals, and then the tiny bit of the space part that was open. That was basically it.

So. Yeah. The AMNH doesn’t really do it for me. It’s like fun to see the animals for a while, I love a diorama, after all. And then some of the people stuff. But eventually it’s just kind of a yawn. A few times the last couple years I have cut through the museum from Columbus to Central Park West instead of walking down 77th street and I think that’s my favorite way to see it: quickly, looking at a few things as I walk by them, maybe going down to see the whale. Something that was kind of fun about this visit was that it was so very empty, bu there were cleaning people just about everywhere. So must exhibits it was just me, some pots and stones, and the sound of a janitor’s cart rolling through the room. Two more things: somehow they manage to show off a lot of dinosaurs without making it exciting at all AND the museum is currently very on display showing that it is struggling with its connection to Teddy Roosevelt. I understand that the statue in front can be viewed as rather culturally and racially insensitive BUT to be displaying that you’re thinking of cutting ties with TR completely? Yeah. That’s a mistake.

Limited Access Visit #4: the Met

Sometimes I get these ideas in my head. September 12th the idea I had was to visit every single gallery and exhibit currently open at the reopened Met. And while it took me four and a half hours, I did it. And I saw plenty of things I had never ever seen in there before.

I started with all the Greek and Roman stuff in the South Wing.

Greece and Rome were interrupted when I came across an exhibit of art from the “Shores of the Sahara.”

Okay, back to Greece and Rome:


Then I went into the South Pacific section that I like so much and it seems I didn’t take any pictures because I’ve taken so many in there before. From there I went over to African, Central American and South American art.

Then the modern art

Then up to the contemporary art

Then: 19th and early 20th century European painting and sculpture

There was this special exhibit commemorating the 150th anniversary of the Met with lots of the big hits on display as part of it. Plus stuff I hadn’t seen before.

Next: “Art of the Arab Lands”

Crossed over the Great Hall (don’t worry, I checked both sides)

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And then on to the Asian art, the great majority of which I do not believe I had seen before.

A gigantic time (and strength) saver: the whole European paintings 1250-1800 section was closed for renovations. Probably saved myself an hour and a half there.

Back down to 1 for European Sculpture, Medieval Art, Rooms, and Armor

Upstairs to the musical instruments section…never been to this before I’m sure, also, not pictured but they’re hiding the Organ Rehearsal in this section these days.

From there I conquered the Americas

The archives…

Stumbled upon this room-sized painting of the grounds of Versailles no one ever told me about

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Next: a painting of otters and the American wing sculpture court

Some more European decorative arts it seems…

The central sculpture court, maybe my favorite section of the whole museum

Then up to the roof to admire the Lattice Detour and the park and city.

Back down to 1 to pick up some last few Europe galleries and back through Rome/Greece on my way to…

Egypt! Don’t think I was going to miss Egypt!

And that was it! Now please don’t be like: Oh yeah, what about the Lehmann Gallery or the photography galleries or all the mezzanines? Because I did not miss them! I lost either photo taking steam or photo posting steam, but do not worry, I promise I saw it all. I would not let you down!

And oh yeah, Covid-times report on attending the Met: I had a reservation, but I don’t think they’re required. The Met is so big I think they figure they can just let people in and it probably won’t be a big deal. It was fairly empty when I got there at 10’ish AM but seemed kind of normal levels of busy by the time I left. Then again, I was there on a Saturday. Weekday mornings are probably real nice.

Oh and as a museum, Met is world class. League of its own. It’s got it all.