Hello Everyone!
I’m excited to share my first travel post with you. Lucas and I have traveled to many beautiful places and I look forward to sharing what we've experienced and some tips with you.
Recently, for Lucas’ birthday, we visited Baltimore, Maryland. I’m not sure if I’ve said this before but I absolutely love food and especially finding great places to dine at. While we were there, we also made a trip to the Baltimore Aquarium which was absolutely beautiful.
So why Baltimore?
Honestly we went to dine at Roy’s Hawaiian Asian Fusion Restaurant.
So why Roy’s?
Lucas and I had eaten at the Roy’s in Hawaii previously and we were absolutely in love with it. Both our dinners were absolutely amazing and the chocolate soufflé for dessert was to die for. We both agreed we would have to eat there again, but have not been able to make it back to Hawaii (poor us!) and found the closest location to us was Baltimore. So we packed our bags and headed to the Royal Sonesta Harbor Court.
If you look closely, the Royal Sonesta is the short brown building facing the harbor.
Review of Baltimore:
The inner harbor section of Baltimore where we stayed was absolutely beautiful! The weather was gorgeous, everything was blooming, and it seemed very clean compared to many other cities. We passed by the Raven’s and the Orioles stadiums and they both looked absolutely beautiful. If I were to compare it to a city, it reminded me of a section of Pittsburgh I stayed at before near the Steelers’ stadium. It just had the same feel…maybe because they were both big sports cities.
Review of the Royal Sonesta Harbor Court:
Let me first say that I am a pretty opinionated person when it comes to accommodations. Lucas always tells me that I’ve become spoiled over the years. I would definitely stay at the Royal Sonesta Harbor Court again. We stayed in a King Harbor View Room and it was very spacious and well equipped. The bed was pretty comfortable…meaning I didn’t wake up feeling like I slept on the floor so that’s a winner in my book. The room included a Keurig for all the coffee drinkers. I hardly ever drink coffee but found it pretty easy to use for Lucas’ coffee habit and I even enjoyed a nice warm tea from it. I really wish I had taken photos but I did not. I will tell you it is very much like what you see in their photos. The carpet looks very oldish/regal in design, the furniture is more antique looking, but the bed coverings are very much modern. It was a combination I had never seen before but I thought it all worked well together. The lobby is absolutely gorgeous and I thought the employees there were extremely friendly. Parking was also quite easy. Our reservation included valet, but the valet was full so we self parked which I actually liked better. The parking was a covered deck and we were given a card so we could get in and out as many time as we wished. The only thing I would say negative is that the room service is very expensive. We spent about $60 on breakfast for two people…for french toast and eggs and bacon. I thought that was a little much but we did not feel like venturing out to find breakfast at the time.
Review of Roy’s:
I hate to say this but I really, really loved Roy’s in Hawaii. So I cannot say that the exceptional experience there may have over stated my expectations for the Baltimore Roy’s. My first impression was that it was much smaller and the tables we much closer together. It was also an extremely busy Saturday and it was almost impossible to get through the crowd to get to the hostess to let them know we were there for our reservation. Once we got up to the hostess stand we were seated within 10 minutes so that was not terrible. Our waitress was excellent so I have nothing negative to say about the service. I just did not feel like the food there was up to par with the Roy’s in Hawaii. Everything seemed much dryer, maybe it was a tad overcooked. Even the dessert was just not the same. Maybe it was just an off night for them, or maybe Hawaii really did set my expectations too high. Whatever it was, I left there wishing we had just stayed at home and went to Fleming’s, which is ironically owned by the same company. Will I go back?...I’m not sure. It was a pretty long trip for a subpar dinner. I’d rather stay home and visit some of our small local favorite spots.
Baltimore Aquarium
On Sunday before leaving we decided to check out the Baltimore Aquarium. The aquarium was absolutely beautiful! When you walk in, you can have your picture taken in front of a blank screen, so be picture ready. You can later check out the photo with different designs in the background. We really enjoyed walking through the many levels of the aquarium and also visiting the rainforest section where they have a sloth. The sloth was hidden for the most part but I was able to get a not that great photo of it in a tree. My only tip for you besides wearing comfortable shoes is to find somewhere affordable to park. I misread the parking information on the aquarium’s website and thought parking at the aquarium was $5. It actually reads that you get a $5 discount and we paid $17 for parking after that discount!!! I was so upset with myself because we could have just walked a little over half a mile from our hotel to the aquarium and would not have needed to pay for parking. Some of you may not think $17 is a lot for parking but where we live you hardly ever pay more than $5 to park anywhere and that’s when you have to pay for parking. You can get more information about the Baltimore Aquarium at http://www.aqua.org/. Below are some of the pictures I took while there. We really enjoyed visiting the aquarium and look forward to going back another time.
The red lion fish really interested me. I had recently seen an episode of shark tank where these two gentlemen went into business to catch these for restaurants. Apparently the fish is pretty good, but they were trying to sell it from an environmental standpoint. The red lion fish is a rapidly growing and invasive species. Their dorsal spines are venomous to protect them from predators and while sharks can feed on them they have no real predator so they just keep multiplying. They also do not bite on fishing hooks like most other fish. Because of that, they have to be speared to be caught. So next time you're out at a restaurant and they have red lion fish, order it...then come back here and let me know what you thought! That's my protect the ocean speech of the day...
There were so many jellyfish. Here are some of my favorite in the aquarium.
This starfish looks like the creature from the movie Body Snatchers...it gave me the heebie-jeebies!
This turtle was adorable.
The aquarium is also home to many dolphins. They have a dolphin show every few hours as well.
The aquarium is also home to many sharks!
I really love all the beautiful colors of these fish and the coral. Looking at this I can completely understand why many people spend so much money on fish tanks for their home.
Moving on to the rainforest...
This green leaf frog is so cute! He was very photogenic!
The monkey did not really want to be photographed but I did my best to get a picture.
Lucas had to take a picture in the Megalodon mouth! Can you believe this prehistoric shark could swallow a person whole? It is said to have looked like a much larger and stockier great white...it was crazy big!
Another view of the Megalodon mouth.
Well I hope you enjoyed this post. All pictures were taken on my iPhone so the quality is not the best. Feel free to ask me questions in the comment box!
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