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Providence - Part 2
Written by: Janet Pope
Photography by: Donald
Small State, Big Heart
Providence: Day Two
Our tour checked out breakfast at Agora, located in the Western Providence Hotel. They serve a delicious buffet breakfast. After dining, we were treated to a ninety-minute city trolley tour provided by Conway tours. Yesterday we explored the area around the river; today we were able to see a little beyond that. Our driver narrated as we took in sights along the way. Greeted by a welcoming archway to Federal Hill, we entered the Italian district. One after another, restaurants and specialty shops beckoned us to come inside and eat. We took a short stop at a public park called De Pasquale Square, which is lined with painted murals and outdoor cafés.
Providence, we learned, was at one time a central area for those in the costume jewelry or clothing business, but the industrial city was dying and downtown Providence was becoming run-down. The city has recently made a turn-around and has had a resurgence of culture and arts: probably affected in part by the many institutions of higher learning. Our journey took us passed the arcade (the oldest mall in the country), built in 1828, with solid stone interior columns.
In the College Hill area there are cafés, bookstores, Starbucks and casual restaurants catering to the many college students. Our guide also pointed out John Brown’s house, of Brown University fame, which is open to the public for tours; The Rhode Island Statehouse, which has one of the largest freestanding domes in the world; and Kennedy Plaza where JFK spoke in the sixties. Our next stop was at Prospect Park, which provides a great view of the city, and where a life-sized statue of Roger Williams stands. The trolley tour is a great way to see the city and to discover a few places to where you may want to return.
Nearby is The Rhode Island School of Design. Rhode Island had a booth at the Philadelphia Centennial World’s Fair in 1876. It was visited by some prominent Providence ladies interested in the arts. They came back from the fair and decided to start an art school. So The Rhode Island School of Design was built for the 100th Anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Because the school specialized in textile, design, and fine arts, a museum was soon built to house these collections, in order to expose the students to an array of artists and styles. The museum has grown so much that they can only show 1% of their holdings at any given time. There are rooms of furniture, porcelain, china, impressionist paintings, sculptures, and Asian art—and that only scratches the surface. Two of the treasures of the museum are the 1,000-year-old, nine-foot-high Buddha and the 2,500 B.C. Egyptian mummy. Of special interest were the rooms of period furniture; Goddard Townsend furniture, we were told, represents the finest furniture in America, as the pieces were made of solid mahogany.
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My up close and personal moment | |
Since Rhode Island is known as the Ocean State, we grabbed a quick lunch at Hemenway’s Seafood Grill and Oyster Bar. After lunch, next on our itinerary was the Roger Williams Park Zoo. The zoo is on 40 acres within a 400-acre park. This is the third-oldest zoo in the country, established in 1872. We caught a show called "Masters of the Sky," which is a live raptor show. I was chosen out of the crowd to hold out my arm for a wild bird to land on. All pictures snapped show me with my eyes closed and a frightened grimace on my face. Beside my up-close, personal encounter with the birds, my other favorite area was the Marco Polo exhibit. Here we saw animals that Marco Polo would have seen on his adventures while exploring in the 13th century—camels, moon bears and snow leopards. This was based on his many writings from the Far East in which there were references to animals he literally encountered. I liked the combination of history with animals, and the zoo seemed to have more of a connection than just animals on display.
You do a lot of walking in a zoo, so we headed back to the hotel to rest up a bit before trying out yet another Providence restaurant. Our hotel put out lemonade and fresh baked cookies every afternoon , which was lovely to have waiting for us. Refreshed and ready, we met for dinner at the Electric Grill in historic Federal Hill. When in Little Italy, eat like the Italians! To me that means good food, good wine and good conversation.
Yesterday, I thought the Riverwalk and Waterfire were enough reasons to come to Providence, today we added so many more reasons to our list— history, art, and great food, to name a few.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
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