Baltimore

Baltimore , United States
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Nicknamed 'Charm City' because of its hospitality, Baltimore is every bit as proud as it is welcoming. Pride sparkles in the bold designs of the skyscrapers and museums that surround the Inner Harbour, in spit-and-polished neighbourhoods, and in the beckoning voices of vendors in the city's five markets.

Baltimore played a significant part in the American Revolution and since then has endured a cycle of rebounding and suffering anew. In recent times, it's become one of the shining lights in the urban renewal movement, although the neighbourhoods with dirt under their nails remain.

After becoming the second-largest city in the US post-Revolution, Baltimore was crippled by military rule and the violence born of divided loyalties during the Civil War. Blooming again during the railroad-rich last decades of the 19th century, the city was devastated by a fire in 1904, bounced back undaunted, but was then plunged deep into the doldrums by the Great Depression. Baltimore didn't really recover from economic stagnation (and the resulting social problems) until concerted urban renewal programs of the 1980s gave the city back its zing.

Area: 210 sq km
Population: 760,000
Country: USA
Time Zone: GMT/UTC -5 (Eastern Standard Time)
Telephone Area Code: 410

Orientation

Rising from the head of the Patapsco River, Baltimore dominates the northern end of Chesapeake Bay. The city lies in the small state of Maryland, 100mi (160km) south of Philadelphia and 25mi (40km) north of Washington, DC.

Immediately north and west of the Inner Harbor is the downtown business district. About a half mile northwest of downtown is the neighborhood of Mount Vernon, home of Baltimore's Washington Monument, the Walters Art Gallery, 'restaurant row', and a couple of cheap places to stay. To the east of the Inner Harbor lie Little Italy and Fells Point, another revitalized shoreside urban neighborhood. Immediately south of the Inner Harbor is the Federal Hill section of the city. You can get a good view of Baltimore from the hill or the top of the World Trade Center on the northern side of the Inner Harbor.

The Baltimore-Washington International Airport is 10mi (16km) south of the city center off Route 295. Penn Station, the city's railway station, is a mile north of downtown. The Greyhound terminal is three blocks west of downtown.\

Baltimore

When to Go

Spring and fall are the most temperate and scenic seasons throughout the Capital Region, but travel is eminently possible in other months. The Chesapeake Bay and Atlantic Ocean give the eastern part of Maryland fairly mild winters and humid summers. Rainfall is pretty steady through the year, but you're most likely to be reaching for the umbrellain July and August. Despite the downpours, the city is a lively place in summer with lots of outdoor events which keep buzzing long into the balmy Baltimore evenings.

Events

Baltimore hosts plenty of events, mainly in the summer months. From late April to early May Inner Harbor comes alive with the Baltimore Waterfront Festival. The Center Plaza Concert Series brings jazz, blues, salsa and reggae concerts downtown from May to July. Between late May and September there are free big band, swing, jazz and other bands at the Pier 6 Concert Pavillion. In July Patterson Park, north of Fells Point's Market Square, hosts the Chesapeake Turtle Derby - a series of turtle heats named after prominent Baltimoreans - and the Square sees the Hog Calling Contest, which is just what it sounds like. Artscape, held in July, is a celebration of local theater, music, arts and food in Mount Royal.

Defender's Day Celebration is 12 September, the anniversary of the War of 1812's Battle of Baltimore. Military drills, fireworks, and music all go off at Fort McHenry. In October, Baltimore's working boats sail through the harbor to be blessed.

Public Holidays
Jan 19 - Dr. Martin Luther King Day
Apr 9 - Good Friday
May 31 - Memorial Day
Sept 6 - Labor Day
Oct 11 - Columbus Day
Nov 2 - Election Day
Jul 4 - Independence Day
mid-Mar - St Patrick's Day
fourth Thur in Nov - Thanksgiving

Baltimore

Attractions

Fells Point

Fells Point is the waterfront community located about a mile east of the Inner Harbor along Broadway and the streets crossing it. Fells Point is one of the oldest maritime communities in the US and has long been a home for the various ethnic communities who worked in the maritime trades. Along the cobblestone streets you can see the rising tide of gentrification and its accompanying antique shops, vintage clothing stores, restaurants and bars.

Most people come here to escape the suburbs, stroll, drink (there are scores of bars) and shop. Market Square is a brick plaza at the end of Broadway opposite the water. There are often street festivals in the square and always a host of people watchers. Some of the oldest homes in Baltimore stand along the cobblestone streets.

Inner Harbor

The Inner Harbor is the revitalized heart of Baltimore. It encompasses both the head of the Northwest Branch of the Patapsco River and the land around it. Now a major tourist attraction, it includes a waterfront promenade, museums, tour boats, historic ships, and the innovative National Aquarium. Over 5000 marine animals are housed in the aquarium's two glass pyramids; an elevator takes you to the top and you walk down ramps that spiral around large circular tanks. The Baltimore Maritime Museum is housed in a ship and submarine docked on the western side of the aquarium and includes the USS Torsk, the last submarine to sink a Japanese ship during WWII. On the northern side of the harbor is the World Trade Center, designed by IM Pei to be the world's tallest pentagonal structure. There's a good view of Baltimore from the 27th floor.

Mount Vernon

Mount Vernon is the neighbourhood and square about a half mile northwest of the Inner Harbor. Its heart is Baltimore's own Washington Monument, at the centre of a cruciform park between Madison and Centre Sts. The young brooding folk dressed in black are likely to be students at nearby Peabody Conservatory, the oldest classical music school in the US. The Walters Art Gallery, an excellent private collection housed in a faux Italian palazzo, is one block south of the monument. So-called 'restaurant row' is the stretch of N Charles St in the blocks south and north of the monument.

SoWeBo

You'll be instantly accepted into the Baltimore cool set if you call Southwest Baltimore 'SoWeBo'. This developing bohemian district lies mostly to the west of Martin Luther King Jr Blvd. During the last decade, artists and artisans have moved into the area around Hollins Market to revive the district - it's something like a clone of New York City's SoHo. The renaissance is real but far from complete. Most of SoWeBo remains poverty-stricken and dangerous at night.

Apart from the funky eateries around Hollins Market, the area's attractions include the B&O Railroad Museum in Mt Clare Station, truly one of the best sights in Baltimore even if you don't like trains. You can see a huge collection of locomotives and passenger cars exhibited in the restored roundhouse, which has a soaring cathedral-like ceiling. HL Mencken House is the place to visit if you're a fan of the witty journalist (1880-1956) who worked for the Baltimore Morning Herald and Sun and wrote for the American Mercury. If that sounds a bit too cerebral, head for the Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum, which celebrates the 'Sultan of Swat' and baseball in general. One exhibit describes each of Babe's 714 home runs (you can never have too much 'he hit the ball, then ran to first, then second, then third and then...home!', now can you?).

Baltimore

Off the Beaten Track

Annapolis

The capital of Maryland is also America's Sailing Capital. Deeply rooted in its colonial past, it's a lively and picturesque modern town. Whether you want to see the Navy boys on parade, or wander through narrow lanes rich with 18th-century architecture, there's a lot worth seeing in Annapolis.

Edgar Allan Poe's Grave

The author lies under a 6ft (1.8m) white obelisk in the Westminster Churchyard in downtown Baltimore, four blocks north and eight blocks west of the Inner Harbor. Poe settled in Baltimore in 1831 with his aunt and her 11-year-old daughter Virginia Climm. Poe fell in love with the girl, which inspired a burst of literary energy, and when she approached the age of 14, he married her. He spent the next decade tending to her recurrent illnesses and drinking himself silly. After Virginia's death in 1847, Poe became even more tortured and haunted, and he died incoherent in Baltimore in 1849. An admirer decorates Poe's grave with roses and a bottle of cognac every year on the anniversary of his death (7 October).

St Michaels

Thickly settled around a trio of coves, St Michaels (population 1200), on Maryland's Eastern Shore, has been a vital port on the Chesapeake since the 1700s. This is the 'Town That Fooled the British'. The nickname comes from events during the War of 1812 when St Michaels citizens rigged a forest with lanterns to decoy British naval gunners into bombarding the wilderness while the actual town lay safe under a cloak of darkness.

From the water, St Michaels looks like a maze of coves. Beyond the town centre, dominated by a lighthouse and church spire, the shore is a mix of forest and a scattering of wharves leading to stately manor houses. Although the town has become gentrified, St Michaels is still the one place to come if you are short on time but still want to soak up Eastern Shore culture or put away beer and crabs. The Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum gives a vivid picture of the bay's maritime culture, and you need only look around the harbour shore to find a representative collection of working watermen, or travel up the road to Tilghman Island to see America's last fleet of working sailboats, the skipjacks.

St Michaels is about 60mi (100km) from Baltimore: shoot through Annapolis and over the Bay Bridge to the Eastern Shore. The town is 9mi (14.5km) west of Easton on Route 33.

Baltimore

Activities

Annapolis, 35mi (56km) south of Baltimore, is the sailing capital of the United States. If you know your way around a sailboat, you can probably find a place aboard someone's boat for the Wednesday evening or weekend races. There are limited sailing opportunities in Baltimore itself, mostly along the lines of a two- or three-hour bay cruise. If you must get on the Baltimore waters under your own steam, there are paddle boat rental outlets on the northern side of Inner Harbor, near the aquarium.

Cyclists can trundle around the country roads north of the city or take advantage of the Baltimore & Annapolis Trail Park, a 13mi (21km) trail that follows the old Baltimore & Annapolis Railroad route from Annapolis to Glen Burnie. Going to a baseball game is particularly enjoyable in Baltimore, though this is more for the enjoyment of the great retro Oriole Park at Camden Yards than for watching the erratic performance of the home team - the Orioles.

Baltimore

History

When the USA declared war on Great Britain in 1812, a British admiral proclaimed that 'Baltimore is a doomed town'. Through its history, the seaport has had its share of naysayers, but has always bounced back from adversity stronger than before. Established as a tobacco and flour-milling centre and named in 1729, Baltimore quickly prospered.

The city's glory has always been rooted in seafaring. With a congenial climate, a fine harbour, and access to first-rate shipbuilding timber, Baltimore developed rapidly in the 18th century as colonial America's shipping and shipbuilding centre, and went on to play a crucial role in the American Revolution. Not only did Baltimore ships and sailors make up the bulk of the privateer fleet that disrupted British supply lines, eventually bringing on the British surrender, but Maryland troops repelled a dramatic assault on Fort McHenry on 14 September, 1814. The victory here gave rise to the US national anthem, the lyrics of which recount Baltimore's - and all of America's - escape from the English.

Rebounding to become the second largest city in the US, Baltimore soon became the focal point of the Civil War when an attack on the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment saw the first bloodletting of the conflict. President Lincoln imposed military rule over the city, which was surrounded by a ring of guns - all pointing inward. The Civil War divided the loyalties of locals, and by war's end, Baltimore was suffering from the combined loss of lives and government support.

With the explosion of railroads in the late 19th century, Baltimore boomed again. Grain, iron, steel, shipping and oysters formed the backbone of the new industrial economy. In 1904 a fire destroyed the entire business district of Baltimore, and Baltimore again had to rebuild. Prospering once more, Baltimore was hard hit by the Great Depression of the early 1930s, stagnating due to the densely-packed, undereducated, unemployed population. Flourishing for a time during WWII and the economic boom of the 1950s, Baltimore was increasingly cursed by the problems of urban decay that afflicted many industrial centres at the time. By the 1960s, residents were fleeing to the expanding suburbs as sleaze and crime took over the downtown area. 'The Block' near Inner Harbor became renowned for all the wrong reasons as strip bars, prostitution and drug dealers took over. In response to the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr in 1968, the city was severely vandalised by angry mobs.

From the early 1980s, Baltimore again rose from the doldrums with a program of civic renewal that continues today. Regarded as one of the greatest success stories in US urban history, Baltimore is now a magnet for travellers drawn to this hard-working, ball-playing, no-nonsense city, with its blockbuster Inner Harbor attractions and energetic ethnic enclaves.

Baltimore

Getting There & Away

Baltimore-Washington International Airport is 16km (10mi) south of the city centre off Route 295. There's an easy-to-negotiate bus and light-rail connection to the city, or you can take a local train from the airport to downtown. Amtrak runs a service between the airport and Penn Station, which is on the border of North Baltimore. There are also shuttle buses between major Baltimore hotels and the airport.

Getting Around

Once you're in Baltimore, the public transport system is well integrated and easy to navigate. The most useful for travel within the city is the bus system. The light rail is a one-line train that runs north-south for 35km (22mi). It's most useful for commuting to/from the suburbs, although there are six stops more or less downtown along Howard St. The metro runs from Charles St Centre downtown out to Owings Mills. The stops downtown are along Eutaw St. The fare system for bus, light rail, and metro systems is identical; daily and weekly passes are available. Water taxis run a scheduled route with stops on the Inner Harbor, Little Italy and Fells Point. Pedicabs run within the inner city for negotiated fares.