How important are Museums on your itinerary? (cathedrals, hotel, Amsterdam)

[arr430]

Personally, I have no interest in museums at all. I'd much rather be out in the street observing today's culture. "Being there" at historic places gives me no sense of presence. Custer's battlefield is just a pasture, and L'anse aux Meadows not much more, and Auschwits is an old building. If you get any more from them, I admire you for your imagination, which I don't possess.

Collection museums are just that, collections of old things, but I get that there are old things, but I don't need see them. Might be nice to handle them, but they don't let me. I'd love to hold and heft an 1880 baseball, but I don't want to look at one. But I did make an effort to see the house where Stan Musial grew up, and that was cool. And I threw a phone book on the porch of Amelia Earhart's house.

Art museums are OK, you can see features in originals you can't see in book plates.

So what attracts you to museums, and how many do you put on your agenda?

[WellShoneMoon]

I have a short attention span for museums, and not much interest in art. I don't intentionally put museums on my itinerary, but if there's an interesting small museum available I might take a look at it. For example, the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, or the American Writers Museum in Chicago.

Because I'm not interested in spending a lot of time in a museum, I probably won't go to one if the price of admission is steep. Free museums are great, because I don't feel I have to stay there long enough to get my money's worth. Last January I was in London, and it was cold, and I saw that the Natural History Museum was free (donations accepted), so I spent a few interesting hours there.

Sometimes the best thing about a museum is its restaurant/coffee shop.

[prospectheightsresident]

Very. That said, I tend to build my itinerary around food, so unless I find a good food spot (based on reviews, etc.) near a particular tourist attraction such as a museum, I don't see myself going out of the way to spend time at a museum, etc.

[Mightyqueen801]

Originally Posted by arr430

Personally, I have no interest in museums at all. I'd much rather be out in the street observing today's culture. "Being there" at historic places gives me no sense of presence. Custer's battlefield is just a pasture, and L'anse aux Meadows not much more, and Auschwits is an old building. If you get any more from them, I admire you for your imagination, which I don't possess.

Collection museums are just that, collections of old things, but I get that there are old things, but I don't need see them. Might be nice to handle them, but they don't let me. I'd love to hold and heft an 1880 baseball, but I don't want to look at one. But I did make an effort to see the house where Stan Musial grew up, and that was cool. And I threw a phone book on the porch of Amelia Earhart's house.

Art museums are OK, you can see features in originals you can't see in book plates.

So what attracts you to museums, and how many do you put on your agenda?

I do love museums, but I want balance. A museum here and there is great, but I too want to walk around a place and catch the current vibe.

I like history, and I do have an imagination, so I would stand there at Custer's battlefield and try to picture what it must have been like on that day. Never have been, but Gettysburg, and other lesser-known battlefields have interested me. I live about 20 minutes from where the Battle of Monmouth took place. There's a reenactment every year, but I've never been able to catch it.

It also depends upon what we are interested in. I wouldn't get excited over a sports museum, but I spent four hours in the now-closed National Museum of Crime and Punishment.

[reneeh63]

Museums and historical sites are very different things to me. Stonehenge - yes! The Parthenon - yes! Any kind of historical architecture - cathedrals, larger than life monuments...yes! But no, I don't want to see a pasture of some battle - maybe because I have no interest in military stuff.

From the same perspective I do like museums because they usually have great architecture but I pick ones with "things" I'm interested in - some may be having an exhibit from an artist that's not often seen (Frieda Kahlo when I was in London).

Or it may not even be "historical" - I don't know why people think all museums are old and musty things. Some are science-oriented or modern art, some are even modern musical artists - I saw a fantastic exhibit a few years ago in Chicago about David Bowie! What about the Cleveland Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?

Some folks have very narrow definitions about museums and maybe pride themselves on being people that want to "live among the living"?

I do like museum cafes...and if the weather turns bad, they can be a great refuge rather than spending the day stuck in your hotel.

[flyonpa]

11.4%

Some are good, Some are Bad. Depends on the trip.

Story:

My son and I were driving thru Wisconsin after a week on a lake in Minnesota, No real hurry to get to MSP as we had a late flight ~8p (Also wanted my 13yo Son to see Non/Interstate parts of the US). We stopped in a small town for ice cream, and the town library and museum were across the street. We had time to kill, so we went over. The Museum was closed, but the librarian on duty open it for us. Was a nice little museum with some nicely made displays about the history of the town, and some of it people who became "Famous". We were about to go when a car came screeching into the parking-lot. The woman who ran the museum has been called in by the Librarian. (We were probably the 1st ones to visit it in months?) , We were stuck, But she was nice and gave us a personal tour for next 20 mins.

[Chava61]

I prefer to go to museums that have physical objects rather just paintings (or just art). But I prefer to do short museums visits and then do something else with the rest of my day.

[Sand&Salt]

Depends.

We loved the museums in Italy with the great iconic sculptures but even those got tiring after awhile. I guess I'm only good for a couple hours then feel inundated.

I discovered I much prefer 3-D statues to paintings. I was so satiated by the Uffizi Museum in Florence, I thought I'd drop (and almost nowhere to sit). But I sat starting at the statue of David for an hour.

But I like car museums, science museums....I guess most of them except for modern art.

[mathjak107]

It depends ...art not so much ...dinosaurs and stuff like the spy museum , military museum ,etc , I love

Here in nyc we have all kinds of museums ...I even went to the sex museum

[Nonesuch]

Originally Posted by reneeh63

I do like museum cafes...and if the weather turns bad, they can be a great refuge rather than spending the day stuck in your hotel.

I generally have a couple museums on the itinerary, sometimes just as backup plans for rainy days. How important they are greatly depends on the quality of the museum and how crowded they are going to be.

I have made exceptions for certain art and military museums, for example I took an overnight trip out of Amsterdam to The Hague mostly to visit Escher in Het Paleis, in London I set aside a morning for the Churchill War Rooms. Neither had a particularly notable café.

Originally Posted by prospectheightsresident

Very. That said, I tend to build my itinerary around food, so unless I find a good food spot (based on reviews, etc.) near a particular tourist attraction such as a museum, I don't see myself going out of the way to spend time at a museum, etc.

One reason I like visiting historical breweries and distilleries, you get a dose of history with your alcohol. Just about every trip I take includes at least one notable beverage manufacturer, sometimes it is the whole reason for the trip --
Just before COVID I built an entire trip to Ireland around spending a day at the 1825 distillery in Cork. I hope to do something similar for Scotch whisky once normal travel resumes.