Motat is a fascinating museum of transport and technology located in Western Springs a suburb of Auckland. It has an amazing collection of historic vehicles of all types and plenty of heritage and history which will entertain delight and fascinate visitors for hours. The large property is beautifully themed with many heritage style buildings and artefacts to give you a real feeling of what New Zealand was like years ago. There are some incredible vehicles on display from cars, trucks, planes, trains and trams, in-fact the tram is a working exhibit offering trips around the complex and to the nearby annex exhibition which houses many of the aircraft exhibitions. The site was once home to a huge pump which serviced Auckland’s water supply, today this incredible piece of Victorian machinery has been restored and is housed in an beautiful brick building looking more like artwork than a piece of machinery, it is really an incredible sight.  Motat also features a historic village with many small cottages all decked out with their heritage fittings and furnishings, they are very interesting and give you a real feel of how people lived years ago.

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http://www.motat.org.nz/

The beautiful Star of India is the world’s oldest active sailing ship and is the pride and joy of the San Diego Maritime Museum. Built in 1863 at the Ramsey Shipyard on the Isle of Man the ship was one of the first built of iron and was originally called Euterpe. As the Euterpe it suffered a bit of tragedy with a mutiny, collision and a nasty cyclone off the Bay of Bengal. The ship was also used in bringing emigrants to New Zealand, Australia and the Americas from England, Scotland and Ireland. The vessel even had time as a salmon hauler working in Alaska. Today she is the second oldest ship what is still sail worthy and the oldest iron hull merchant ship floating. The ship has been declared a United States Historic Landmark and still sails a couple of times a year.

A result of the cold war’s technology rivalry when the Soviet Union they copied many things the west made including the some pretty impressive technology including the Space Shuttle. Another of their copies was the Concorde, they produced a pretty similar supersonic get which they called the Tupolev TU-144. But they didn’t really pull it off to good and the plane was never certified to fly passengers. They had a bit of a media disaster at the Paris Airshow in 1973 where a TU144 fell out of the sky, break up and crash. They ended up using the plane for mail runs across Russia, then a second one crashed in 1978 followed by you guessed it a third a bit later and this was out of a fleet of 22 which included a prototype. The US ended up buying a few in the mid 90′s and refit them for testing of a future supersonic project. Today one of the remaining TU-144 is on display in Germany at the Auto & Technikmuseum at Sinsheim. Interestingly the craft is on display right next to a Concorde it is interesting to see how similar the aircraft are. For more information:  http://www.gizmohighway.com/history/tu-144.htm

Back in February on 1969 The city of Everett made history as the first Boeing 747 to fly. This aircraft was the first flying prototype to what would become one of the most successful aircraft in history with over 1400 of them sold over the last 40 odd years in various variants. The aircraft now lives back in Seattle only miles from where she was built in Everett. The plane is part of the wonderful collection that makes up the Museum of Flight at King County Airport just south of Seattle. The old girl is looking a bit tired and weary these days but the future looks bright although it may be a little time off. The Museum of Flight plan to build a new annex where a restored City of Everett will take centre stage regaining her former glory. Currently the Jumbo is parked in a lot open to the public with a 707 US Air force 1 Presidential Plane and Supersonic Concorde close by.

There are lots of legendary stories about Elvis and his plane but one of the favorite which gets told time and time again. Elvis was a bit hungry and needed his favorite peanut butter and jelly sandwich to quench his hunger, the only problem was the best sandwiches were in Denver. So Ron Strauss his pilot flew the Lisa Marie from Memphis to Denver to pick up enough sandwiches for Elvis’s snacktime.

The airplane is part of the extensive Elvis collection on exhibition as part of Elvis’s Graceland mansion in Memphis Tennessee. The plane sits next to the Hound Dog II which is a smaller aircraft Elvis also flew in. Nearly quarter of a million people visit Graceland every year to celebrate the life and times of Elvis and the Lisa Marie Convair 880 is one of the more popular attractions.

Longbeach California just to the south of Los Angeles is the resting place of one of what was one of the world’s grandest ocean liners. The RMS Queen Mary sailed the seven seas for just over 40 years until she was retired in 1967. Today the 1019 ft long liner is docked at Longbeach and has taken on a new role as a museum, restaurant and hotel. Many of the original splendor of the Queen Mary is intact including magnificent art deco hallways, ballrooms and function rooms.  The ship also boasts some stunning artwork including a huge transatlantic map which stands in the first class dining room which had lit up and showed the position of the ship as it cruised from London to New York. The cabins are not as luxurious as you would expect in a modern liner, but they are charming, a bit small but have good comfortable amenities. The Queen Mary is a unique accommodation experience and a very fun place to stay for anyone planning to spend a few days in Longbeach, San Diego or Los Angeles.   Interestingly the Queen Mary was owned by Disney for a period in the late 1980′s there was talk of the ship being the centrepiece of what would have become a ocean themed park. There is a striking resemblance to the Queen Mary in Tokyo’s Disneysea.. Maybe the Tokyo Park might have come out of concepts for what might have been in Longbeach.

No one does the sausage better than the Germans and to celebrate their skill in making these tasty cylindrical morsels the Deutsches Currywurst Museum has been set up in the Deutsch capital Berlin.  Berlin is proud of the sausage and claims to be the place where the Germany’s favourite sausage the Currywurst was invented. The brand new museum traces the history and legend of the sausage, its effects on culture, the ingredients (those that are mentionable) and offers all the smells and sights you would expect to experience in a sausage museum, and like any good museum they have a gift shop at the end of the museum where you can pick up some sausage treats and plenty of novelty items. The Currywurst museum is a fun and interactive look at the sausage and has some pretty fun displays including huge sauce drops and giant sausage and fries props, it is fun for young and old. The cinema is sure to be one of the museums highlights showing some great moments in sausage history with adverts, and a funny documentary called “Best of the Wurst”. The museum is self paced but does offer interactive tours which take about 45 minutes, currently they are only held in German but there are plans for English tours in the new year. Located on Schutzenstrabe the museum is very handy for the Berlin visitor being only 100 metres away from Checkpoint Charlie.

For more information: http://www.currywurstmuseum.de

Fair Lane is the property built by Henry Ford founder of the Ford Motor Company. Located in Dearborn a suburb of Detroit in the USA. Work commenced in 1913 and the Ford family moved in in January of 1916 and hundreds of craftsmen were used to construct the sprawling house all set in magnificent gardens and natural forest. Built of rough Ohio Limestone the house had some amazing technological and architectural features including its own hydro electric PowerStation, a bowling alley and magnificent carvings and lead lights. The budget for the residence was set at $250,000 but final cost blew out to a staggering $1.8 million dollars (remember that is 1916 money) and then there was another $175,000 spent on decorating. Today the estate is a National Historic Landmark and is owned by the University of Michigan and is open for tours by a dedicated team of volunteers.

The Guggenheim

Dating back to 1959 the Frank Lloyd Wright designed Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has become one of the best-known landmarks in New York City and is one of the 20th century’s most important architectural buildings. The Guggenheim Museum is home to a renowned permanent collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art as well as featuring special exhibitions throughout the year. The Museum is located on Fifth Avenue at the corner of 89th Street in the Upper East Side in New York City. The museum overlooks  Central Park and is great spot to start a walk across the park around the Central Park Reservoir across to Central Park West where you will run into the memorial to John Lennon. Known as Strawberry Fields, the memorial sits in the park opposite his old apartment building (The Dakota) on the opposite side of the park from the Guggenheim.

http://www.guggenheim.org/new-york