Good museums always take me back....

Whenever I visit a good museum (for example the Pacific War Museum in Fredericksburg, Texas) it always reminds me of my time in London, where you are practically surrounded by wonderful museums all the time.

Last weekend I had that feeling again, when I got to visit Denver's wonderful Museum of Nature and Science, and their special Pompeii exhibit.

It wasn't my first trip to this great museum. A few years ago we saw a special Titantic exhibit there that still gives me chills when I recall it.

And its regular exhibits are first-rate, too. I'm sure that their Gems & Minerals area must have been under construction when I was there before, because it was new to me. And this type of stuff is usually what I head for first in a science museum.

I was particularly impressed with the quality of the scientific side of these exhibits. Not just a lot of pretty rocks on pedestals; they display a lot of chemical and geological information alongside. Really top-notch!

And, speaking of rocks, I did make a return visit to this "gem" of a room tucked away up on the 3rd floor, accidentally discovered on my first trip to the museum. It's a collection of carved gems, minerals and other natural elements that I find endlessly enchanting.

The artist is Vasily Konovalenko, and I can confidently bet that you've never seen anything like these pieces, unless you've been to the only other exhibit of his work, in Moscow. There's just one example on the right. Check out the museum web page that I've linked to for more, and much better, photos of these unique artworks.

But the main attraction for us on this most recent visit was the Pompeii exhibit. I'd seen one about Pompeiian artifacts a few years ago in a Houston art museum, and wasn't sure if this one would show me anything new. But it did! For one thing, there were a great many more of the poignant body casts, made by filling holes made when the volcano's victims were buried in ash and then decomposed. These casts make the human element of the tragedy so very real:

Another new item was a series of computer-generated videos that give you virtual tours of some of the buildings, showing what they must have looked like in Pompeii's glory days. The climax was a very well-done visualization of the course of the eruption. Wow! Not only was it exciting and scary, but it did a very good job of explaining how the tragic day unfolded, and why so many people logically decided to stay and shelter in the city's buildings rather than fleeing. When it became obvious that's what they should have done, it was too late.

Of course, the tragedy of Pompeii resulted, ironically, in a treasure-trove of Roman artifacts and artworks, better preserved than practically anywhere else. These artifacts made up a large part of the exhibit, and there were many fascinating objects.

Isn't it hard to believe that something as beautiful as this vase survived the conflagration?

And some of the mosaics were vivid reminders of our trip to another Roman city, Bath, in the fall of 2008. The mosaics were some of my favorite items in that museum, too.

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I'll be blogging soon about other activities during my quick trip to Denver in my Hometown Tourist blog.