Over the last two weeks we have visited four state capitols and one national, all of the state capitols were unplanned. Nashville, Raleigh, Richmond, and Annapolis. Having done no research on any of them, our opinion was formed solely on first hand experience. Each had its charm, but our favorite was Annapolis, Maryland. Perhaps because it is the smallest. Only 36,500 live in Annapolis while the other three capitol has over 200,000 (Nashville has over 600,000).
Annapolis was incredibly charming. It had the old brick streets making roundabouts around centuries old brick churches, government offices, and homes. In a lot of ways it reminds us of the beautiful city of Baltimore but on a more manageable scale. Annapolis has a harbor on the Chesapeake Bay but instead of the dock being filled with tourist ships, there are mostly small personal sail boats. 
On our walk about town we noticed the obvious tourist nature of the town. There were far too many fudge and t-shirt shops for one street. But there were also a lot of galleries and studios. We went to a clay gallery in which workers were firing pieces in the back and rows of bisque ware could be seen on the shelves. We even found a store with Northeast Iowa artist The Story People in the window.
We didn’t have a whole lot of time to spend in the city, but what we were able to experience brought a smile to our faces that had been missing the first part of the day.
Adventures with Lincoln 