Back to grass again! After being packed in at Jersey City, this campground feels spacious. Today Mark is going to work for awhile and Katie and I will explore Mystic a little.
Here is what we see out our window this morning.
Mystic is a small town that was settled (by Europeans) around 1650, and was a fishing port town with shipbuilders, whalers, oystermen and the like. A lot of building went on in the 19th century and the old wooden homes still stand, beautiful, individualistic homes built by/for carpenters and sea captains. Driving around town, the hundreds of old homes each have plaques on them stating the year they were built, for whom, and that person's trade, like:
1859
John Smith
Carpenter
I found myself slowing down to peer at them all. Here is one of the homes, shaped a little like a lighthouse:
Here's the town library, built 1893. Katie and I went inside for awhile, she played with their wooden toy barn and animals, then met their 15-year-old cat, Emily.
There is an old (1921) drawbridge in town, near the chi chi shops, notably a really wonderful toy store. We walked across to the toy store. here is Katie, hoping a boat will come so the bridge will go up:
No boats came, but after buying a cool magnifying glass and some drawing paper and a neato multi-colored pencil, Katie and I walked back over the bridge and up the street to Mystic Pizza, made very famous from the movie by that name. It was Julia Roberts' first film and she was the love interest, but I liked the performance of ________ better. If she's in a film, I know I'll like it. Remember "I killed Andy Warhol?" That was a weird one!
Anyway, here's Katie, showing how big a piece of pizza she wants. The pizza took a long time to come and was only okay, in case you are wondering how it was.
Saturday, May 7
Boy when the weather turns bad here on the New England coast, it really turns bad. Yesterday was cool and a little breezy, but nice. Today we wake up to rain and 50 mph winds, and the high is supposed to be 45 degrees (20 degrees below normal for this time of year).
We head to the local aquarium, to get out of the weather. When we get to the parking lot we see it's almost full: everybody else in town had the same idea. Then we find out it'll be $50 for us all to get in, and we can hear an outside show going on, so we won't be warm or dry afterall. Hmm, change plans.
There is supposed to be a May Day celebration (a little late, granted) today in town, so we try to find it. Mystic is a small town so we head to the drawbridge. There is a big banner over main street, saying that the events, including a bed race, will be "at the park," but, despite driving around every direction we can think of, we can't find the park. Hmm... so we start heading back to the RV, maybe it's just not meant to be fun today, and we pass Mystic Seaport Museum, a living history museum that looks quite big. I'm interested, but Mark's really not. It still means a lot of outdoors walking, with Katie. Then he offers to drop me off; it'll be my Mother's Day present, he'll take Katie for a few hours and I can see the museum. We're supposed to leave tomorrow (on Mother's Day) and drive to Plymouth or Boston, so that day will just be a travel day. I thank him and go find out what this place is about...
Mystic Seaport is very cool. They have about 50 buildings, many relocated from around town, many built in the 17th century, showing how the seaport area functioned long ago. They were "living" in about 1830 that day (maybe they always do). You could see folks working on ships in one building:
This ship is so big I still couldn't get all of it in the picture.
You could see the last remaining whaling ship of its kind, the Robert Morgan:
Each of the 200 ribs in its hull is made from the L of the trunk and largest root of a live oak, so it took 200 trees just for the ribs. Ya gotta hope that you're gonna catch a lot of whales when you're spending that kind of money.
Here is a crew of men who were hired to caulk the boats. They were the people actually living in town when those Victorians were built; now it's mostly shopkeepers and summer tourists:
Here is a woman helping to get a sail ready for the Robert Morgan. It takes 6 or 7 people just to carry each heavy canvas sail for the ship. They have old treadle Singer sewing machines to work on the sails. One was huge, from 1878.
Here's a shot of one of the little avenues in the museum:
Here's the blacksmith, whose job was to make harpoons, chains, and other stuff for the ships. His name is Craig and he loves what he does. He also loves history and learning about how things used to be done. He's got the Foxfire books, just like I do, and he told me a story about how he travelled all the way to Ireland to meet three brothers who still wove wool plaid (they call it something else but I forget). He'd seen a documentary 15 years before, that included them. One was dead by the time he made the trip, and he only found the other two by stopping into a local pub and asking the woman who owned the pub; she called around and then realized she knew the guys (they were since retired). He got to meet the two living brothers and see their old looms.
While he chatted with me, he made a hook for us to take and put in our old home or wherever we eventually settle down.
This last person was a docent in the general store, a building which really was the general store in town until the early 1950s. The 100-year-old owner had kept all his old stock and saved everything, so it was easy to "redo" it to the mid 19th century.
I had a great time chatting with Susanne here about quilting and crafting. She was given a quilt top by an old Japanese woman who must have sewed Hawaiian shirts in her youth: it was a crazy quilt of old Hawaiian shirt scraps. She finally finished the quilt (I wish I could see it) and now wants to give it to a Hawaiian museum or organization. She has lots of old stuff she has collected over the years, and her neices aren't too interested. I think I would be!
Saturday afternoon came but not the mail we are waiting for, so we have decided to stay till Monday. My museum admission will get Katie and I in for free on Sunday, so Mark can work and I can show Katie the neat stuff there.
Sunday, Mother's Day
Mark and Katie surprised me with a card and Alton Brown's new cookbook this morning. Wow how nice. After lollying around the RV awhile, Katie and I headed back to Mystic Seaport, but without the camera this time.
We went on the ships that were open (Katie loves going into the hulls and looking around) and then we found the children's museum part of the museum, and spent a couple hours there. everything there was handmade toys, games and puzzles made by the folks who work there, for kids. They had ropes you could learn to tie into sailor's knots, lots of wooden boats and clothespin people to work on them, nautical flags made of wood that you could use to spell your name, a big "boat" you can pretend to pilot and swab or paint or catch fish from. I want to make some fish like they did, out of canvas stuffed with stuffing and then painted, with a metal circle coming out of their mouths (shower curtain ring) so you can "catch" them with a metal clothes hanger "hook." Katie had fun climbing into her sea bunk and catching fish and playing with their huge wooden Noah's Ark full of animals. It was really great and the old ladies working there were very nice. A great way to end a fun time in Mystic.
This morning around noon the mail finally came for us. We're off to Plymouth, Mass, just south of Boston. More later!
PS: had a tight turn into a gas station in Providence, RI, and came within a half inch of scratching the paint off the RV. We actually banged the exhaust pipe against their steel protective bar. It's as close as we've gotten to a hit since Gettysburg. Whew! so far so good...once again Mark's good driving got us out. Great job!