New England Fall 2017
We were overdue for a “girl’s trip” with Mom and Linda so the planning went into place with Deedee our cousin invited to fill in as a fourth. We settled on Mayflower tours for the fall foliage in New England and decided to throw in a few days in advance for New York!!
Sept 27-28th: Linda and I fly down to San Diego after a successful meet up for the connecting flight in Sacramento. Unfortunately I discovered later that my tablet did not connect with us and was left on the plane from Portland. (Like mother, like daughter…). We had a nice visit with Rose and Steve before heading to mom’s place.
The next morning - our delayed flight takes off for a direct flight to Newark, New Jersey. To make up for the delay our funny flight attendant offered us free alcohol! Oh boy! Later in the flight he had to say to mom “The bar’s closed Flanigan”.
We were feeling good by the time we took a cab to our apartment in New York. In fact I carried on a conversation with the Uber driver all by myself. Deedee asked at one point - “Are we on a famous street or something???”. Uber by the way worked out great!
Sept 29th:
We ended up with a rare 2 bedroom, 2 bath apartment in midtown Manhattan. Though it was a bit more of a walk to Times Square it was certainly worth having an extra bathroom and a bit more room. There was a nice view from the upstairs rooftop:
The Hop on Hop off bus
We stopped by a bagel sandwich stop and then figured out our way to Grand Central Station. What a place!
We decided to just continue walking to Times Square and signed up for the bus ride. We “hopped off” in Soho for a lunch experience in a more residential area. We experienced a very different and delicious corn on the cob covered with cheese and spices. Wonderful!
We are getting ready to eat - aren’t we happy.
A close up - these were just delicious!
Then we had to fit in a bit of shopping at the Glo place with nice lightweight warm garments with an excellent selection. We had thought about going to Hell’s Kitchen - isn’t this a restaurant based on the TV show? Well fortunately we didn’t ask where the restaurant was located as it is actually a suburb of Manhattan.
9/11 was our next stop - it was quite an experience to see the actual site where the buildings fell and walk through the museum
A nice waterfall effect with names of those who died in the building around the edges.
The staircase that survived
“NO DAY SHALL ERASE YOU FROM THE MEMORY OF TIME”
Then we finished our bus ride around to the stop nearest our apartment and then a search for dinner. Italian tonight - delicious pizza!
Saturday Sept 30th: The subway ride to the boat ride to see the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island
Well it turned out it was Yom Kippur and we had the unpleasant surprise that the Hop on Hop off Bus was NOT operating that day!!! Grrrrr!!! They sure didn’t inform us of this. Of course another bus company was pleased and ready and waiting to take our money. We decided to experience the New York subway instead. Of course we were befuddled about what to do and how to do it but with some help we figured it out. So….we were on the subway and at the last minute a small group of musicians got on and played some music! Fun!!
We made our way to the ticket booth for the boat ride to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty (after repeatedly fighting off sales people eager to sell you tickets for a higher price!). We decided not to get off at the Statue of Liberty but rather to totally enjoy it from the water.
There was some confusion amongst some of us as the Statue of Liberty was thought to be on Ellis Island. Well pretty quickly this confusion was cleared up as we arrived at Ellis Island (after seeing the Statue of Liberty on another island). We decided to disembark and boy were we glad! It was really interesting to see how immigrants were “processed” during the early 1900s. For example their eyes were closely examined to rule out a parasitic eye disease. So logically Linda thought that the “hearing room” was thought to be where hearing was tested. Oh how funny as it was actually where they were heard about their individual cases for immigration.
The Registry Room
And then back to the subway home and Chinese food
Sunday October 1st: Uptown on the hop on hop off bus, Times Square at night.
After calling to make sure they were back up and running we were off to our bus tour again. This time we took the uptown tour through Harlem and around central park and back (through a lot of traffic).
After getting off in Times Square it was time to see about getting discount show tickets. Unfortunately some of the bigger shows were dark on Sundays so we settled on a smaller production “A Perfect Murder”. But first a chicken pot pie at an Irish bar followed by some exploring around Times Square. Interesting sights! The show was good but in a small theatre so if and when I return to New York I have something leftover to do - a big production!
Waiting for the show to start!
Then we experienced Times Square at night (all of those lights and crowds!) followed by listening to some great music back at the Irish bar.
And of course the splits
Monday Oct 2nd: Central Park
We had a beautiful day in the very, very large Central Park in New York. There is a “castle” in one location and “strawberry fields” in honor of John Lennon in another area.
And a few miscellaneous pictures from New York:
Me forgetting to take off my nightgown before putting on my top!
Bikes are a better choice if you lived here - just look at those parking costs. Yikes!!!
Tuesday Oct 3rd: We fly to Boston
The Uber service came in handy again today. We had ordered it up in advance but to the wrong airport! Fortunately we figured it out in advance and we were able to change the destination in time! Everything went smoothly after that and we checked into our hotel rooms and went downstairs to the bar for a drink. Did you know that Massachusetts does not allow happy hours in the state? We made a grand entrance into our tour group’s dinner room - Late! Somehow we got the time wrong - oh great the group already thinks we are a bunch of dunderheads….
Wednesday Oct 4th: Tour of Boston, Plymouth Rock and arrival at Cape Cod
We went for a walking tour of Boston - following part of the Freedom Trail and going by Paul Revere’s house and the North Church. This was followed by a lunch time stop at Faneuil Hall and onward travel to Plymouth and Cape Cod.
The brick “freedom trail” leading to a variety of sights throughout Boston
Paul Revere’s house
And statue of Paul Revere
A very old graveyard and those poor headstones tilting all over…
An interesting reflection of a building on a building in downtown Boston
The Quincy market near Faneuil Hall where we obtained our delicious “lobsta rolls”
Happily eating our lobster rolls
Monument to the forefathers
Now you can appreciate the size of the monument with us in the picture
And the monument with a hand towards the sun
Plymouth Rock 1620
View from our hotel in Cape Cod out to the water
Oh wow - lobster feed!!
Bibs on and ready to dig in! Good thing they had some instructions on how to get to the delicious meat of the lobster! The lobsters were brought in live earlier that afternoon so they were certainly fresh. What a great end to the day!
Thursday Oct 5th: Martha’s Vineyard
Up and at ‘em so we can catch the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard. Apparently there were a lot of vines on the island so the British explorer named it after his infant daughter Martha and the many vines. After a relatively smooth ferry ride we loaded on our bus (which rode the ferry with us) and headed on an exploration of the island. We visited Oak Bluffs where there is a well preserved collection of Methodist camp meeting houses in the gingerbread style. This community not surprisingly has pretty strict rules (no wild parties here!)
Very cute homes
We celebrated Deedee’s birthday in Edgartown at a restaurant near the water
Happy Birthday!!!
Then we traveled to another part of the island to view Gay Head Cliffs for a beautiful view.
Gay Head Cliffs panorama
Friday Oct 6th: Newport Rhode Island and the Breakers mansion
And off we go to Rhode Island and the town of Newport where mansions are everywhere along the coast. A particularly spectacular one was the Breakers mansion and it so happens we were able to tour the mansion.
A painting of the original owner who of course was quite rich, Mr. Vanderbuilt
Extraordinary detail everywhere you looked
Nice backyard!! Quite a lawn to mow though……
Saturday Oct 7th: The Backroads of Vermont
And now the real purpose of the trip begins - fall foliage!! We lucked out as they recently had a cold snap that turned the leaves almost overnight. We stopped in several small country towns and visited the Vermont Country Store where we had our group picture taken.
That’s our bus in the foreground
How cute is this?
Taken on our drive - nice reflection!
What a group!
Love the reds as part of the fall foliage!
Our New Hampshire condo for 2 nights
Sunday Oct 8th: Mount Washington Cog Railway and Kancamagas Scenic Byway
Today was a bit wet and interfered with our train climb to the top of Mount Washington. Oh well - everything can’t be perfect. We still had a good day and later in the afternoon the sun even came out to enhance the beautiful scenery!
This is what it would have looked like if we had made it to the top! Next time……
Love these colors!
Clowns in the foreground, covered bridge in the background…
And she does it again
Beautiful view from the balcony of the room
Monday October 9th (Columbus Day): Lake Winnipesaukee cruise and Kennebunkport
Today we took a cruise across a beautiful lake with quite a few little islands that were inhabited and finished up in the town of Wolfeboro where we had lunch with a view of the water.
An island on the lake - the perfect size for a solitary house and yard
Dancing on the boat
Walking around Wolfeboro (in the rain of course)
Tuesday Oct 10th: We all fly home
A few additional notes on the trip:
The “simpleton sisters” - We are pretty sure that our guide secretly thought that we might be a little “slow”. After all, we did have to ask what she meant by a “pond”. We did not see one when she pointed it out but of course we were probably too busy talking and laughing at the time and didn’t look in time. We over-thought this and thought maybe it had a different meaning. She was quite diplomatic when asked what a pond was and stated with a straight face: “A pond is a body of water…..” while thinking I am sure “oh dear, we have a slow one here”. We noticed on our next stop our room number was “simple” - 1234. Do you suppose there was a connection?
Is your mother here??? This occurred in a conversation between Linda and the guide about the guide’s mother who recently passed. Our guide asked “Is your mother here?”. Yeeees…...she is right in that seat back there. Of course she was flustered as she had forgotten we were traveling with our mother and that she indeed is quite alive and very frisky.
Movie on the bus: During a lot of traffic on one of the days she showed a really good, true movie called MacFarland with Kevin Kostner.
And so ends another wonderful girl’s trip!!!!!!