Mystic Seaport and Rhode Island
Day 13:
We had a big hotel breakfast in Westport and headed to Mystic CT. Yes, Mystic, like in Mystic Pizza (no, we didn’t eat there – we were planning on a pizza night for dinner). We looked at a lot of places to go in Connecticut and originally had a campsite at Hammonasset Beach State Park, but after our Boston plans changed, so too did our Connecticut plans. We looked into New Haven and Yale, traveling the small towns in the area, maybe catching a glimpse of the Gilmore Girls gazebo, but we found the same recommendation from both travel sites and people we talked to along the coast. Mystic Seaport was the place to go.
When we got there it seemed pretty pricey for a museum, but Jeff paid since it was most of our day and I was finding bathrooms for the kids, again. We spent a lot of time in the museum area learning the history of boating. It was pretty fascinating. I actually found it really interesting that we all had different things we enjoyed about this space. My favorite was the history of the Patsy Green, a canoe a couple took up the coast of New England, camping along the way. It became such a spectacle the press took hold of the story and it was what popularized canoeing for sport. There was also a dugout oyster boat on display that is the oldest surviving watercraft found by archaeologists. It is 10,000 years old and was discovered in the Netherlands. Walking out of the museum, we expected to begin exploring the coast, watching some ships, instead, there were more museums to explore – the art of the sea, figureheads, etc. then beyond we began to see what this place really was. There was a whole shipping town built along the water. Each building could be explored like it was used – for those of you near Des Moines, kind of like Living History Farms, but think oysters, whales, ropes, shipbuilding… There are toy boat-making demos and wood carving, a place where you could raise the sail, learn about the history of oyster farming, look at how old vessels were built against how they are built now, take boat tours, and visit the oldest commercial whaling vessel. We couldn’t get to it all. It went on and on. However much research we do for these trips, we slipped on this one and missed what this all was. It was way beyond our expectations. We sat on benches at the entrance and had a late lunch of sandwiches and apples in the shade with a view of the water before moving on to Newport, RI.
Newport was… odd. We stopped at a sort of downtown-ish area. We walked through some shops. It was touristy. The boys had some ice cream. Ben found sunglasses he’s been looking for for a long time. We drove down Mansion Row and Sam dreamed of the house he will have when he becomes an MLB player, with one attached for mommy, dad can come too. Ben can come if he wants. Ben didn’t want to. We found a Little League field by the water to play catch and walked over to the beach. We stuck our feet in the sand, watched the boats on the water, and said goodbye to the ocean, we were heading inland from here. We drove back to Westport for the night, had pizza, played cards, took a swim in the pool, and relaxed in the hot tub again.
