Newport RI

Whoops - this is a month delayed and a long one! Back in early November we took a trip down to Rhode Island. It's not too far away - love Boston!  Newport, RI was the happening spot for the richies back in the day. They have 7 'summer cottages,' aka mansions, for the normal person to tour. The rest of the area is filled with other huge cottages that richies still own. I wanted to tour three cottages, but Dave wouldn't have been to handle more than one. I had to pick the 'best' one. So to The Breakers we went!

The Breakers was completed in 1895. It took only two years to build the whole thing, and it's like 20,000 sq ft. or so. The Vanderbilts owned this home...so Gloria Vanderbilt's grandparents built it, I believe. Unfortunately we couldn't take pictures once inside the building. They give you individual audio tours, which took a little under an hour. This place was unbelievable! So ornate and over the top. Gold and platinum on the walls incorporated in the wallpaper. Wood used from all over the world, bedrooms that are as big as our house. The list goes on.  Oh, but my favorite extravagance was definitely the marble tub in Mr. Vanderbilt's bathroom. If he wanted to take a hot bath, his staff would have to fill it full 6 times with hot water before he could use - it took that long for the marble to heat up enough to be comfortable!  Of course, Dave said he wants one of those when we build our house. lol

The front gates are made with wrought iron and are impressively huge. They also have another set of these at the side entrance. The side entrance gates were down to be worked on. It took them over a week to dismantle, using a crane etc, because they are so heavy!

This side of the house faces the vast Atlantic Ocean!

 Dave on the patio of the Breakers.

The huge yard looking out at the ocean. They had all sorts of parties back in its heyday. I wish I could have seen it.

After our tour of the ostentatious Breakers that some called a tasteless exhibit of money (which by the way Dave was ready to buy ... typical American!), we did something Dave would enjoy - Tennis!  We briefly wandered the grounds and he saw a nice grass court up close. We were too cheap to buy tickets for the museum, but it was worth just wandering.

With our stomachs growling we headed to downtown Newport. It has all sorts of shops, restaurants, one way streets, and the like. We happened upon the White Horse Tavern. It looked pretty decent. We walked into an extremely dark room with ceilings about 7 ft tall and a huge fire warming the restaurant. The food was amazing! It happened to be restaurant week in town, so we got an appetizer, delicious lunch, and yummy dessert for $15 each - well worth it.  While we sat there we read a history of the tavern. It is the oldest tavern in the U.S.  It definitely seemed old :) but how cool that we ate there and didn't even realize it!  We bought a pint glass from there - how could you not?!

While heading back to the 'summer cottages' to do the cliff walk, we drove past the structure below. I bet few know about this structure.... but it made my heart skip a beat! A couple years ago while watching the History channel they discussed the origins of this, the Newport Tower. The origins have been argued for centuries. Some believe the vikings built it when they discovered the U.S and used as a lookout or cairn landmark (I thought this was the case after watching the HC). Others are convinced it was a windmill Benedict Arnold (the great grandfather of the Benedict Arnold most have heard of) built for his farm. They've done carbon testings and all sorts of tests, but there is still no definitive answer.  Love it.

 It's crazy to see the stones up close!

So, as you can see, back to the Breakers for the Cliff Walk! The Cliff Walk is about 7 miles roundtrip I think. You walk along the edge of the ocean in front of all the huge 'summer cottages.' What a perfect way to see these secluded homes! We started at the Breakers and began walking a portion of it - about a 1 mile trek.

How could I not take another picture of the Breakers in the late afternoon with families playing on the lawn?!

 Dave enjoying the water breaking on the cliffs.

Part of the path had a nice stone wall... other areas were sketchy looking fences, mucky tunnels, or really narrow right against the cliff.

This gazebo was half a football field away from the main house, and people on the path could look right into it. Maybe it's cool to have a structure right by the water, but who wants to have all these people walking by you and staring?

Another house we could have toured was the Marble house. We'll have to go back in the spring when their Chinese Tea house is open. It was an interesting sight to see this on the Atlantic ocean.

Ok, so this is just a silly picture of Dave walking through one of the mucky tunnels. After I took this I couldn't stop laughing. We had just watched Halloween the weekend prior and this made me think of Michael Myers.  Dave embodies MM here and it's way freaky to me.

We turned around and headed back to the Breakers. Can you see it in the background?  It's the dark red roof with a bunch of chimneys. It's just such a big building - I still can't get over it.

Oh, and our last stop was to the front gate again. I wanted a picture of me by it to provide some perspective. Can you even see me? :)

 

Rhode Island tip of the day: If you are a young, pretty female working at a bar - watch out for Marine guys from the Newport base! While at the White Horse Tavern there was a Marine guy sitting next to us at the bar. This guy would not leave our poor waitress alone. He kept telling her she was beautiful, and right before he left he asked to take a picture of her - say what?!?! We were a little creeped out, especially since we heard him talking to someone else about his girlfriend in Chicago and going home to see her and her child. Weird.

Freedom Trail

This post is a little delayed....  We traveled on the Freedom Trail 3 weeks ago in downtown Boston. It's about a 2.5 mile tour throughout all of Boston. Since it can take 3+ hours to walk it, Dave suggested we bike it instead. Biking around downtown was awesome!  You get around so much quicker and it's a lot of fun.

Throughout all of Boston there is either a yellow painted line or a nice red brick line to guide you through the tour. It was extremely helpful to know where to go next. :)

Our first stop was the Public Garden. Dave found an ice cream vendor outside of the park, so of course he needed to purchase some!

Next we biked where John Kerry has an abode.  These houses were all right next to each other, but looked pretty expensive!  On the top of the hill was the Capital. Every year Boston spends a lot of money refinishing the gold top! It was made of wood, but in order to stop it from leaking they began covering it with gold.

The cemetery where Paul Revere, Sam Adams, and others were buried was surrounded by all these large buildings. So odd to see these old headstones sandwiched between buildings.

Kings church was used by the British. The beams look like some beautiful type of stone, but really it is wood painted to look like stone.  Neat trick, huh? :)

The Old State House below was originally used for the British until the Revolutionary War. In here the concepts of 'taxation without representation' and the 4th Amendment, 'no unreasonable search and seizure' started here!

The Custom House Tower was built in the early 1900s. There was an unwritten rule that no building could be built higher than the tower. Unfortunately in 1964, the Prudential Tower was built taller than the Custom House Tower. Lame!  Now this tower is the 17th tallest building.

We wandered past Faneuil Hall and the nearby markets. We'll have to spend some more time down there because there's so much to see and do right here! Ok, trivia time.... what is on top of the weather vane on Faneuil Hall??  Give up?  You must be a British spy!!!!

 

The answer is: a grasshopper! The grasshopper was a 'shibboleth' during the Revolutionary period. If the suspected spy knew the grasshopper was on top of Faneuil Hall, they were free, if not they were convicted as British spies.  You better remember the grasshopper... :)

We biked to the oldest part of town where the roads are uneven brick and barely fit one car down the lane.  We saw Paul Revere's home, but didn't go into the musuem. We should have though - it isn't that expensive to get into. Look how funny it is, though, this building from 1680 is just chilling right up against a much younger building.

Since Paul Revere's house is right by Little Italy, we stopped at Mike's Pastry. Dave's coworkers raved about this place and man is it happening! We waited in a big line for 15+ minutes, and actually got serenaded by a guy's college acapella group. Not just us... there was a large group enjoying them singing Coldplay. :)

The canoli and tiramisu were huge!  We could hardly finish them. Were they the best we ever had? No, but they were delicious and crazy big, and it was fun to experience this packed out place.  Mom - just got your letter today about Mike's Pastry... we've been, as you can see, but can't wait to take you when you visit. :)

Old North Church was one of our last stops. Thankfully it was free, so we went inside. :) Each family had their own 'box.' The door/walls of the box were quite high (4ish feet maybe) and could fit 6ish people. You had a little lock on your door, too. All I thought was, I can hardly see over the wall to look up to the pulpit - how did people not just take a little snooze in their boxes... seemed quite easy cause no one could see you!

Last stops were over the bridge to the Bunker Hill monument and Old Ironsides. There's Dave biking on the road over the scary bridge. I biked on the sidewalk ... too scared to be biking next to cars on a bridge.

If there isn't a long wait, the USS Constitution is worth it!! It was one of 7 warships commissioned by George Washington and is the oldest functioning ship in the US. They said they actually took it out on the water the day before we were there. It takes a couple hundred people to run the ship - there are ropes everywhere, so it kind of makes sense.

Some of the original cannons.

 

 Dave chilling on the boat, notice all the rope!

 Yay! End of the trip and a quick self portrait. :)

Oh! Boston tip of the day: If you do end up going to the USS Constitution make sure you bring your license and be prepared to experience mini airport security. We had to show a valid license/passport, scan our bags, walk through a metal detector, and get wanded (if necessary). Definitely wasn't expecting that!  FYI - you could keep your shoes on :)

Breakdown Lane

I had an appt this morning south of us. This meant I had to drive down I-95 during rush hour. I was overly prepared and gave myself tons of time. Well, going south on I-95 was not bad at all, thankfully!  On the way home obviously I had to go north (still during 'rush hour'). Going north had what I would call a pretty significant amount of cars... :)

So merging onto the highway was kind of weird. Cars seemed to be a lot closer to me, but I merged on and didn't think much about it. As I'm driving along I start seeing cars passing me in the break down lane. What in the world? Why are all these people being illegal?! I thought, well maybe they're just being illegal for a little bit until their exit ramp comes up.  Nope, no one got off the exit.

I started paying more attention and looked ahead - ok, the breakdown lane was just as packed as the other 3 lanes. An example pic (albeit much less crowded) of what I was seeing. Sooo weird!

A little further down there was actually a sign (similar to below) saying you could drive in the breakdown lane between 6am-10am and 3pm-7pm from Monday-Friday.

 

It's kind of a clever idea for Mass to try to handle the insane amount of cars during rush hour! Although be forewarned, this doesn't happen on all highways or even in all spots of highways... so don't read this post and think when you visit us in Mass you can just drive in the breakdown lane all day long. :)

I don't know if this is really something that could be used in MI. I mean it would be useful, but I don't think MI drivers could handle it. I know I was too afraid to drive in it. haha  Plus it would need to be clean... no random tire pieces or junk, etc.

Boston Tip of the Day: Bostonians feel Detroit is being ridiculous about Thanksgiving Day.  Let me explain a little bit.... while slowly driving in rush hour the radio peeps brought up how Nickelback was going to sing at halftime at the Detroit Lions game on Thanksgiving Day. They then noted that people in Detroit are all pissed and want a talented person from Detroit to perform.  This is when the radio guy brings up that Detroit needs to just calm down, not worry about hearing the only Detroit artists, Kid Rock or Eminem, and stop shooting your residents.  Ok, the shooting residents was a little ridiculous, but I couldn't stop laughing!!! Hearing another state talking about my Detroit was so hilarious to me... I felt like 'I know Detroit, we aren't all crazy there!'   Wow, long explanation for my tip of the day- whoops :)

Dave's Experiment

For those of you who don't know Dave too well, he likes to experiment. Let me give you a couple examples... raw milk - a recent blog of mine :), crazy diets with low sugar and no white carbs (which actually works well for us both!), super intense workouts, training for a marathon with no further distance trained than 12 miles.

His most recent experiment is to bike to work 15 miles each way. Luckily there is a decent path for most of the trip right along the Charles river. 

This all started when Dave got sick of feeling a little stressed while going on the T. It wasn't always reliable, would be so full he'd have to wait for two more trains, etc. He wanted to do something that he'd think would be more reliable. There are a lot of people that bike around downtown, and a coworker of his bikes about 15 miles into work.  So the experiment begins.... :)

This weekend he had a test run. He got all geared up and figured out the 15 mile trek. He had a couple detours, but got to his building in an hour and 27 minutes. Then I picked him up, he got some yummy sticky buns from Flour bakery by his work, and we drove on back home.

Attire: Hat, helmet, aviators, scarf, gloves, smartwool long sleeve base shirt, fleece, outer shell, long underwear, track pants

I wanted to highlight here that in order for his track pants to not get caught in the chain he used my headbands. :)

 So like I said, he made it to his building! Pretty cool, Dave.  But of course, this new experiment costs a little bit of money. Dave said now he doesn't have to pay for the trains, and it should even out in a couple months - so fingers crossed. So like I said, since Dave plans to bike throughout the winter he has to buy some items. So he needs some warm base layers, bike fenders, a bike rack, clear glasses/goggles to protect his eyes, waterproof shoes, and front and rear lights. He has about half of these things already. 

The one I'd like to point out is the crazy bright front light. So Dave comes home and says this was kind of expensive, but it's a safety feature, so it's important.  'Was it like $50?' 'Hmm, a little more.' 'So more like $100?' '(Smile)... a little more' 'What?? Like how much?' 'Well it was $150, but remember it's a safety feature.'  ... So for any of you who would like to do this kind of experiment, be prepared to spend a little bit of money for safety features. :)

And in case you are curious, Dave has been riding his bike to and from work this week. He's loving it - although it's pretty decent cool weather for biking right now. Unfortunately today the bathroom stalls were all full so he decided to change out in the open.  He said nicely dressed middle aged men kept walking in!!! He said he thought they all looked at him like he was homeless. lol  If anything interesting happens on his bike rides, I'll most likely share. :)

Boston Tip of the Day: There are a lot of hills around Boston! Dave bikes uphill for the last couple miles - it's crazy!  Oh, except he does luck out in downtown because long ago they filled in the ocean with a bunch of dirt to make Boston bigger (fun fact!!), so it's nice and flat.

Maine

We wanted to head north to see some nice fall colors.  Unfortunately we probably needed to drive like 4 more hours north to see nice colors.... but we still had a great time! Maine is beautiful.

Our first stop was Kittery, just over the border of Maine. There's a huge outlet mall area. We stopped for a bit and bought a couple things, we didn't go to crazy shopping.  We wandered from Kittery and drove through York, a cute small town.

The main destination was next - Portland!  Did you know that Portland, Oregon is purposely named after Portland, Maine?  Fun fact for you.  Oh also, another fun fact... Maine has more ocean coast then California!  I couldn't believe it, but if you look close at Maine on the map, you'll see tons of little islands and peninsulas.

Ok, so we drove through downtown Portland right by the water, and it looked packed. Well, we quickly found out why when we saw a huge cruise ship! Dave has never seen one - he couldn't stop looking at it. It was pretty cool. We wonder how it compares to the Titanic in size...

It was time for lunch! We could have got some yummy lobster, but we weren't that hungry. We stopped by this small restaurant on a pier. Dave had lobster bisque and I had a shrimp-avocado wrap. Delicious.

While wandering Portland we walked on a couple historic cobblestone roads. They were quite bumpy and uneven. No wonder horse drawn carriages would 'break down!'

We have to go back to Portland. There was this stretch of shops that had old school candy, amazing fudge (we got creamsicle!), gelato, and homemade cupcakes. We filled up on some good sweets on our Saturday 'Cheat Day.' :)

And guess what else we found?!  Bubble tea! I haven't had Bubble tea in years, and here it was. I got Mango flavored - so good.

We had to walk off some of these sweets so we strolled along the shoreline and got a couple nice pics of old docks.

Our last stop in Portland was to see a lighthouse. We drove out to the Portland Head Light. You can get some really good views of it - close up, far away. This part of the ocean is just so different from the Lake MI we're used to. There are rocky cliffs and waves crashing and swirling around. I could have sat there all day.

 

Our final destination was just north of Portland.. Freeport.  I had to see the LLBean flagship store that is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year! Like what in the world do the employees do there at 2am? There were actually 3 LLBean stores there for different things, and they were quite large. We didn't buy anything, but it was kind of cool to see. Freeport has tons of other outlet malls, too. We only bought a new backpack at the North Face. :)

It was hitting sunset pretty quick, and we wanted one last look of the ocean. We found a park to head to, but it was closing their gates at 6, it was 5:40.  We parked quick and literally ran through the woods down to the water. It was indescribable. It was like running through a wind tunnel to get to the shore! It was lots of fun. Dave struck a pose without even knowing it. :)

 Dave thought the seaweed was really gross, but I loved the vibrant colors... so there you go.

We decided to take a couple pics of us together. They all turned out blurry (whoops!) but since these pics are little I don't think you can really tell. ;)

If you can, you need to check out Maine. Lots of nice little towns and it's just awesome driving around the area.

New England tip of the day: If you have the Mass Pike 'FastLane' (like we do) you can use it all over the place! Including NH, ME, IL, NJ, NY... and others.  While driving on the NH turnpike we didn't think our 'FastLane' would work on the NH 'EZPass.' So we waited in a 8 minute line to pay cash. The booth teller guy practically yells at us that we have 'EZPass' and can go through ..aka 'stop wasting my time'.  Alrighty - we learned our lesson! :)