Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Vacation Report, Part 2: A Mystic Tour

Maintop
After a comfortable night at a small hotel just south of the Tapanzee Bridge, we headed north Friday morning (July 14), across southern New York and into Connecticut.

Our day's destination was the historic town of Mystic, where we spent a morning at the Seaport and an afternoon at the Aquarium.

BowI love Mystic Seaport. I am a fan of sailing ships and the sea. I repeatedly devour historical, tall-ship novels. I love to wander among old sailing ships, wood, cordage and canvas.

Karen and the girls are less enamored, but they were good-natured about it. At one point, I was explaining the working of a ship's windlass to Christina. Her eyes lit up and she started to tell me about a scene in the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie. But she stopped short, remembering that I had not yet seen it. I saw the movie after we returned and there are, indeed, several scenes that make use of a windlass. I'm glad I was able to explain that to her a bit.

Jellyfishes
After lunch, we made the short drive to Mystic Aquarium. A well-put-together, if small and tourist-y place. Here we all were fascinated.

Swimming PenguinsChristina is a budding naturalist and Colleen loves the grace of many kinds of fish. She's always seen the beauty in jellyfish.

I love to watch the girls when they are deep into something like this. Their pleasure is a joy.

When we left the aquarium, after a full afternoon of touristicality, we cut across country to Hartford and up into Massachusetts.

We had dinner in Holyoke, near were my parents met as college students.

We headed north from there, towards our night's stay in southern Vermont.

1 comment:

Dave said...

Mike -- I spent a lot of time in my youth in southern RI and have very fond memories of many trips to Mystic. Thanks for reminding me.

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