We only arrived at Sandwich in the evening, after dinner, and with only 30 mins before pool closing time. The kids had never the less used all of that 30 mins in the water, and the first thing on thier mind in the morning was more pool time.
We had to do a re-pack of sorts, so Justin did that while I took the kids to the pool. It is always a bit rushed in the morning leaving a hotel, as you have check out time, and the desire to get on the road to the next destination, so every day we had to do that required focus and good time management.
We got on the road and stopped at the supermarket to get some driving supplies. The breakfast at the hotel had been ordinary, but it was at least available.
It was here that we saw one of the funniest sights on the trip. Well, it may not have been that funny, but we got a good half hour of jokes out of it.
I always joke about the over the top nature of schools and lunches these days at home, I’ve even called the teachers in the Kindy the Sandwich Police. Today, we found evidence that such a thing really existed. Beware of putting any unauthorised fillings between bread today.
From Sandwich we made our way down the glorious Massachusetts coastline. It had been one of our regrets that by this time we had been unable to get to an American football game. The closest we got was in Hartford, but we were hours behind schedule and couldn’t do it. We tried many times to find a game to coincide with our destinations, but it just wasn’t happening.
We tried college and NFL, and it was all to no avail. This day, we happened upon a High School match. We didn’t waste the moment. It was also alongside a farmers market. We parked, paid the $2 entry, and sat in the stands with the locals. It was the team of Fairhaven. It was fabulous to watch the cheerleaders going through their paces, and the bulked up kids running head on into each other whilst the 5 coaches paced up and down the sideline.
I really enjoyed the little slice of America, and I think it was almost as fun as the big time matches. I felt like I was at Rydell high as I sat up on those metal benches and a little bonus was having to actually enter the school to use the toilet. It was like a scene from a movie !, a real American high school..priceless.
Fairhaven was only miles from the border of the smallest state in America, Rhode Island. We headed towards the very familiar (for Australians) city of Newport. I had originally like to stay here, but couldn’t find any suitable accommodation in our price range. This turned out to be a huge shame, as it was the most beautiful little city I had ever seen. I think it will be one of the huge regrets of the trip that we couldn’t stay here longer. The streets were colourful and eclectic, gorgeous to look at and teeming with people. You could hear the music from the ocean side bars as you drove along the streets, the sun was shining, and it took everything I had not to jump out the window of our slow moving vehicle to join them. It reminded me of my long afternoons sitting on the deck of The London hotel in Balmain, in Sydney. Similar vibe, similar look. No doubt I’ll be back for a slice of that.
We headed away from the action, and up the hill to see the “mansions”. The most impressive example of American 20th century opulence, they were super impressive. Newport was the playground of the new industrialists in the early 20th century. Here they built to out do each other, copying many of the castles from Europe and lining them up side by side with their neighbours as to make party hopping in the 1920′s a breeze. Here played the Vanderbilt’s, The Astors, the Wideners. Later the Kennedy’s and Bouviers.
They sit on a hill overlooking the Atlantic, and they were for the most part, hardly ever used whilst their owners spent most of the year in the Upper East side of NYC.
From there we went down the hill to the equally impressive large sweeping estates on opening of Newport harbour. The significance of this place was not lost on me when we passed the New York Yacht club, and I imagined the rowdy bunch of Aussies, sailing their victorious crew past it whilst the drank champagne from the bottle and their Prime minister equally tipsy gave their compatriots the right to a day off in honor of their victory.
I was a wide eyed ten year old when all that happened right here in Newport, Rhode Island, and the moment wasn’t lost on me as I drove on through.
Off the Coast, we spied a rather impressive looking Cruise liner making it’s way out to sea, could it be our friends on the Aida again ? we couldn’t see her hull close enough to know, but it made me giggle.
I also noticed the geology of the coastline was unusual, flaky granite like stone. I wondered about this, and didn’t know the answer would be found later in my travels.
We left Newport and headed for Connecticut, our stay in Rhode Island was as small as it is in size.
