September 28 - Westbrook CT

It's getting late to post pictures tonight, but if you want to see the project the girls did on Plymouth, I've added a link to it in the link list on the top right of the blog...


Sept 25 - 27 Newport (and Mystic)
Wednesday and Thursday we stayed in Newport as there were really high winds in Buzzard’s Bay and Block Island Sound. School was done in the morning and then we walked around Newport in the afternoons. Newport is a really pretty city with lots to look at.
On Friday there were heavy rains forecast so we decided to rent a car and go to Mystic Seaport. Mystic is a small town in Connecticut and there is a really large maritime museum there. They have been working on developing it since 1930 or 1940, We picked up the car a little after 9:00 and were at the museum by 10:30. It is a really wonderful place. Most of the small buildings there are original buildings that were built elsewhere in the 1900’s and brought to Mystic there are lots of nautical theme buildings as well as a store, a school, a bank, and cooperage, a blacksmith. There is a building that shows how rope was made that was originally part of a rope factory. The last surviving whaling ship is there as well. We had a really enjoyable day even though it was raining and we didn’t’ leave Mystic until about 4:00. We made a couple of quick stops on the way back and had the car back to Enterprise by 6:00

Sept 28 Newport to Stonington Connecticut
We decided that the forecast wasn’t that bad and we would leave Newport. We weren’t exactly sure where we would end up, but we had spent enough time in Newport. It was a very wet day, but after we actually got out of Newport Harbour the seas were fairly calm and it was a better day than we expected. We had kind of hoped to go to Block Island, but we decided that the weather wasn’t going to be that great for exploring and we were better off to go farther west. We decided on Stongington CT. It is a really nice little town with lots of older homes, full of character. There is a great playground here. Unfortunately it started to rain again when we were out for our walk so that wasn’t too great. The kids went for a swim when we got back to the boat. We had lasagna for supper which was quite a bit of work but everyone really enjoyed it.

Sept 29 – Stonington to Westbrooke CT
We got a fairly early start and left around 7:00 – it was still barely light and quite foggy. We decided to tow the dinghy, but took the motor off. We wanted to leave early enough to catch the favourable current going down Long Island Sound. It worked out well and we had 1 or 2 knots of current with us all the way. We had been emailing back and forth with Chris and Penny on Carpe Diem and they had found a great marina in Westbrooke so we headed in there and were tied up by 11:30. People are really friendly here. Someone lent us a car so the girls and I went and got lots of heavy groceries like soup, water and pop. Dave stayed behind and changed the oil. After we got the groceries put away and went for a little walk there was a little Sunday afternoon gathering at the BBQ shelter so we went over. There was a really nice lady (Linda) who makes jewelry and gave Annie a few pointers and gave her some of her old jewelry making tools. Someone else bought a pair of Annie’s earrings. There were also a couple of other kids around so the girls played soccer. We had a great BBQ steak for supper.