August 24 – August 28, 2016We stayed at Seaport RV Resort in Mystic, CT. by the advice from Helen and Bryan Salgado. This is a Beautiful place.Site #69. Very level and long.  They have 50 amp service with water, but no sewer.  They have a pump out service that comes by every 3 days for free and 2 dump stations on the way out.

Thursday August 25, 2016Heading to Newport, RI.Nice bridge Rose Island Lighthouse.  It is hard to see through the glare of the window. Sorry.Newport Shipyard, right behind the Visitor Center. Look at the tall masts.Repairing this huge sailboat. History of the America’s Cup had a strong influence in Newport.The bridge we came across to get here.Beautiful sailboats.The big one is named Sun Chaser.Another Big boat.We took a Historic Trolley Tour with Nate.The Bernardo Cardines is thought to be the oldest baseball field in America.White Horse Tavern, est.1673, is thought to be the oldest Tavern in America still in operation.The International Tennis Hall of Fame. Known for their 13 grass courts. The most recently restored building in Newport.This is the front.Mansions everywhere.The Breakers. Vanderbilt’s Summer home, 70 rooms. Click on the link and see all the cool photos. Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt(1794-1877) established the family fortune in steamships and later in the New York Central Railroad. The Commodore’s grandson, Cornelius Vanderbilt II, purchased this property in 1885. There was a small wooden house on the property then. In 1893, he commissioned a new Italian Renaissance-style palazzo.      Nate, the tour guide, was great at explaining the history of Newport and how Doris Duke was mainly responsible for saving a lot of the mansions in this city. This is my cup of tea.And real breakers.Striped cows.The trolley makes a short stop at Fort Adams.Remember this ship, you will see it later getting under sail.There is a nice food truck here at Fort Adams, A Fork in the Road.. We split a Mediterranean Chicken sandwich, which was very good.These moorings have little docks (look between the sail boats ahead). Never seen this before.  Everywhere else they are just buoys.Large Sailboats.New England churches are beautiful.Newport harbor.Remember the big old sailboat at Fort Adams? We caught sight of it going out when we crossed back over the bridge.Pretty cool. We need to spend more time in Newport, RI. Loved it!!

Friday August 26, 2016We drove to Mystic, CT. (Our campground is in Old Mystic)Draw bridgeMystic Pizza anyone?Beautiful churches.Then on to New London, CT. Kind of a rainy day.Beautiful colonial homes.New London had some pretty homes. Private lighthouse.Art out on an island.Plenty of boats.New London is a lot bigger than we expected. Very cool fountain.Large bridge to get here.Back to Mystic to go to the Mystic Seaport. The Museum of America and the Sea.There is a whole lot to see here.This Live Oak log grew on the coast of South Carolina for over 600 years, until it was blown over by Hurricane Hugo in 1989.  Live oak is a dense and strong wood, long favored by shipbuilders for frames and parts of the structural system within a wooden ship. Mystic Seaport workers salvaged this tree along with ten trailer loads of prized live oak.They have an active shipyard here where older vessels can be repaired authentically.One of the ships being repaired.This was a general store.There is a large building that demonstrates how rope is made.The yarn runs through this spinner to make the strand.The strands are twisted together to make the rope. They can make all different sizes of rope, depending on how many strands they use.Replica of Brant Point Lighthouse.You can take a sailboat ride for $4.00.We met the Captain in charge of this beautiful sailboat. He takes students, ages 15-18, on a five or 10-day voyage on this sailboat. The students learn teamwork, leadership and traditional nautical skills while sailing as the crew under his direction.  The students stand watch, steer, and help navigate through New England waters.  They go to places like Martha’s Vineyard, Block Island and Cuttyhunk.  Sounds great for a teenager.Beautiful wooden sailboats.These large old sailboats are massive.Mystic Bank – 1833.This is the museum’s pride and joy.  The Charles W. Morgan.  The oldest American merchant ship still afloat – and the last surviving American wooden whale-ship. When launched in 1841 in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the Morgan was one of more than 600 American ships hunting whales to supply the world’s need for oil.Check out the girl climbing the rope lines from the whaleboat to the ship.  You can barely see her just above the whaleboat with the yellow strip.The guy standing on the railing is singing as the crew and visitors pull the whaleboat up.  These boats weigh over 2,000 lbs.The Charles W. Morgan is 106 feet long.  Named for it’s original owner, Charles W. Morgan, a whaling merchant.  The vessel made 37 voyages during an 80-year whaling career.Hunting primarily in the Pacific Ocean, the Morgan often spent 3-5 years on each voyage. Seventy whales were killed during the first voyage, filling the hold with 2,400 barrels of oil. A crew of 30 to 36 men were needed to sail the ship, row the six-man whaleboats used to hunt and kill whales, and render oil from the blubber in a brick tryworks on deck.And there is the whaleboat and the man is still singing.  After the ship’s retirement in 1921, the Morgan was preserved as an exhibit near New Bedford, Mass., before being brought to Mystic Seaport in 1941. It was named as a National Historic Landmark in 1966.  It is a beautiful ship. (Trivia: the difference between a boat and a ship – you can put a boat on a ship, but you cannot put a ship on a boat).  Learn something new everyday.  Love it.This is just a beautiful boat.We learned about Scrimshaw, the Whalers’ Art.  And learned about oysters and how they are harvested.  Very interesting place. Highly recommend going.

Saturday August 27, 2016Leaving Mystic, CT today, heading to East Stroudsburg, PA, about 220 miles away. We went through New York state.Across the Hudson River.  Dang, this is a big river.Into Pennsylvania.We have 2 nights at the Moose Lodge in East Stroudsburg, PA.They have a lot of property, with an outdoor pavilion and a small creek in the back.Not a bad campsite, it was level, 30 amp and water.  $15.00 a night, we love these kinds of places.Sunday they had a bike ride for charity.  Nice place and pretty easy to get to.

Monday we are off to Lancaster, PA, about 114 miles from here.