Tuesday, September 29, 2015
WE'RE HOME!  Because the weather turned cold, windy and rainy, we decided to just head for Wittenberg, so we arrived this afternoon at 2:00.  It's been a great trip and we're glad we did it, but we're also glad to be home.  We had no major problems on the whole trip, but our house batteries need to be replaced.  We discovered that when we visited Pat and Garry on Sunday.  That was another reason to come home.  We have two weeks to unpack, repack and head southwest.  Several people we encountered along the way, asked if we knew where home was, being that we're full-timers.  So I will post a picture to answer that question.  We've gotten a lot of comments and e-mails from many of you, regarding our trip, and we're just glad you wanted to come along.  We still have a bucket list, but it's getting a lot shorter.  We will always have some place to go, or something to do, as we aren't ready for that list to terminate!

I haven't edited the pictures I took today, so you can see that we are entering Wisconsin at Marinette today.

We received this awesome wall hanging from our former neighbors, John and Barb Dresen, when we sold our house and moved to Wittenberg in 2006 (and went full-time motor home).  We think of them every time we move or stop to set up, as this comes off the wall each time we travel.  It does say it all.  We've had many homes on this trip, and we have enjoyed them all. 

Monday, September 28, 2015
I am including Sunday and today in this blog, as we were so busy yesterday and we didn't have time to enter our fun and excitement until now.  We arrived at Garry and Pat Scribner's in Bancroft, MI early afternoon on Sunday.  We have gotten pictures and many updates from Pat and Garry over the years, about their grandchildren, and it was good to finally meet them.  They are very well behaved, and polite children, and quite active.  They are involved in a lot of things at home and at school, and that makes for healthy youngsters!  We met Pat and Garry in Arizona, several years ago, when they arrived in the same park as us, and we did a lot of hiking together, and attended social events.   Pat and Garry took us to see the Scribner Farm and we met several of their relatives, and saw where they spend a lot of their summers, at this wonderful pond!  We returned to their place and shared a meal of slow cooked ribs, salads, and apple pie!  We did stay up long enough to see the Blood Moon.  I will be 93 when the next eclipse happens, so "if I still have my memory", I will always remember where I was when I saw the last one!  We were lucky that the clouds dispersed just in time for us to see it quite well.  It was a wonderful, but short stay, and we struck off for northern MI this morning.  We had intended to go to the 2nd largest falls east of the Mississippi River (2nd to Niagara Falls) and also do Pictured Rock, but it looks like rain and the cold front is coming in. We opted to find a campground on Hwy. 2 that has cable and we will stay put for tonight and watch the Packers.  We'll arrive back at Eagle's Landing (our homey shed) tomorrow afternoon.  We are ready to plant our feet for a bit!  It's been a great trip, but we have two weeks to unpack, repack and leave for the southwest by the 16th of October!

Relaxing on the Scribner deck.  Seated: Pat, Garry and Zu  Standing: TK, Tamaki, Marlene and Jim.

This is the Scribner home, in rural Bancroft, MI.  Pat and Garry have made so many great changes in the house and still working on finishing part of the basement.  Our motor home fit alongside the house, quite well.

View down a beautifully landscaped pathway, through the vine covered archway, and you can see the gazebo and the pond where the family spends a lot of time in the summers. 

The Scribner Family in front of the barn, on Garry's grandparent's farm.  They are gone, but the family still owns the land and many members of the family have built home here. 

This is a picture of our approach to cross the Mackinac Bridge.  We did see Mackinac Island from the bridge and the Grand Hotel stood out like a beacon!  The last time we crossed the bridge, we think it cost us $5.00 with the motor home and car, and today it was $14.00.  Fuel prices are still great, though! 

Saturday, September 26, 2015
We arrived in Kalamazoo, and we're camping at the Markin Glen County Park.  It was recommended to us by this couple in Delton, MI, which isn't that far away.  We met Jim and Teri Enrietti, our dancing and music friends that we met in Willard, WI last year at their polkafest.  We had intended to go to the Italian fest when we came to Kalamazoo, but the committee decided to scratch it for this year, due to late planning on several things, and it would have been a rush, and then those things don't turn out successfully.  We told Jim and Teri that could could come to Kalamazoo, anyway, and meet up with them.  We are so glad we did.  They visited us at our park, then took us out to their place for the afternoon.  We found out that we have a lot in common.  Teri is a quilter, for one thing!  They live on a lake in Delton, so we sat on their deck most of the afternoon. They played some music for us, and then we went to a wonderful Italian restaurant for dinner.  We all laughed a lot and just enjoyed the day.  We are so glad we made this a stop on our trip back to Wisconsin.  They spend most of their summers in the UP of MI, so I know we'll see them more next summer.
Tomorrow we move to Bancroft, MI to see our good friends, Pat and Garry Scribner and their 3 children.  These are all bonuses for us to stop and see our friends, and family along the way.  We plan to be home by the 1st of Oct. 

                                         A leisurely afternoon on the Enrietti deck.

        Teri and her wonderful applique wall hanging.  She did all the hand quilting, as well.  Beautiful.

                                                    Jim playing 'one of his button boxes'.

Jim and Teri playing for us.  Jim plays both the button box and the accordion, and I might say, quite well. Teri's addition of the contra bass really adds to their sound together.  She can even dance while she plays!

Thursday, September 24, 2015
We left WV (I finally realized I was spelling that wrong), and had a good day's drive to Marysville, Ohio, just northwest of Columbus.  We will be staying with our friends, Tom and Karen for the night.  They have a lovely home and plenty of room for us to come in and hook up!  They showed us around their place, and then took us for a ride to show us the area where they live.  The weather is gorgeous here, and quite warm.  We'll head out in the morning.

We're all hooked up and ready to spend the night at Tom and Karen's.  They have a storage shed behind our motor home where they keep their motor home.  It's a lovely place with lots of hickory trees.  We'll pick some nuts in the morning before we leave.

Tom and Karen took us for a 'spin' around their area and showed us four covered bridges there.  It was a perfect day for a ride in a convertible!

                                  Tom, Karen and Jim at one of the covered bridges, that we saw.

Back to their house after our ride, to a delicious meal that they fixed for us.  It was a fun and relaxing evening, and they were the perfect hosts! It's nice to see where our friends are 'perched'.  We'll meet up with them again in southeastern AZ to get some hiking in before we arrive in the Valley for the winter.

Wednesday, September 23, 2015
We will be leaving in the morning, after a short little stay here in West Virginia.  We stayed long enough to get our geo-caching souvenir for W VA and a few others that are planted in this corps of engineer park.  What a lovely little park, and wonderful and friendly people working it.  The park ranger graduated from Stevens Point, WI in forestry, and knows our area back there, very well.  He even insisted that we all have a campfire, so he started it, and we sat around and chatted with the staff and had a great time.  It was foggy coming in here and we are hoping tomorrow morning won't be a repeat.  It will delay us in getting out of here.  We are high atop a mountain, and 'our heads are in the clouds again'.  We will arrive at our friends, Tom and Karen in Marysville, OH for the night.  They are northwest of Columbus, so we have good day's worth of travel ahead of us.  We met Tom and Karen in our park in AZ, and hike with them there.  Our internet is so bad here, that I won't post any pictures until we get some place else.  We are still enjoying our travels, and we're glad we made this stop.

Monday, September 21, 2015
We've had a wonderful weekend and time spent with our second daughter and her family this weekend.  Our campground was perfect for our 'reunion' and it was a very relaxing time for all of us.  We had it all well planned as for food and drinks, and didn't have to leave the campground at all.  Our grandsons had to leave on Sunday afternoon due to work related obligations.  Nick still lives at home and had to be at work Monday a.m. at 6:00, and Cam is working in Los Angeles area for at least two weeks, so he flew out of Baltimore airport yesterday afternoon.  It was great that the boys could make it this weekend, if even for  part of the time.  Karla and Worth left for home this early afternoon, to unpack and be ready for work tomorrow.  Karla is lucky to get a pass to see the Pope on Wednesday, so she is looking forward to that.  We are ready to move to West Virginia tomorrow and we will be at a corps of engineer park there. 

This shows our motor and truck next to the smaller cabin, and our daughter and family stayed in the larger end deluxe cabin for the weekend.  It was very nice and served us all well.  We had a couple of campfires complete with S'mores in their nice little pit.  They were next to a woods, so it made it very private.

This is the fishing pond on the campgrounds.  It was taken at sunset and I captured a very cool reflection in the water.  It was well attended during the weekend with lots of families taking advantage of the catch and release program they offer here. 

We ate all of our evening meals outside on the picnic table.  We just so happened to have German Sweet Chocolate Cheesecake, a request of the Hester's.

From left to right, front row: Worth, Jim, Karla and Marlene - Back Row: Nick and Cam Hester

We walked the campground this morning before Karla and Worth left, and wanted to check out all they offered here.  Some kids never grow up!  Isn't that wonderful?

Jim and Worth at the entrance of our campground.  We feel that this is the nicest campground that we have stayed at on our trip, excluding the corps parks, of course, as they are an altogether different type of park.  They are decorating for Halloween now and will be full every weekend for the next three weeks here.

                                     Karla and Worth at the campground entrance sign.

Thursday, September 17, 2015
Today was a travel day, so we left the Catskills of NY, traveled through Pennsylvania, into Maryland, and we are in a wonderful campground near Woodbine, MD.  It is rated 9.5/10/9.5 and it should be a perfect 10.  The last one doesn't even come close to what this campground offers in activities, layout, and aesthetics. They even have a catch and release fishing pond. We are glad we have such a nice one this time, as our daughter from McLean, VA is visiting us this weekend with her family.  They are in a cabin three sites down from us, and have a big fire ring, and lots of space for all of us to gather, and it's quite private.  If we get a little rowdy, it shouldn't bother anyone! I probably won't post anything until the weekend is over, unless we do something that we feel we should post.  We're here until Tuesday, and the weather looks great with possible rain coming in Sunday night late. We'll take it.

Wednesday, September 16, 2015
I didn't post anything yesterday, because it was a ho-hum day.  We did drive the main highway through 2/3 of the way of the Catskills Mountains, and we didn't see much to make us want to go any further.  It is through the 'soft, rolling mountains' of the Catskills, but no quaint little towns, although we didn't drive off the main highway, so we probably missed it.  We just chalked it up to, running into our first snag of the trip.  It is a beautiful area with the mountains and trees, but the little town we are camped nearby, shows a lot of depression, and lack of progress.  We were told by the people at the interpretative center, that in the 1950's and 1960's this area was booming, and the Jewish people from NYC came here to enjoy all there was to offer.  There's no sign of a lot of tourism here now at all.  We still continue to have beautiful days, with cooler evenings, and we did get on the bike path yesterday and cached a bit.  Not all is lost.  We can always resort to caching!  We tried to do the Canal Trail today, only to find out that you can't bike on it!  The gnats were so bad that we didn't want to walk it, so we headed home.  We move tomorrow to Woodbine, Maryland and will meet our second daughter and her family for the weekend.  We look forward to that.  They will come in on Friday and stay until Monday.  They have a special request of a cheesecake, so I'll get that made tomorrow night, when we get in.  We look forward to the Republican debate tonight, and glad that we have cable here to be able to see it.  We haven't been the luckiest with the phone and internet service on this trip, so we were glad the cable hook up is available here.

This is the sign that is on a lot of street signs, announcing coming into a town, parking areas, and places of interest. 

We actually passed through this old stone bridge today, trying to find the Canal Trail.  Only one vehicle at a time can travel through it. 

This was a pretty old totem pole that we saw on our drive through the Catskills.  The Indians were the first occupants of the lands out here.

We found this interesting to see their cell phone tower disguised as a pine tree.  In AZ, they dress them up as palm trees.

Monday, September 14, 2015
We moved today from Sussex, NJ to Ellenville, NY, at the foothills of the Catskill Mountains.  It was a short drive today, and very windy, so we were glad it didn't take us long.  We are seeing a jump in campground prices, but we're out east!  This is the only 10/10/10 campground that we remember ever staying at.  That basically, means that it is a perfect 10.  I suppose that is why they can demand the higher prices.  We don't think it lives up to its rating at all.  We've stayed in much nicer campgrounds than this, so we'd rate it a straight 8.  We didn't get any warmer than 61 today, but the heat is to return by Wed. We even have our little heater running!  It was very mountainous and tree covered on our drive today, so quite pretty.  We didn't venture out, as we both wanted a little down time.  Tomorrow we'll scout out the park and see what it has to offer.  We have found several rails to trails bike paths in the area, so we can always resort to that.  Our phone and internet service here is very spotty, so we're back to limitations again.  We do have cable tv here, so we're connected to the world again.  I miss my news!  Our dish didn't work at the last place, due to the tree cover, and no local tv, so we're catching up.  I'm glad that we will be able to see the debate on Wednesday night.  We'll see what we find tomorrow and will report in tomorrow night.

Sunday, September 13, 2015
We were able to make connections to meet our oldest daughter, Lynn and her husband, Gary and our grandchildren, Sam and Sophie.  They live in Moorestown, NJ, so it was halfway for each of us to drive.    Gary picked the place.  We thought it was somewhere that he had been on business, but it wasn't, so it was a stab in the dark.  What a wonderful surprise to everyone.  It was a gorgeous and huge building, with a ballroom that was set up for a wedding this afternoon.  They graciously showed us around the building, and talked of their plans of expanding it.  The food was excellent and moderately priced for 'out east fare', and the service was impeccable.  It was good to see them, and now we can move on to the Catskills tomorrow. 

                                              The Ryland Inn at White House Station, NJ

                Seated:  Grandson, Sam age 23, Gary, Sophie age 17, Lynn, with Jim and I in the back. 

                             The ballroom getting set up for a wedding reception this afternoon.

Saturday, September 12, 2015
We had planned to attend a geo-caching event in NJ, way back before we made any reservations at campgrounds, so we knew we had to find one close to the area that this was held.  We drove to Waterloo Historic Village, and attended the 2nd annual Metro Geo-Cache Event there.  They are doing great things there, restoring the old buildings, and keeping the grounds nice, but they have a lot of work to do.  Our entrance fee of $5.00 (optional) went to the preservation of this village.  That's money well spent! The event was fun, and we met a lot of nice people, although some saw my t-shirt "Wisconsin Badgers" and they had to give me a hard time.  I reminded them that we have welcomed many New Jersey players to Wisconsin.  It was all in fun.  The day was overcast and much cooler temps than we have been having, so they really got lucky on the weather for their event.  They had some wonderful vendors there, and we stocked up on containers for planting back in Wisconsin, and also, bought some t-shirts.  I also bought an organic salve to put on BEFORE we go traipsing through the Poison Ivy, and it is declared to work.  We left happy campers with all our loot, and got back to the motor home just before the heavens fell!  We had quite the downpour.

The old stone building was constructed in the mid-1700's and was converted into a grist mill a few years after it was built.

This is the Smith home, and he was the owner of the stone building above.  His home looks fabulous, but it needs some repair.

                                                     I attract all the handsome green people!

This is the farm prior to reaching the campground, which is on top of the hill.  It is called Pleasant Acres and is a working farm, and campground!

You can see how closely the farm animals are here, to the RV's.  The little kids that come here, love the animals and we actually, don't smell anything.
I will close today with the price of gas, which was listed at $1.95.9 and diesel was $2.11.0.  In New Jersey, they have people pump your gas for you, as it is against the law for you to do it. 

Friday, September 11, 2015
This is our only free day to check out the Delaware Water Gap.  This area of land was set aside by Congress in 1962, with the proposal to build a dam upstream to control the flooding of the Delaware River due to hurricanes passing through the area.  Many small farms were bought up, and some people resisted, holding out selling, in hopes of staying there.  With the war costs of Vietnam escalating, President Johnson felt compelled to stop the construction of the dam.  He also had to deal with the squatters on the now vacant farms, as family communes and flower children began living along the Delaware in the abandoned houses.  Others set up tents and teepees.  Many Poconos residents, resent the 'hippies' cultivating marijuana and living in the homes that they had to vacate.  In 1973 a judge ruled the squatters were illegally occupying the valley and ordered to vacate within 30 days.  I checked out how close Woodstock was to this area, and it's not far! Today the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area is a 70,000 acre national jewel with more than 10,000,000 visitors each year.  We struck off this morning and wanted to get a taste of what was here!  Five waterfalls, Grey Towers, which is on the Register of National Historic Sites,  and the monument at High Point State Park.  I'll start with Grey Towers, which was the home of the Chief Forester of the newly created United States Forest Service, and is the only private residence that the U.S. Forest service maintains. Gifford Pinchot was appointed by Pres. Theodore Roosevelt and under his leadership, the national forests more than tripled in size to more than 170 million acres.  He later became governor of PA for two terms.

This is Grey Towers, that was built in 1886 by James Pinchot, father and philanthropist, who acquired enough fortune to retire at age 44.  In 1963, Gifford Bryce Pinchot, the son of Gifford and Cornelia, donated Grey Towers and the 102 acres to the USDA Forest Service.

       This is a small 'lounging pool' on the grounds of the Grey Towers estate.  It was quite inviting!

We were on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware Water Gap today, and we're back to all the beautiful waterfalls, that the state has to offer.  I won't bore you with every one we saw, as we felt they just kept getting better each time.  We hiked to them all, but they weren't long distances, and many were on boardwalks.  PA is a beautiful state!  This particular one was 4 feet shorter than Niagara Falls.  My pictures don't do justice to what we saw.

The High Point State Park is the highest spot in the state of NJ, and the top of the monument placed there, by Colonel Kuser and his wife, stands 1803 feet above sea level.  The monument is a memorial in honor of all NJ wartime heroes and it is 220 feet tall. It was built between 1928 - 1930.  The Kuser's donated their home and 102 acres of land to be designated a state park.  Their home is being used as the park office.

Thursday, September 10, 2015
We left our campground in Phillipston, MA this morning and decided to make it an easy drive to NJ.  We spent most of the day on interstate or toll way, and it turned out to be a great choice!  It was in the mountains for the most part, and just a very scenic drive.  We had about 20 miles on a secondary road to get to our campground.  It is called, Pleasant Farm, and it's just that!  We are on a farm.  It's quite a large campground, and we passed the buildings, to make our way to the campsites. It is the most expensive campground that we have reserved on this whole trip.  I guess we are very close to NYC, so the feel it demands the higher prices. We came through the Berkshires in MA and the Shawangunk Mountains today, just south of the Catskills in NY.  We will be returning to the Catskills after our extended weekend in NJ.  We aren't far from them now, but we want to explore the Delaware Water Gap, of which, we are very close to.  We'll explore that tomorrow.  We saw lots of trees turning yellow, on our drive today, and we arrived at our campground to rain.  We just got set up, and it started to pour.  They need the rain so badly, so we're glad it decided to rain at night!  It's a fast moving system, and will be out of here by midnight.  I think our days are to be in the 70's for this weekend.  We have been blessed with beautiful weather throughout this whole trip.  We had rain early on, but it's been great for most of it.  We probably needed a rest when it rained, anyway!   I don't think we'll have enough days in this area, but we must keep on a schedule! Tomorrow is 9/11, so please reflect on the day, and what it means to us!  We will never be the same, but we have endured!

Wednesday, September 9, 2015
This is our last full day in Phillipston, MA, and we are ready to move.  Jim got his GPS tonight!  Not any too soon.  So much for overnight, when they said it would be here yesterday.  Anyway, we are good to go, and we don't have to wonder how we are going to get it forwarded to our next stop. We did go biking again today, but we are getting that Midwest, hot and humid weather, and the bike trail was very sandy, so it made it tough going.  We still managed to find 14 caches, until we decided that it not a good day for this.  We stocked up on a few groceries and will pack up in the morning and head for Sussex, NJ.  We hope to connect with our oldest daughter, Lynn and her family while we are there, and we are also going to a Mega Geo-caching event on Saturday.  We are going to be close to the Delaware Water Gap, and the Pocono's, so we'll see what we can cram into that stay.  We are there until Monday of next week.  Rain is moving in tonight and it will cool things off for them in this area.  They need the rain, as it is very dry. 

Sunday, September 6, 2015
Happy Labor Day to everyone!  We have been in Phillipston, MA since last Thursday and we wondered what we would do here.  As it turns out, we are in a fairly remote area, away from any large cities, and it's just fine with us.  With the holiday weekend and everyone off work, we are enjoying the peace and quiet.  We did find several rails to trails bike paths, and have been biking and caching every day since we arrived.  We met a few people out on the trails, but not many.  They have all been friendly, and like to stop and chat.  People are so amazed that we are on a 2 1/2 month trip to New England.  When you're retired, you can do that!  We had one frustrating event, and that is, that Jim's GPS got a crack in the face of it, and we were unable to use it.  That left us with his old GPS and it was like going from a Smart phone to an Apple IIe!  He immediately called Garmin and ordered a new one and it is being shipped overnight to our campground.  It is to arrive on Tuesday (hopefully).  We can't be without a good GPS, as it's our entertainment!  We use it for geo-caching and hiking.  We've enjoyed beautiful 70 degree weather and the nights are down to 49 to 55 degrees.  We hear it is sweltering back in the Midwest, so that means we'll be getting it in a day or two. We're finding small roadside stands with home grown fruits and vegetables now, and we had the most delicious sweet corn, that we have ever had!  Or maybe we were just hungry for it.  We are in moose country again, but no sign of them.   Enjoy your last big day of Summer!

Northern Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire have a lot of biking trails, so that decided our plans for our stay here.  They are fairly nice, and one is similar to the one we have in Wittenberg.

There was a geo-cache in this beautiful covered bridge in Ashuelot, NH.  It is one of the best preserved bridges in NH, and was built in 1864.
.

A geo-cache brought us to this monument in Northfield, MA, and it is a tribute to Isabel and Monroe Smith.  They were teachers in Northfield, MA and they took a boy scout group to Germany.  When they arrived there, they experienced the youth hostels for the first time, and they returned to the States and started one in Northfield.  It was the first American Youth Hostel and it opened for business in 1934.  The building is no longer here, but this monument is placed where the building stood.

Thursday, September 3, 2015
We had an uneventful trip from our last and wonderful campground, to Phillipston, MA, where we will be situated for a week.  Labor Day Weekend is included in this stay, and it doesn't seem like there is a lot to do here.  Maybe we'll watch football and rest up!  We're back in moose country, and we are starting to see more of the leaves changing color.  We do believe it is because it's been so dry lately, and all these trees are rooted into a very hard rock base.  They are under stress, thus they will turn color sooner. In some areas, it's still quite green, so they have either gotten some rain, or the soil is richer. We've had some questions on the Cliff Walk we did yesterday, so I'll post some more pictures from that, so it's better understood.  I also want to explain a little more about Cornelius Vanderbilt II.  He inherited the mantle as head of the Vanderbilt empire in 1885.  At this time, they were dealing mostly in railroads, and he and his brother, William directed the family business.  Cornelius suffered a paralyzing stroke 11 years after taking the helm, and he died in 1899 at the age of 56.  At the time of his death, the local gossip held that he had more money than the U.S. Mint!

Most of the walking path was cement, and not very wide.  It was too narrow to walk two abreast most of the time, especially when meeting people.  Hurricane Sandy came through and did some serious destruction to the walkway, but the Corps of Engineers came in and repaired it.

This is an area at the southern end, and they had large flat rocks positioned, as to make a walkway.  Some people had trouble with it, but we're used to walking on rocks in AZ!  These were huge, and no problem for us.

We had a couple of these tunnels to go through, and it was very comfortable in there.  The breeze from the ocean came through and cooled the air. 

This was at the very end of the Cliff Walk, and in fact, we had to leave the cement pathway, and make our way over some rough rocks, such as those showing here.

This fancy little 'cubicle' was on the far end of the property of an Italian type structured home, and an opera singer's voice was being broadcast from it, as we walked by.

For the next week, we will only report in, if we find something exciting to do, or we see a moose!  I am finding some bike trails, but if they aren't any better than the last one, we'll pass.  We do see a couple of state parks that have hiking and geo-caching, so we may do that.  We need to get our souvenir for Massachusetts. Jim is setting up our DirecTV, as their satellite here is so-so, and we want to get the Packers and Badgers, if we can!  The fellow that parked us is a staunch Patriot fan, and he made it clear that everyone else around here is, too.  I wonder if I should put up our Packer flag!  We're fine with relaxing a bit, but I'm sure that will wear off quickly!  Jim's back is better, so that's a plus. Have a great Labor Day Weekend, and to our grandson, Greg...we hope you had a great day!  He's 12 today. 

Wednesday, September 2, 2015
My head is swimming tonight!  I saw so much history today, that it was mind boggling!  We drove down to Newport, Rhode Island and walked the 3.5 mile Cliff Walk, which means we did 7 miles. It is along the rugged cliffs on the Atlantic Ocean, and offers some of the best views of the Gilded-Age mansions. The Cliff Walk was developed by the estate owners, and was designated a National Recreation Trail in 1975. The most elegant and prominent mansion is, The Breakers, home of the Vanderbilt's.  They amassed their fortune in steamships and later the railroad.

The Breakers was built in 1895, and was the summer home of Cornelius Vanderbilt II.  Its elegance surpassed all other Newport mansions in extravagance.  It cost 10 million dollars to construct.  Today they give tours through the mansion and they have 400,000 visitors a year.

This mansion is called Ochre Court and today, it belongs to Salve Regina University in Newport.  It cost 4.5 million to build it in 1892 and is the second largest mansion in Newport.

We walked between the homes and the ocean along the Cliff Walk, and many of them had hedges so high that you couldn't see them, until you got a distance away from them. 

After our 7 mile 'walk', we went to the older section of Newport and had lunch at the oldest tavern in the nation.  It is the White Horse Tavern and it was granted its liquor license in 1673. At one time, state legislators gathered here before sitting at the Colony House.

This is the entrance to The White Horse Tavern.  The dining room was to the right and also, upstairs.  They also had a few small tables in the bar room, which was quite small.  We ate in the bar room, next to a very huge fireplace.  Notice the flag on the wall, and the black and white 'rug' on the floor is painted.

This is the dining room of The White Horse Tavern.  Everything was very immaculate and the food was delicious.  We both had a lobster croissant BLT and of course, a beer.

This was our bartender/waiter, and you can see that the bar isn't very large.  We enjoyed kibitzing with him, and so glad we came to Newport, RI today.   We're ready to move tomorrow (I guess).  We have enjoyed this area, and we could have stayed another week here.  We will be in Phillipston, MA for the next week, and we hastily booked that, because of Labor Day Weekend.  It's busy out here, and will be crawling with people on the last big holiday weekend of summer.  I always say that, we will find something in every little town that interests us.  So we'll see if this holds true this time. 
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR GRANDSON, GREG, TOMORROW!