Plimouth Plantation is Better than Walmart

This day requires two posts....here's the first...

On Tuesday we went to Plimouth Plantation, the amazingly authentic re-creation of the 1627 village where the Pilgrims settled. If you haven't seen this, it's a "living museum" where everything is exactly as it was 380 years ago. The structures, the costumes, the tools, the food, and the people are all as they were.
The people are modeled after real people who came over on the Mayflower, so they tell of their lives in the language they used. You can interact with them but they never come out of character, so you can ask them about their experiences and their lives...it's an amazing technique that makes history so understandable and interesting.

Peter actually tried to get this guy to come out of character by asking him where he really lives when he is not working here. The guy said, "Where else could I live? Out there? In the wilderness?"

Everything, I mean everything they say and do is in character. After a while you feel like you are actually living in 1627. He talked about the clothes they wear, that they brought them over with them from England and they are no particular size...he said "it's not that we can't make our own clothing, we are very skilled at that in our homeland but we just don't have the time because we have so much to do to survive here in this new land, and we have the women and children to protect from the natives." I finally had to drag Peter away from this guy since he was hell-bent on getting him to break character.

There are also present-day crafstman who produce the utensils, pottery and furnishings for the village using the techniques and tools that were used in the 17th century. While they worked they answered questions and talked about what they were doing.

Here is a potter...and a carpenter.

If you are ever looking for a place to go on vacation I highly recommend Plymouth and Plimouth Plantation. It's a great place to take the kids too. I have no jokes about this place...it was simply amazing and way better than Walmart!

The Tale of Dolly & Donna...& Charley

Here's the second...

After a day of site-seeing at Plimouth Plantation and traveling, at about 5:00 PM we were on Cape Cod and realized we hadn't eaten since breakfast. We required seafood. So we found a restaurant called "Clancy's" in Dennisport on the Nantucket Sound. It was very crowded, so not wanting to waste time waiting for a table, we decided to sit in the bar and order dinner.

Throughout the whole trip Peter and I have been thinking of songs about the places we have seen that I can play on the tour as we travel..."Old Cape Cod", "New York, New York", "Falling Leaves", etc. So Peter mentioned a song but couldn't remember the name of it.

It's about a guy named Charley who "rides forever 'neath the streets of Boston", "and his fate is still unlearn'd", "he's the man who'll never return"...these are some of the lines that we could remember. We kept coming up with snippits of the song but never the title.

We asked the waitress...she didn't know.

We asked the bartender...he didn't know.

I told Peter to "call Jack in California, he knows every song ever written"...he didn't know.

As we finished our stuffed shrimp dinner and were getting up to leave we tried once more and asked two women at the table behind us. Peter sang the part of the song that we knew and one of the women, Donna, said..."Was the guy in the song named 'Charley'"?

We said yes it was. So she took a card out of her wallet...an "MTA Charley Card"...used to purchase multiple trips on the Boston MTA. On the card is a cartoon character named Charley on a train. (Did I mention serendipity?)

So we struck up a conversation..."where are you from?", "where are you going?", "what's your name?" and on and on and on.

Donna's cousin Dolly said she is visiting from San Francisco. I told her I just came back from San Francisco, and why I was there, and what does she do there, and on and on and on. Then we all said our goodbyes--they went to their table for dinner and we went to the coach to leave.

Before we left I googled the song and found out that the name is "Charley on the MTA" by the Kingston Trio. I printed the lyrics of the song, http://www.mit.edu/~jdreed/t/charlie.html, and we went back into Clancy's to deliver the lyrics to Dolly and Donna. Again we had a big conversation about where we are going, and what everyone does for a living, and on and on and on. I told Dolly about my blog and that I am writing about the trip and if she looks at it she will see the posts about my San Francisco trip too.

At that point I decided that tonight's blog will be about our new best friends, Dolly and Donna.

So as we sit in the coach parked in the East Falmouth Walmart parking lot I raise my glass of wine in a toast to Dolly and Donna...

and to Charley, whose fate is still unlearn'd.

Springfield Walmart to Plymouth Walmart

As we continued the Great New England Walmart Tour of 2008, we left Springfield this morning and drove the rest of the way across Massachusetts to a little southeast of Boston to the Nantasket Beach Hotel http://tinyurl.com/5zvaju%20whichwhich is on a little peninsula in a town called Hull. Talked to the person in charge of groups, got info, brochures and had lunch.

Then we drove on to Plymouth. There we saw the Mayflower II which is an exact full scale replica of the original Mayflower. I think this should be Nancy and Bruce's next boat. It was built in 1957 and there is a plaque commemorating the transatlantic voyage of 33 men who made the same trip from Plymouth, England to Plymouth, MA. I wonder if they got scurvy.


We saw Plymouth Rock where the Pilgrims first set foot on land in America, except that the structure that houses it is under renovation and we could not see it really well.

Across from the rock is the monument to the women who came over on the Mayflower in 1620, called "The Pilgrim Mother."

We got here too late to see the Plimouth Plantation, we will start out tomorrow and go there first then on to Hyannis and Cape Cod.

Tonight we spend the overnight in the lap of luxury as we park in the extra large parking lot of the Plymouth Walmart SuperCenter. This is the cadillac of Walmart free parking lots and we are feeling pretty elite. After all, is this not the land of the Kennedys? This is really living!

Update: We just found out that this is the Walmart that the Pilgrims shopped in when they landed at Plymouth Rock...amazing! There is even a frozen turkey still in the freezer case left over from the "First Thanksgiving Storewide Sale". I told you this was a SuperCenter.

Serendipity and Walmart

This morning we left Hidden Acres Campground and crossed the border into Massachusetts and drove the Mohawk Trail, http://www.mohawktrail.com/, a beautiful scenic drive that goes thru several small picturesque towns. The first one we stopped at was Shelburne Falls. Of course we saw the falls,
and the Bridge of Flowers which is America's answer to Florence's Ponte Vecchio only without the gold jewelry.

I spoke to a local shopkeeper about bringing my tour group there in October, got brochures, maps and lots of good information. We drove on to Claremont where we saw the monument to Native Americans created by Italian Sculptor Joseph Pollina called "Hail to the Sunrise", a beautiful statue and an impressive number of memorial stones to Native Americans.

All of this so far has been fabulous but I guess you are wondering where the serendipity comes into play...well, the next town we drove to was Stockbridge, where I needed to find the Yankee Candle Store because it is on the October Tour itinerary. After making a wrong turn and backtracking what amounted to 9 miles we found Stockbridge and the candle store. Right next to Yankee Candle is The Red Lion Hotel, where we noticed a lot of activity involving video equipment and lighting and sound checks. As we soon found out they were preparing to shoot tomorrow's (Monday) episode of Good Morning America.

So we stood around a while watching the activity, I talked to the manager about possibly taking my group here for lunch in October and who did we see get out of a bus in front of the hotel but Diane Sawyer, Robin Roberts, Chris Cuomo and James Taylor!

We took lots of pictures then got back in the coach to proceed on our journey, simply amazed at the "serendipity" of having made a wrong turn that brought us back to the place we were looking for just in time to walk into the middle of Good Morning America!

Tonight we are spending the night in the Walmart parking lot in Springfield, MA.

Like I said before...You Can't Make This Stuff Up!!!

Vermont is Better Than Walmart

Today we did some serious traveling and site-seeing and tour-planning. After we left the Bennington Walmart behind, we traveled on Rt 9 east to Willmington and then north on Rt 100. We found the Stratton Mountain Inn, which is where my tour group will spend 2 nights. I went in and introduced myself to the desk person and picked up some brochures and maps, took some pictures and continued on to find Woodstock Vermont. On the way we stopped at The Vermont Country Store which is a destination in itself. It's actually about 6 buildings of stores selling everything from hand crafts to candy to clothing to rugs to hardware, souvenirs, maple syrup, maple candy, jams and jellies, cheese, toys, books, gadgets, nice stuff, silly stuff, fun stuff, boring stuff, edible stuff, and every other kind of stuff you could ever want and never need. Definitely on the agenda for my tour group.

As we continued on to Woodstock we saw a covered bridge or two and the Quechee Gorge and various other scenic wonders and Vermont vistas.

Tonight we are staying at the Hidden Acres Campground which is a few steps up from Walmart.

Tomorrow...on to Massachusetts!

First Stop....Walmart!

We left Farmingville at about 3:00 PM, and head for the NY Thruway. It rained all the way. We hit a lot of traffic thru the Bronx but things started to loosen up after the Tappan Zee Bridge.

By the time we got to Troy NY and head east on route 7 toward Vermont, it was pretty dark and still raining so we decided to get to Bennington VT, where there is a Walmart with a giant parking lot.

I am not even kidding, Peter has a catalogue of all the Walmart's in the US where Motor Homes are allowed to park overnight for no charge. So we parked the coach, went into a pizza restaurant, ordered dinner, went shopping in Walmart, went back to pick up our dinner and back to the coach for salad and stuffed shells.

You can't make this stuff up!

New England Practice Tour

Today Peter and I are headed upstate thru NY on the thruway to Troy where we will make a hard right and go into Vermont. We'll see the green mountains while they are still green, go to Woodstock, the Quechee Gorge, http://tinyurl.com/0 ,The Bridge of Flowers, and who knows what else.
Then we will head down to Massachusetts on 91 and drive the Mohawk Trail http://www.mohawktrail.com/, then down to Stockbridge and across MA to Boston. We'll see Plimouth Plantation, Hyannis, and Cape Cod.
Stay tuned to this blog for updates and pictures.

A Good Time Was Had by All: South Street Seaport & Lunch in Little Italy

I met my group of 48 at the pick-up stop in Plainview and we set out for our day in Manhattan. Our group was scheduled for early lunch at Sal Anthony's Restaurant on Mulberry Street in Little Italy. It was drizzling nicely when we left Plainview and by the time we got to the drop-off 4 blocks from the restaurant it was torrentially pouring. So with me leading my ducklings thru the rain and the puddles we marched with our umbrellas, canes and walkers to dry off and have a great lunch--salad, pasta, main course, desert and coffee. So far so good, no one lost, no one injured.

After lunch we made our way back to the bus, and headed for the South Street Seaport.

We had some free "shopping, strolling, ice-cream eating" time before our boat ride to see the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the man-made waterfalls under the Brooklyn Bridge...

We saw all four of the falls created by Danish artist Olafur Eliasson. It is a temporary exhibit which will only be available for about another month.

After the boat ride we returned to the seaport for a little more "independent exploration" and "biological interludes". Then back on the bus for the trip home to Long Island.

All in all it was a good day, not too stressful, and a lot of fun with some adorable senior citizens.

I'm a Day Tripper...oh yeah...

Tomorrow (9-9-08) I'm escorting a group to Manhattan's South Street Seaport, including a boat ride to see the NYC Waterfalls exhibit http://nyfalls.com/nycwaterfalls.html. Then we go to Sal Anthony's Restaurant in Little Italy for lunch. This is a trip organized by Rendezvous Travel in Merrick (www.rendezvous.travel). Check out their site, they have lots of great trips and events.
I will post pictures when I get home.

My First Assignment!

I got a job!! Just two days after I came home from San Francisco I got a notice from ITMI that there is a company in California booking for a UK Tour Company and looking for a Tour Director based on the east coast. I sent my resume and got the job. Yayyy!

It's two seven-day back-to-back fall foliage tours of Vermont and Massachusetts, with a city tour of Manhattan and a city tour of Boston.

Here's the link for the brochure of the tour: http://tinyurl.com/5apwg6

Both tours are a full coach of 52 people. I have been routing and researching since Saturday and will continue to do so until the night befor the first tour! The first one is Oct 8-14 and the second is Oct 15-21.

I am going to do a practice tour with Peter in the Monaco coach on Sept 12th-17th just to see the areas I will be touring in October with the British group. I need all the help I can get, and I will be more confident after I have actually traveled the route and seen the sites.

I will naturally take lots of pictures and post them with daily updates on this blog.