Couple of Coffees

The second time around

The last few days have been a blur of driving, shopping, laughing and thunderstorms. Piya, Krista, Jonathan and I left New Jersey on Thursday morning. Gliding over the Tappan Zee Bridge was a joy, with little traffic, a beautiful view, and important people in the van with us.

We stopped for beverages in Old Greenwich, then headed to Mystic Seaport, where we wandered around near the waterfront. There was an upcoming book signing there by Jim Lynch, for his amazing tale of a boy growing up in the Olympia, Wash., area, but our timing was off by a few days. The bookstore was great, though.

Piya ordered a slice of pizza from Mystic Pizza, yes THAT restaurant of the Julia Roberts movie fame, and we all shared in its cheesy goodness. I picked up a great dress at a ridiculous discount, probably my best deal of the trip.

Then we were off to Rhode Island, where we stayed in a suburb of Providence. The next day brought us to Newport, land of the uber rich and a way of life that seems to be gone these days. The opulent mansions there were built in the Gilded Age as summer cottages for powerful New York City families. We toured the Breakers, one of the Vanderbilt family’s several residences (another being the Biltmore in Ashland, N.C., which we sadly missed this time around). The Breakers has 70 rooms or so. We wandered up and down the stairs, listening to the tour guide’s warnings about holding on to the banister and his many facts and stories about the family’s residence. They only lived there for two months of the year. The carvings, inlaid stone, mosaic ceilings, painted walls and frescos were incredible. It’s the closest we come in America to national castles. We all talked about what it would have been like to be a servant in that home, living there year-round, while the bosses only came to town for two out of 12 months. Crazy.

The shopping in Newport was entertaining. As was watching the sumo wrestlers sit around and chat with a news reporter. I do wonder how their cool diaper things stay on during their matches.

We dropped Piya off at the Amtrak station in Providence, after exploring some of the neighborhood around Brown and finding another Favorite Store for Krista to be excited about. Then we drove north and (finally) found a hotel for the evening. It was one of the evenings where we expect to settle down and have dinner a lot sooner than we actually get to settle down. But that’s part of the road trip experience, I suppose.

From there, we headed back to Amherst and Northampton in Massachusetts. We wanted to show Krista some quintessential Massachusetts towns, and with the Boston tunnel issues, a number of people told us to skip heading that direction. We loved Northampton a few weeks ago, especially the coffee place, but when we got there, we found out that Northampton Coffee had a broken espresso machine and couldn’t make us our lattes. Argh. Jonathan and I both thought about saying, “But we drove for hours to have another espresso drink here,” which was pretty close to the truth. We'll easily drive a lot of miles for good, creamy espresso.

When I talked to my friend Tamara later, she told me we weren’t supposed to return to places we’ve been earlier on the trip, because they won’t be the same. Very true.

Instead of opting for regular coffee at Northampton Coffee, we followed the call of our stomachs and went to Sylvester’s, a hip café in the building where Sylvester Graham used to live. For the record, we took Krista to all the educational places where we could also get her caffeinated. The place was the home of Sylvester Graham, of graham cracker fame.

Breakfast was really good, an hour and a half later.

As we began our exploring, a torrential downpour started, and rather than get soaked, we hopped back in the van and went in search of an oil change and some yarn. Oil change for Jonathan, yarn for the girls. We ended up having a picnic evening in our hotel room in Hadley, Mass. A nice change of pace, definitely, from all the running around earlier in the week.

Yesterday, we spent more time in Northampton, while it was dry and lovely. I found peas and carrots candy at Sweetie’s on the corner. Anyone know of that candy? I used to love these things and now I have my very own baggie of them. I am sharing, in case anyone is wondering.

We also found our new favorite café in Northampton, Haymarket Café, where the lattes were luscious and the raspberry and peach oat cake was moist and moutwatering. Who knew? I could have that every day for breakfast, if I could figure out how to make something similar. It’s fruit and oatmeal and very little sugar.

The road trip continued back through Connecticut, where we ate at the Holiday Diner in Danbury again due to a lack of better plans, and then to New York, the Tappan Zee Bridge again and New Jersey. Dear friend Lisa met us for Mexican food, and we returned home to our hotel happy and full of conversation, beans and rice. Jonathan made Krista order his small number of tacos off the children’s menu, which is how the vegetarian in the group asked for a beef entrée while pretending she was 12.

posted by Laura the Writer @ 9:03 PM