Newport

A few Saturdays ago I drove down to Newport, Rhode Island.  It's hard to believe it's been eight years since I was last there, on the 7th grade trip.

Two bits of important practical info that I didn't know before I left: 

1. To drive to Newport you have to cross the Claiborne Pell Bridge, which costs $4 for passenger cars (or $2 per axle for larger vehicles).
2. There is public parking at the transportation/visitors' center, not far from the historic sites; parking is free from November 1 through April 30 (happily, the day I went).

Even though it was April and still a bit chilly, there were many more tourists than I'd expected to see.  I was both glad and disappointed that most of them were not interested in anything historical, leaving those sites for me to enjoy.  There were also at least two dudes wearing Nantucket red shorts.

There may be the most colonial houses in Newport of any place I've been so far.  This one belonged to John Stevens, a stone carver; he and his family members carved many of the stones in the Common Burying Ground, and his shop across the street has operated since 1705.  Three hundred eleven years in operation is pretty impressive for an American business.  You can sign me up for a tombstone from them, because they do nice work (including on the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C.).

About four cemeteries are grouped together when you enter the city.  These include Historic Cemetery Number 6--if it has another name I didn't see it--home to many Irish immigrants, overgrown, with bees from a stack of hives nearby buzzing through the clover; Braman Cemetery, into which I did not venture; and Island Cemetery and the Common Burying Ground, which border each other but cannot be entered one from the other.

Both cemeteries had people with their dogs off-leash in them, and some owners failed to clean up after their pets.  Two young men rode a motorbike through Island Cemetery and later sat on graves to have a chat; in the Common Burying Ground I saw a man whom I thought at first was doing some kind of clean-up work, because he had so much stuff spread out from his car, but later it seemed like he, too, was just using a grave as a table and was kind of hanging out.  It was disconcerting, to say the least.

Island Cemetery has many interesting gravesites, some of which have been defaced by graffiti or are used as places to sleep by the homeless.  Newport cemeteries in general are a great place to find buried captains, but Island has two famous ones: Oliver Hazard Perry and Commodore Matthew Perry.  The former won the Battle of Lake Erie in the War of 1812, and is also honored with a statue in Washington Square.  From his grave the masts of ships in the harbor can be seen not far away, which I thought fitting.  Oliver's younger brother Matthew was instrumental in the opening of Japan.  He is buried in the Belmont family plot (pictured at left, with Perry's monument at right),* and a statue of him stands in Touro Park.

The Common Burying Ground is in sad shape.  Some of it cannot be attributed to malfeasance; lots of the carvings are illegible because of lichen, likely due to the damp sea air, and some slate stones had holes right through them.  At first I thought they might be bullet holes, as someone in this article also believes, but upon closer inspection I changed my mind and reckoned there must have been some inherent flaw in the stone.  However, much of the destruction must have been the result of neglect at best and malice at worst.

This is especially awful since the Common Burying Ground is home to the highest number of colonial African-American graves in the country.  I expected there to be some kind of sign noting this and giving some information, but there was nothing.  It was also curious that most of the burying ground was crowded, with little concern for space or chronology, but the section where the servants are buried has plenty of room.  I would have liked to have seen the official explanation for this.  The photos below illustrate the difference in population density in the two sections.

On a more positive note, my favorite epitaph described the ingenious Captain Pollipus Hammond and his charitable, prudent, virtuous wife Sarah.  Would that I could be all of those things.

After I failed in my quest to find affordable fish and chips, I wandered past a few mansions and Salva Regina University to the Cliff Walk.  I walked the half-mile from Forty Steps to Memorial Boulevard.  The blues in the water were beautiful, and the air was cool and fresh. 

I also found made my way to Touro Park.  Just as last time, there is no sign by the stone tower, though at the museum at Washington Square they now claim the stone tower was part of a mill built by Benedict Arnold, ancestor of the famous one.  I'd rather believe it was built by Vikings.

I just wanted to include a picture of this house because it is HUGE for a colonial home.  Obviously the section at the back was an addition, but still: it makes sense that John Banister, for whom it was built in 1751, was a merchant but also a privateer and smuggler.

*I thought it odd that someone so famous was buried in a plot that prominently featured another family's name.  It turns out that Perry was originally buried in New York and was later moved to Newport.  One of his sons-in-law, August Belmont, was fairly rich and could afford a big monument.  He's also the namesake of the Belmont Stakes. ↩

The Most Ancient Towne

Kit's heart sank.  This was Wethersfield!  Just a narrow sandy stretch of shoreline, a few piles sunk in the river with rough planking for a platform.  Out of the mist jutted a row of cavernous wooden structures that must be warehouses, and beyond that the dense, dripping green of fields and woods. 

 
 Thank you, public television!

When I traced how I found out about a recent destination, the source was a program aired on Connecticut Public Television sometime late last year.  I somewhat flippantly thought to myself, 'Thanks, PBS!' but then I considered that "Rick Steves Europe," not to mention "Doc Martin" and all of the thousand British crime shows we watch, air only on PBS stations.  So, in all sincerity, thank you, public television.  And if you're in a position to do so, please support your local station(s) so they can keep providing educational, informational, entertaining content.

I heard about Wethersfield, Connecticut, because of its cemetery.  My aunts saw a program about it in the fall or winter and visited in December, sending me a few photos of graves there.  With the weather finally nice, I decided to drive down on a Sunday afternoon.  I invited the aunts to meet me there, and they agreed, though I showed up earlier for two reasons: it's a shorter drive for me, since the town is not far at all from Hartford, and I wanted ample time to explore the cemetery without having to worry about them waiting for me.

At least it looked solid and respectable, compared to the cabins they had passed.  Two and a half stories it stood, gracefully proportioned, with leaded glass windows and clapboards weathered to a silvery gray.

I didn't do much reading-up before I went, but I'm glad I at least looked at the Historic Wethersfield website, because it clued me in to an important thing.  On Broad Street, near the cemetery and a block or two from Main Street, there is a house called the Buttolph-Williams House.  It looks fairly unremarkable, just three stories of dark-weathered wood and a few windows, but it was the inspiration for the family home in Elizabeth George Speare's The Witch of Blackbird Pond.  It's been so long since I read it that I hadn't realized that the book was set in colonial Wethersfield, so it was fun to go see the town and those buildings and homes that likely would have been around at the time Kit lived there.  (This write-up was delayed by the fact that it was harder than it ought to have been to procure a copy of the book to see how Kit described the town.)

The long rows of onions looked endless, their sharp green shoots already half hidden by encroaching weeds.

Considered one of Connecticut's very first towns, Wethersfield was also the home to Silas Deane, a diplomat during the Revolution, and Washington and Rochambeau met up there to plan the battle of Yorktown (which did not happen at the Yorktown in New York, as we thought, but at the one in Virginia).  With all of this history and culture, it's no surprise that the town's emblem is a red onion.  Apparently the Wethersfield red was for many years an integral part of the local economy.

The town also has the Grand High DMV of Connecticut (a.k.a. the department's state headquarters).  It is very much the most stately DMV building I've ever seen.

As promised, the cemetery had a bunch of colonial graves.  It was also interesting to see the newer markers near some graves noting in which wars the deceased had fought, because they were not limited to the Revolution; they included the War of 1812, the Civil War, and such lesser-known conflicts as Queen Anne's War and King George War, parts of larger European conflicts carried out in their colonies.  Other somewhat unusual bits of note: the grave of a Mr. Boyssou de Monplaisir of Guadaloupe, the names Salmon North and Zechariah Bunce, and the number of skulls that look like concerned lightbulbs.

It's fun to drive or walk around the historic neighborhoods and admire the 18th- and 19th-century houses.  Though this bed and breakfast isn't that historic, it is really beautiful.  Wethersfield was quaint and perfect for a pleasant Sunday afternoon out.

Gravestone Onomastics

Recently I decided that a fun project would be to create a list of all of the legible names from tombstones that I've photographed around here.  I actually made a spreadsheet listing surname, maiden name, given name(s), honorific or rank, spouse's name, parents' names, year of death, age at death, and the cemetery and state; the dates were to note when the name would have been given.  Then I didn't know what to do with my spreadsheet, and while it may not be completely on-topic here, it's the best place I have to put it.

There are 466 individuals from graves in 11 cemeteries: Wethersfield (Connecticut; to be written up in the near future), South Hadley, Old Hadley, Amherst, Maplewood in Springfield, Calvary in Holyoke, East Parish Burying Ground in Newton, and Copp's Hill, King's Chapel, Granary and Central Burying Grounds in Boston.

This list is not at all comprehensive; it's only based on what I could decipher while embiggening on my photos (though I was kind of shocked at how detailed some of them were, even when zoomed in). I did not set any strict cut-off dates, so these date from about 1630 to about 1920--all 11 of the Winthrops, spanning almost three centuries, are on the same stone--though the majority are from the 18th century. I also listed every spelling variant separately. Of course "Abigail" and "Abigaile" are basically the same, as are "Lowel" and "Lowell," but if the point is to make an amateur study of the names, those variants can be noteworthy. The names are given in descending order of frequency.

Female Given Names	Male Given Names	Surnames
Mary (34)	John (30)	Smith (13)
Elizabeth (19)	Samuel (25)	Warner (12)
Sarah (18)	William (17)	Winthrop (11)
Abigail (12)	Thomas (13)	Griswold (10)
Hannah (7)	Joseph (12)	Buck (8)
Rebecca (7)	Jonathan (9)	Cook (8)
Anne (6)	James (8)	Montague (8)
Ann (5)	David (6)	Day (7)
Lydia (5)	Benjamin (5)	Stillman (7)
Ruth (5)	Edward (5)	Wolcott (7)
Eunice (4)	Isaac (5)	Dickinson (6)
Rebekah (4)	Ebenezer (4)	Fuller (6)
Anna (3)	George (4)	Green (6)
Elisabeth (3)	Josiah (4)	Beadle (5)
Huldah (3)	Moses (4)	Deming (5)
Jerusha (3)	Stephen (4)	Hanmer (5)
Martha (3)	Elisha (3)	May (5)
Mehetable (3)	Enos (3)	Parker (5)
Deliverance (2)	Henry (3)	Ward (5)
Eliza (2)	Timothy (3)	Williams (5)
Harriet (2)	Adam (2)	Bernard (4)
Lucy (2)	Daniel (2)	Blin (4)
Miriam (2)	Eleazer (2)	Goodman (4)
Polly (2)	Elias (2)	Goodrich (4)
Prudence (2)	Francis (2)	Moody (4)
Sally (2)	Joshua (2)	Nash (4)
Susannah (2)	Michael (2)	Porter (4)
Abiah	Nathan (2)	Robbins (4)
Abigaile	Peter (2)	Wells (4)
Annah	Robert (2)	Woodhouse (4)
Azubah	Seth (2)	Wright (4)
Barbara	Aaron	Chapin (3)
Betsy	Abraham	Crane (3)
Beulah	Alvin	Dix (3)
Billisent	Ansell	Hale (3)
Bridget	Ashbel	Hall (3)
Caroline	Boyssou	Hammond (3)
Catherine	Caleb	Hide (3)
Charlotte	Charles	Judd (3)
Chloe	Chow	Skinner (3)
Deborah	Christopher	Stoddard (3)
Desire	Crafts	Treat (3)
Dorcas	Crispus	Welles (3)
Editha	Elihu	White (3)
Elizebeth	Elijah	Woodbridge (3)
Emily	Eliphas	Alvord (2)
Esther	Ephraim	Ayres (2)
Experience	Ephriam	Ballard (2)
Grace	Fitz John	Belding (2)
Hopestill	Hezekiah	Bingham (2)
Jean	Hiram	Bordman (2)
Jemima	Humphrey	Bryant (2)
Johana	Jabez	Butler (2)
Johanah	Jacob	Chester (2)
Julia	Jahleel	Clap (2)
Katherine	Joel	Copp (2)
Kezia	Jotham	Drew (2)
Lucretia	Lemuel	Fox (2)
Mabel	Leonard	Francis (2)
Marcy	Levi	Franklin (2)
Margaret	Loomis	Harkness (2)
Maria	Lorenze	Harrison (2)
Meriam	Lowell	Holland (2)
Naomi	Luke	Hopkins (2)
Olive	Martin	Lewis (2)
Patience	Mathew	Lowell (2)
Phebey	Matthew	Merritt (2)
Rachel	Nathanael	Mitchell (2)
Roxa	Parsons	Moodey (2)
Sabra	Patrick	Mountague (2)
Seferanna	Paul	Murdock (2)
Susanna	Philip	Parkman (2)
Tamesin	Prince	Peirce (2)
Thankful	Robart	Pitman (2)
Thankfull	Roger	Preston (2)
	Ruggles	Russell (2)
	Salmon	Sampson (2)
	Solomon	Scoot (2)
	Sylvanus	Standish (2)
	Thadeus	Trowbridge (2)
	Wait Still	Varney (2)
	Walter	Willes (2)
	Zechariah	Winsor (2)
		Woodward (2)
		Worthylake (2)
		Adams
		Archer
		Armstrong
		Arnold
		Attucks
		Balston
		Barns
		Blake
		Boltwood
		Boyes
		Brewster
		Brown
		Bulkley
		Bunce
		Burrough
		Bush
		Buttolph
		Byles
		Caldwell
		Carr
		Cheevers
		Cheney
		Church
		Clark
		Cogswell
		Crouch
		Cutler
		Davis
		Dawes
		Demery
		de Monplaisir
		Dolbeare
		Doubelde
		Downe
		Dwyt
		Dyar
		Dyke
		Eastbrook
		Eaton
		Ellis
		Elliott
		Eustis
		Fosdick
		Foster
		Frances
		Gardner
		Garrett
		Gibbs
		Giles
		Gillburt
		Gladding
		Gleason
		Goodwin
		Gray
		Greenough
		Greenwood
		Griswould
		Hammatt
		Hancock
		Harris
		Harvey
		Hedge
		Hollowell
		Holmes
		Holms
		Hubbard
		Hunt
		Hurd
		Hurlbut
		Indicott
		Jackson
		Johnson
		Kellogg
		Kilborn
		Kingsbury
		Knock
		Knowles
		Labbe
		Lamson
		Lancelott
		Latimer
		Lee
		Leonard
		Long
		Loring
		Loud
		Lowed
		Lowel
		MacCarty
		Malcom
		Man
		Manderien
		Marion
		Marsh
		Mather
		Maverick
		Maxwell
		McKean
		Newman
		Nickols
		North
		Otis
		Page
		Pain
		Park
		Parsons
		Pearce
		Phillips
		Pigeon
		Raynolds
		Revere
		Rice
		Richardson
		Ridgaway
		Ridgway
		Riley
		Rogers
		Rowlandson
		Sanborn
		Sanders
		Scollay
		Seymour
		Shannon
		Shaw
		Simpson
		Snider
		Sprague
		Spring
		Staples
		Sterling
		Swan
		Tapping
		Truesdell
		Tryon
		Tyler
		Viburt
		Voeax
		Wakefield
		Waterman
		Waters
		Watts
		Webb
		Wheat
		Whitney
		Wickam
		Will
		Winchester
		Wiswall
		Wiswel
		Wollcott
		Woster
		Young

Almost Like Home

Living abroad can be a richly rewarding experience, one that allows for personal growth, learning, and enjoyment.  Things will stick with you long after you leave, haunting you with the memory of experiences that you'll never quite be able to recreate, no matter how you try.  You might think food would be an easy way to transport yourself back there, if only for a few moments, and for some travelers and some countries that probably works; in the absence of Slovak restaurants we've even made guláš and knedľa with fair success (though the former used seasoning packets brought from SK).  But some things, like Kofola and Studentská, are harder to make at home.  Sometimes an unexpected package will land two unasked-for chocolate bars in your mailbox, courtesy of a thoughtful former student.  More often, though, you have to keep your eyes peeled for things that will remind you of another place.

One of the snacks that I enjoyed after school was something called chrumky.  My default description of it is this: Imagine Cheeto Puffs covered with peanut powder instead of cheez.  Like all of the best snacks, chrumky are delicious, cheap, and low in redeeming value.  They are also scarce on these shores.  Somehow a few weeks ago I came across a mention online of something similar to them found at an Aldi in the States.  Today my errands took me by an Aldi and I was able to check for myself.

Stepping into the store was like being in Europe again.  For those unfamiliar with the chain, it's a discount grocery store based in Germany; I'd heard of it before, but today was my first visit.  Compared to American supermarkets the store feels spartan.  There aren't multiple brands crowding shelves, just the store brand.  There are also some items imported from Germany, from chocolate to wursts.  It reminded me of Lidl, another German chain whose Brezno location we visited on occasion.  This Aldi didn't have the bread-slicing machine that I loved using at Lidl, or the carrot juice selection that H availed herself of, but it had frozen schnitzel, and spaetzle, and a seemingly random selection of home goods.  It was even set up in a similar fashion, with refrigerator cases along the back wall and those home goods in the middle aisle, toward the back.  Though I didn't use a cart, I noticed that they even had the anti-theft system common in Europe.  It all felt very familiar.

And they had chrumky--or at least a German version, labeled as "peanut puffs."  I managed to wait until I got home to try them.  They're a bit crunchier than what I remember, but certainly the closest thing I've had in years.  That and the $1.49 price will hold me over until the next time I go back to Slovakia.

Quabbin Gate 40

In the late 1930s the powers that be decided to build a nice big reservoir to help supply Boston with fresh water.  And, as you do when building a nice big reservoir, they had to destroy a few small towns: Dana, Enfield, Greenwich, and Prescott.  When the residents had moved elsewhere, mostly into surrounding towns like New Salem and Pelham, their former homes were razed, leaving only stone walls, foundations, root cellars, and wells.  (A few buildings were moved rather than destroyed; the Joseph Allen Skinner Museum in South Hadley is housed in the erstwhile First Congregational Church of Prescott.)  Then lo and behold, as the waters of the Quabbin Reservoir rose, they fell far short of the abandoned streets of Dana.  Because of that, one can visit empty Dana today.

From the parking area at Quabbin Gate 40 on Route 32A visitors walk a bit on asphalt to reach Dana Common.  I say "a bit" because various websites I consulted said either a mile and a half or two miles, and once again the idea of using my phone's pedometer function to track the distance did not occur to me until I was more than halfway back to the car.  It took me just under an hour to get there, so I'd estimate it closer to two miles; but I did stop to take photos along the way.  The road is mostly level, and easy to walk.  As a further practical tip, please note that the port-a-potties one website talks about are apparently seasonal, and as such were entirely absent on this visit.

The town was named after a legislator, Francis Dana.  Mom asked if he was related to Richard Henry Dana, of Two Years Before the Mast and Dana Point fame, and while I scoffed, she was right to suggest it, as Francis was Richard Henry's grandfather.

Walking to and through the old town was eerier than I expected.  This was a site not destroyed by war, or depopulated because of epidemic or massacre; it was just bureaucratically "disincorporated."  If any of the former causes had led to its abandonment, one might expect to find the atmosphere sad.  While I wouldn't call Dana sad, it was quiet, and felt a little empty.  I don't think the place is haunted, but I would be entirely unsurprised to hear that someone else thought it was.

The common.  The school and town hall were to the left and the hotel to the right;
across the green would have been the church, stores, and a few homes. 
In the middle stood the World War I memorial.

I did wonder if the atmosphere would be even creepier for someone who didn't know the history of the area, and decided that it probably would be.  The ignorant visitor (who in this case would not notice the informative signboard inside the gate) would first likely remark on the drystone walls that line the road.  Nae problemo, though; those are typical New England.  But then he might observe that some of those walls run up the hill on one side of the road, dividing nothing but trees from other (possibly inimical) trees.  Before too long he could not help but observe the right angle of a pair of walls, and would conclude that they must have been part of a building. 

And looking into the brush he might pick out the dark entrance to a root cellar, now the perfect hiding spot for any number of critters.  He would see rusted metal, in the form of cables and wire fences and drums and other less easily-identifiable bits.  Upon reaching the common he would see sidewalks that led nowhere and doorsteps the crossing of which would lead to a fall of several feet and likely injury.  Of course, on the common our visitor would see more markers, with photos of the town's buildings, including the town hall, school, Congregational church, and a hotel, where now only their foundations remain.  He would read the marker erected in 1996 and learn that this had been the common from 1801 to 1938, but would not ascertain what exactly occurred to flatten all of the architecture.  There are lots of possibilities to choose from, most more titillating than the truth; and if he chose the theory that this place had been (and could easily be once again) Extreme Witchcraft Murder City, I can certainly understand that.  I visited on a bright, sunny day, knowing why the town had been left and knowing that witchcraft had nothing to do with it, and that's still a little bit of the vibe I got.

They want you to believe this was a cellar, but this is some kind of wolf pit or
something. Yes, there used to be wolves in Mass, and yes, I watched
"Ladyhawke" last night.

The foundation of the school.

Nature taking back a road.

Artist whose "Very Best of" album I got 80% of the way through on the drive there: Jethro Tull.
Artists to whose works I could have referred in this post and did not: U2, Shel Silverstein, Eddie Izzard.

Murtaugh in Montréal

Last weekend I learned that I can't travel now the way I did when I was eight years younger.  That may sound silly and obvious, but it's been fairly upsetting to me.  Even before I left I thought--at the time rather jollily--that sometime after my first overnight bus I'd find myself repeating the famous words of Detective Murtaugh in "Lethal Weapon"; little did I realize how true they would prove to be when I was exhausted and hobbling around on astoundingly blistered soles.  Mostly I'm sorry about missing the opportunity to go shopping and buy souvenirs for people, and to look for this book in a used book shop (and in case you were wondering, it's not too late to get me a birthday present).  Rather than dwell on all that, I'll pretend that I don't feel like a failure and just present the things I did manage to do and see.

The weather was better than forecast: though chilly, it was bright and sunny most of the time.  The temperature seemed to fluctuate; at times it was almost warm, but then the wind picked up and it cooled off again.  Still, and as usual, the weather was better than it should have been for spring break.

Early in the morning we twenty or so passengers were roused from the bus and made to go into a building, where Canadian border patrol agents questioned us briefly.  Fortunately, I knew this was going to happen, as I'd read about it online.  I'll admit to being incredulous at the idea; the last time I crossed a border on a bus where we actually had to stop was between Hungary and Romania, and there the guards took our passports and checked them, leaving us to wait on the bus.  Getting off of the bus to be checked out is probably preferable to surrendering one's passport in a foreign country where one doesn't speak the language.  This time I was asked where I was going, why, and for how long, whether I was meeting anyone there and whether I planned to leave anything in the country.  Apparently I seemed safe enough to let enter, and it didn't take too long for everyone to be allowed in.

Despite the obvious border crossing, and despite the fact that most people I heard spoke French, it didn't seem that I was really in a different country.  I'm not sure why that is.  In addition, a lot of people online (particularly on the TripAdvisor forums) say that Montréal feels European, a sentiment I did not share.  No one can deny that the city was influenced by its early French inhabitants, but influence is not ambiance.  I didn't have much trouble because of the language difference, though I did realize that my French sounds better in my head and that my receptive skills are not fantastic.

Though I don't often drink coffee, I definitely needed some upon disembarking at a quarter to six.  There was a Tim Hortons not far from the Gare d'Autocars, and I managed to get a small coffee and a beignet aux pommes (it's not what I'd call an apple fritter, which is what the website claims it is).  Thus fortified I returned to the métro and took the blue line to Jean-Talon.  The métro itself is fairly easy to use; there are only three or four major lines, and you just need to know toward which terminal you're headed.  My problem came whenever I had to leave a station and figure out which way to head on the street.  This is not something I did well at all.  However, this first time I managed to find my way to the Marché Jean-Talon, a daily market.  Though the market supposedly opened at 7, most of the sellers were still unloading their goods when I arrived.  Most of the stalls were produce, but there were others selling other types of food, like bread and pastries, seafood, and foie gras poutine; few of these were close to opening so early.  I was excited to see several stalls with different kinds of apples, though most seemed to be selling them by the basket, rather than individually.  There was also plenty of freshly-pressed apple juice, and lots and lots of maple and honey products.  I bought some juice, and found a stall selling apples singly; the man there was unpacking McIntoshes but let me pick a few.  Then, when I went to pay, he said there was no charge, and gave me another apple, a small plum-colored one, as well.  I couldn't even think of how to ask if he was sure (being fairly sure myself that the only foreign word I could recall at that moment, "Pravda?", wouldn't do the trick), and he insisted, so I got three free apples.  It was so kind that I almost cried.

 

I knew that there is a Polish cafe somewhere in Montréal, and I believe it was that fact that led me to grab my phone at 10 PM to search the Internet for places that might sell Kofola.  A comment somewhere noted that a Romanian deli named Bucarest stocked it at one point, so I made my way there.  Bucarest is on what seems to be a highway that runs through the city--it reminded me of how Fordham Road becomes Pelham Parkway in the Bronx.  Its location means I absolutely would never have found it if I hadn't known where to look.  The deli, which is a good size, had all sorts of Central and Eastern European goods, including the hoped-for Kofola, in one- and two-liter bottles.  I bought two one-liter bottles, for ease of carrying, and a Milka bar; I didn't want to get much more than that and have to carry it around all day.

Theoretically not far from Bucarest, though you would not know it from the somewhat meandering route I took, is l'Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal.  L'Oratoire was conceived of by a monk named Frère André and is dedicated to St Joseph, Jesus' earthly father.  Visitors can ascend the steps in front of the basilica--and pilgrims can climb on their knees--or people who are just mildly interested and have already walked a lot can take a shuttle bus from the parking lot to the entrance.  From the outside it looks like a pretty standard, though large, sacred building, one that wouldn't be out of place in Vienna; the inside is a different matter.  For one thing, l'Oratoire has more escalators in it than any other church I've ever been in.  

On the first floor is the shrine, with statues of St Joseph in his different roles, like Model of Workers, Protector of the Church, and Terror of Demons.  There were candles before the statues, and between them racks with canes discarded by those who had been healed.  Behind the shrine was an alcove with a statue of the Virgin Mary in front of a raw, dripping rock wall, part of Mont-Royal itself.  On the next level up is a gift shop, the terrace, with windy views of the city, and the basilica proper.  This is where the stylistic disconnect between exterior and interior was most obvious and jarring, because while the outside is very neoclassical, the basilica is quite postmodern and almost brutalist, made mainly of concrete.  It strikes me as an odd choice to make--though the interior was finished in 1966.  Among the decorations are the apostles, arranged in groups of three, carved from wood and larger-than-life; their size means that they are literally looking down on the viewer, and their expressions are all fairly unimpressed as well.  In the other, larger gift shop, located in a building adjacent to the oratory, among the usual rosaries and such, they also sold prayer cards, though these were printed not on paper but on plastic, the size and weight of a credit card, with the prayer on the back in French, English, or Spanish.  I, of course, bought one featuring St George, with a prayer in French.

If one church is good, more is better.  My next stop, in Vieille Ville and near the old port, was Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours.  Because of its location the chapel became known as a site to which sailors came to give thanks for good weather.  On the port (as in waterfront, not the opposite of starboard) side, the chapel is topped not with a Touchdown Jesus but a Touchdown Mary statue.  The port side also has an interesting wooden gallery attached to the stone building, to what purpose I'm not sure; I think it's part of the museum that I didn't visit. 

The interior of the chapel is decorated relatively sedately and was certainly the brightest of any of the churches I saw that day.  The vault was wood, painted in pastel hues, and I was amused to see that hanging from the ceiling were lamps in the form of small ships.  Despite the fact that it was Saturday, there seemed to be a small school group there, with a docent giving a talk.  That's something I would like to do, I think, though I might have a problem if I thought the kids were being disrespectful.  Still, I think it would be satisfying to work in a beautiful, historic church. 

I did basically no shopping on my trip, but I did wander into a store in the old town that sold Inuit art.  Though there was some jewelry and a whole room of fur coats and accessories, as well as fur rugs, most of what was for sale was sculpture.  Most of the sculptures were of animals, my favorite of which were the dancing bears.  They're just so joyful.

I also spent some time walking around the Vieux Port.  The Saint Lawrence River was moving swiftly, but, as you can see, the marina was still iced over.  There were a few yachts moored there, despite the fact that I thought you were supposed to take your boat out of the water when it might freeze.  But I don't own a yacht, so what do I know?  There was also a truly huge freighter docked in the river, near the Molson building and the Jacques Cartier Bridge.  The Vieux Port has many activities that are better suited to warm weather than when there are still mounds of snow on the ground; no one was taking advantage of the beach umbrellas when the sand below was mostly covered in ice.  The clock tower at the end of the quay was open, and I believe free to ascend, but I chose to sit on a bench by the river and rest my feet.

The first thing I said when anyone asked what I planned to see in Montréal was "the basilica"--that is, Notre-Dame Basilica.  (Oh, francophone Catholics, we know you love Mary, but did you really have to name every dang thing Notre-Dame de Whatever?)  In Place d'Armes, the square opposite the entrance, is a monument to the people who founded the city, which was first known as Ville-Marie (come on, Catholics!): Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve, Jeanne Mance, Charles Le Moyne, Lambert Closse, and the Iroquois.  From the outside the basilica looks like a small two-towered Gothic cathedral, made of fairly nondescript stone, just like you'd see in any number of towns in England or France.  It's certainly nothing to write home about.  The interior, on the other hand, is a different story.  It's well worth the five dollar (Canadian or American) entrance fee to see it.  As so often seems to be the case, pictures do not do justice to the decoration.  The interior is probably what many of the cathedrals of Europe looked like before their paint jobs were faded by the centuries; it is magnificent, though I can see how it might seem a bit gaudy to someone used to the aforementioned faded style.  The basilica reminds me a little of the one in Kraków, and even like some of the restored synagogues in Central Europe, particularly the Spanish Synagogue in Prague. The blue around the altar was glorious.  I was more than a little put off by the number of people taking pictures of themselves or others in front of it, but I tried to focus less on the annoyance that my fellow visitors were causing me and more on the sublime beauty of the church itself, and what that beauty was created to represent and exalt.

I wandered around on my own long enough that I was there when the next free tour in English started, so I figured I'd stay for that.  "Tour" was a bit of a misnomer, as the group merely sat in a few pews and listened while our guide spoke, but the wedding about to happen in the chapel at the back might have curtailed our group's ability to move around.  Or maybe the tours are just talks after all.  Whatever the case, Julie, our guide, pointed out some things that I'd noticed and some that I hadn't known, and some that were a combination of the two.  For example, the stained glass windows along the walls depict not Biblical stories nor saints' lives but scenes from the history of Montréal, which I had noticed; but I didn't realize that those windows can be opened, an uncommon feature.  I also didn't realize that the vault and even the columns were made of wood.  That's part of the reason why the windows open: the wooden construction is warmer than stone, which is more pleasant in the winter than in the summer.  Julie also told us about a number of hockey players who were married in the basilica, a bit about the pipe organ, and that one of the towers holds ten bells while the other only holds one, named Jean-Baptiste.  Cast in London and weighing 11 tons, Jean-Baptiste is so big that when it was still being rung its vibrations were damaging the tower.  It is no longer rung, only struck on special occasions.  The ten-bell carillon is still used.

One might think that with all of the churches and cathedrals I've been to, I would be less moved by them at this point.  I'm thankful that that isn't so.  

The last significant thing I did was eat poutine.  Poutine is simply cheese curds and gravy on fries.  Restaurants around the city offer a number of variations, including lobster poutine and vegan options, but I went for the classic--or la Classique, as it's called at La Banquise.  La Banquise only offers two sizes, régulier or grande; I got the regular and only ate about half of it, saving the rest for my breakfast the next morning.  It was just as good (if not perhaps better) then.

My trip didn't turn out anywhere near how I thought it would, and I know now that things have changed and will have to change the next time I travel anywhere farther than a few hours away.  I can't say I'm pleased with or prepared for this turn of events, and that discovering these seemingly new limitations hasn't put me off the idea of traveling somewhat.  I hope in time that feeling will fade, and I'll soon be eager to go again, but right now I don't feel sure that will happen.  I'll be here if it does, though.

Guilford

My family is fortunate that we don't need to depend on Black Friday's discounts to afford our shopping, and none of us (unless someone is harboring a secret desire otherwise) is keen on fighting crowds.  While some of us prefer to stay home and avoid the traffic and madness, Black Friday can be a good day to do local sightseeing.  Since we'd watched the miniseries "Saints & Strangers" the night before, visiting a place of similar vintage seemed a good idea.

Just after Thanksgiving dinner I often feel like I never want to eat again, but somehow on Friday I can always manage.  It's also hard to say no to lobster bisque, a fried scrod sandwich, and soft serve.  The sandwich could have used some tartar sauce, so please remind me to ask for it next time, but the lobster bisque was excellent.

The oldest house in Connecticut and the oldest stone house in New England dates to 1639.  The Henry Whitfield State Museum includes the house, a visitors' center, and an interactive/craft area.  The visitors' center, which includes the gift shop, had samples of colonial-era food, including pemmican (deer jerky) and cornbread.  There was also an exhibit on autumn holidays as they relate to the site.  Particularly of interest was the explanation of why the house isn't decorated for Christmas: the holiday was thought to be frivolous, and was often celebrated in ways that belied its religious significance.

The house, in which photography is not allowed, is fairly large, with two floors accessible to the public (I believe the guide said there is a cellar, and I don't know why there wouldn't be).  The artifacts on display were gathered from various sources and did not all belong to the Whitfield family.  Visitors enter through an anteroom, whose displays discuss the house's history and restoration, before stepping down into the great room.  This long hall shows the influence of European architecture, subtly reminding us that the early modern period was not so far from the Renaissance and even the Middle Ages.  There is a large fireplace on each end, particularly necessary when the room was partitioned into two; at one end there is a settle, a high-backed bench designed to trap heat around the sitter.  An interpreter there was dressed in a military outfit.  I'd hoped he would provide a wealth of information about the house, its original inhabitants, and their time, preferably with a period accent like those of the interpreters at Plimoth Plantation, but alas, this was not the case.  The upper floor has more displays of objects and things like looms and whatnot.  While I enjoyed it, I'm not sure the Whitfield House is a site that would stand many repeat visits, and were I taking children I would check to make sure there was an activity available that day.

On the way home we drove by Long Island Sound, and jumped out at a marina parking lot to enjoy the sunset.  On one side of the lot was this marshy area, with swathes of localized fog, while on the other side was the blue and pink and orange Sound.