Day 9 September 11, 2026
We boarded a bus at 8:30am for our adventures for today with the tour group. Our driver was Daniel. The way Fantasy determines which seat on the bus you get is if you are a couple, one person draws a playing card, if the card is a black suit you are on the drivers side and if it is a red suit you are on the passenger side. The card value determines which row. In other words a 5 puts you on row five, etc. We were told to take a photo of our card and at the end of the tour ever who has the best playing hand of cards gets a prize.
Our first stop was the Nubble Light House. It sits out on a rock island in the edge of the Atlantic Ocean but accessible by boat. It is currently under renovation with scaffolding and netting all around it. This took away from taking a perfect photo but the location out on the island and the keepers house still made for a nice photo. The land here is very rocky along the coast line, unlike the sandy beaches in North Carolina. It was really windy when we got off the bus. When we were grouping up for a group photo Lena’s straw hat blew off and almost went into the water but one of the ladies in the group stopped it just in time.
From there we drove over the state border into Portsmouth New Hampshire to tour the Strawbery Banke Museum and the 350 year old neighborhood of Puddle Dock. There are numerous houses that are original to this location. Some have been moved to group them with other houses to form the historic section for preservation.
One of the staff came on the bus and gave us a little introduction to the Puddle Dock history and then we began a self guided tour of the houses. All the houses were not open today. If the house was open for touring there was an American flag flying at the house. Some of the houses had an interpreter that explained some of the history of the house and the items inside.
There were two men that were interpreters that we barely understood what they were saying. One man hardly moved his lips when he talked so we didn’t get much out of his talk.
The building that Lena and I both really enjoyed was the store that dated back to the time of the Great Depression. The interpreter there gave a really good explanation about how ration cards were used back in that time. He had one to show that was for 5 pounds of flour. He also had a ration card for gasoline. I can remember my mother talking about daddy getting ration cards during that time.
The store was stocked with over 400 items that were available during that time. Back then the stores were not self service. You came in with your list and the clerk pulled the items from the self that was behind the counters. Very interesting.
We had to be back on the bus at 2:15pm so we walked out in the town street and found a place named Fezziwig’s Food & Fountain that had an interesting looking menu so we stopped there. Lena got a breakfast crepe with scrambled eggs, bacon and onions with a side of fried potatoes. I had a Colonial sandwich loaded with baked ham, lettuce, etc. We both got a latte. The waitress misunderstood me when I told her I wanted whole milk so she fixed it with oat milk but it was still good. While we were in there 6 more of our group came in to eat. The cafe was small. It would only seat about 12-14 people. Everyone said their food was very good.
Then we returned to the old houses to continue our tour. We saw a tree with an odd looking fruit on the ground so we asked the lady interpreter and she said it was a Quince tree. The fruit was a little bigger than a golf ball but smaller than a tennis ball and was kind of lumpy. Google it. It is not supposed to be eaten until it is cooked for jam, pies, etc. It is very tart when it is raw.
When we got back on the bus a local guide came on board. As the bus road through town the guide gave a history of several houses, churches and other buildings. He was with the local historical society and was very knowledgeable about the local history.
As a side note: When most people talk about slavery they normally always associate it with the South and down the Southern people for owning slaves but the people in the North also owned slaves and we saw lots of proof of that fact today.
On the way out of town heading back to the campground we could see the Portsmouth Navy Yard. That is where the USS Albacore and about 75 other submarines were build in WWII.
After we got back to the campground we returned to the pavilion to have our first drivers meeting for our trip Sunday when we leave here. Fantasy RV Tours provides a trip book with step by step directions for each drive day.
Day 10 Saturday September 12, 2025
Today is a free day with no tour planned activities. After breakfast we drove to Kennebunkport to see if President George W. Bush and Laura Bush was in residence at Walkers Point which is just a few miles from our campground in Wells Maine. I thought about sending them a text but I thought that might be rude. 🤣🤣
The town is very touristy as we expected with long lines at all the breakfast eateries. We drove out to Walkers Point to see if we could get a few photos of the Bush compound. As expected the very small parking lot beside the road was full so Lena took photos out the window of the Jeep of their big house. There is a lot of really nice large homes along the same road where the Bush Compound is but we didn’t see any as large as the Bush Compound. It sits on what is named Walkers Point which juts out into the water.
We rode around awhile before returning to the campground. This is our last day here. We will be moving to the next campground tomorrow.
Day 11 Sunday September 13, 2026
We woke up to rain this morning and it continued until 4 pm after we got to our next destination in Massachusetts, where we will visit the Boston area. It is about 175 miles and checkin is not until 2 but we will be allowed to arrive as early as 1:30 since we have to be out of this campground by noon. We waited until almost 11 to leave.
Once we got on interstate 95 South the traffic was bumper to bumper and we poked along about 20-25mph for miles and miles. And again we went through toll plazas. They sure love tolls up here in the North.
We pulled into a rest stop after about 75 miles but there was not a single parking spot open. It was a rather small rest stop and all the big rig parking spots were parallel parking. We can’t backup with the tow car attached so that doesn’t work good for us. So we just drove through and kept going.
We checked into the Normandy Farms Campground, got our assigned campsite #114 and partially setup in the rain. After the rain stopped about 4pm we finished setting up. We have been lucky in our years of RVing as we have rarely setup or packed up in the rain. We were glad to be off the road. It is rather tiring driving in heavy traffic in the rain. There are so many careless drivers you really have to be alert.
At 6pm we all gathered in the clubhouse at the campground for a meal prepared by the Wagonmasters/Tailgunners. They really had to hustle to get everything ready because they were still checking some of our group into the campground at 4pm. We had chili over white rice, salad and Boston Creme Donut for dessert.
Day 12 Monday September 13, 2026
We can check off another state that we have stayed in with the motorhome, Massachusetts. That makes 44.
We had to get up early this morning and be on the bus at 7:30 for our hour ride to Boston. Daniel was our driver again this morning and man did he earn his paycheck today. He took that bus down some streets in downtown Boston that I am not sure I would have driven my pickup truck.
The traffic going into Boston was bumper to bumper. It helped a little that we could ride in the HOV lane once we got close to the city. We stopped in the city and picked up Peter, our local guide. Part of his tour was walking through the city. We went to Paul Revere’s house, saw the statue of him on his horse and also the Old North Church where he saw the two lantern signal about the British coming. Peter was like a walking encyclopedia of the history of Boston. Too much for this old brain to remember it all.
There was a lot of history made in Boston. Part of the city, even some fairly tall multi-story buildings are built on land that was once marsh land that was filled in to build on. They used a lattice work of piers to support the buildings and they have held up extremely well.
After we dropped off the guide Daniel took us to get lunch at Quincy Market which is a building that had numerous places serving about anything you want to eat. Similar to a food court in a shopping mall but this was one long corridor with food vendors on each side. The place was packed with people getting lunch. After checking all the options we decided on Chicken Teriyaki over fried rice with vegetables. It was very good and a very generous portion.
Then we boarded the bus and went to Concord and Lexington to visit locations that were the locations of the beginning of the Revolutionary War. At each town we saw a short film in the Visitor’s Center. Paul Revere made his ride from Boston to here to warn the people of the British coming. He was captured by the British but he convinced them to turn him loose but they did confiscate the horse he was riding which was a horse he had borrowed.
We liked the town of Concord or at least what we saw of it. There were a lot of really nice older houses that have been maintained very well. Then we returned to the campground. I think everyone was very tired but we had a day of learning about history of our country and some really nice weather.
Day 13 Tuesday September 15, 2026
We boarded the bus at 7:45 this morning and Daniel was our driver again. Kathy our Wagonmaster told us that Fantasy always asks for Daniel to be our bus driver. He is very good. He has an accent and I always try to figure our accents. I asked him was his accent Jamaican. He said no, Dominican. At least I was in the ballpark.
Our first stop today was Plymouth MA to tour the sailing ship the Mayflower II. It was very interesting to tour this ship. There was a guide on board providing a lot of information about the ship. It is a full scale reproduction of the ship that carried the Pilgrims to this area. It is now 65 years old. It was built using the same tools and techniques as shipwrights 400 years ago. The Mayflower II was built starting in 1955 in Brixham, Devon, England.
It set sail on April 20, 1957 from Plymouth England with a crew of 33 men and one cat named Filex. After 54 days it arrived in Plymouth Massachusetts on June 13, 1957 and was greeted by approximately 25,000 spectators.
After we toured the ship we walked a few yards down the sidewalk to see The Plymouth Rock. I think everyone was expecting a very large massive rock but it was not very big at all. It has somewhat of a protective barrier built all around it to protect it from idiots that would be tempted to paint graffiti on it.
We boarded the bus and went a few miles to the Plimoth Grist Mill. And yes I spelled the name correctly. This is a working grist mill. It is a reproduction of the 1636 mill that once stood here on Town Brook. It was built in the 1960’s. Some of the mill parts including the millstone came from a 19th century mill from Pennsylvania. The waterwheel and gears were made specifically for this mill.
The miller explained how the grain is ground, and then sifted to separate the ground corn into meal, grits, and the chaff. On Saturdays they mill a few hundred pounds of corn and local restaurants and other customers buy it.
Then we boarded the bus for the Plimoth Patuxet Museum. After we viewed a film we had a prepared lunch in the dining room of the Henry Hornblower II Visitor Center. It was a Thanksgiving style dinner of turkey, dressing, creamed potatoes, fried potatoes and carrots and either apple or pumpkin pie.
Then we walked out to the Historic Patuxet Homesite and the 17th Century Village. At the Patuxet Homesite they were demonstrating different things that the indigenous people that lived here did as part of their daily lives. One man was burning out the core of a large long log to make a boat. A couple of ladies were preparing cattail plants for drying to later make rugs. They also discovered how the indigenous people would use the bark from large trees to make their houses. They said it was getting difficult to get the bark now due to the large trees are not as plentiful as they were hundreds of years ago.
There were several houses and a fort in the 17th Century English Village. Several women in the village in different houses were dressed in period clothes and talked with heavy English accents explaining how they lived during the 1620’s. It was all very interesting.
We returned to the campground and had our drivers meeting at 5pm for our travel day on Thursday. It has been a great day, lots of new interesting places, lots of history and beautiful weather. Sure beats the 100 degrees weather we had at home all Summer.
Day 14, Wednesday September 16, 2026
Today was a free day to do whatever we wanted. In other words no planned activities. We caught up on some sleep, then had a full breakfast, the first in three days due to the early morning bus rides.
We did a few housekeeping items and then took a short trip to take a hike along the edge of a Cranberry Bog. It was located behind the Bass Pro Shop. The New Englands Patriot’s Gillette Stadium was also in that area.
We have never seen a Cranberry Bog other than on the TV. Very interesting how they grow in such a wet area. When it is time to harvest them they flood the bog and the ripe berries float on the water where they are scooped up. The berries were not ripe today.
We didn’t walk the entire hiking trail. Some of the trail was elevated by about 12% climb and there were numerous trip hazards such as tree roots and loose rocks. We don’t need a sprained ankle or worse.
The wet marsh area near the bog was full of lily pads in bloom. We saw a large bull frog resting on a lily pad and several small turtles. One of the turtles was flapping his right rear leg trying to crawl over a small limb in the water. He was not getting much traction.
We needed some milk and a few other groceries so we stopped at Trader Joe’s in the shopping area by Bass Pro Shop. We were expecting the prices to be much higher than they were. We even found our favorite maple flavored, maple leaf shaped Canadian cookies. So three boxes jumped into the shopping cart. We saw some yesterday in one of the gift shops and they were twice the price as the ones in Trader Joe’s but those were chocolate.
The rest of the day was lunch, laundry and relaxing for our short drive tomorrow.
Later we joined Gregg and Judi at their motorhome to celebrate their recent anniversary with a glass of wine from Duplin Winery that we gave them.
Day 15 Thursday September 17, 2026
We have a short 69 mile drive today so we didn’t leave until about 11am for our drive to Mystic CT. Nice easy drive to the Mystic KOA campground. We were assigned site 428 which is a nice site with a concrete patio and nice table/chairs and a glider.
We enjoyed some outside time before we walked to the campground pavilion for Mystic Pizza and chocolate chip cookies. The Fantasy team went and picked up several pizzas for the group. It seems there was a movie about Mystic Pizza that we haven’t seen. It was good pizza but no better than we get near home.
Bill, the Wagonmaster, had planned to have a campfire that everyone was invited to but rain came through and put a damper on that idea.
Day 15, September 18, 2026
We can check off state number 45 (Connecticut), that we have stayed in with our motorhome.
Our group excursion today was to the Mystic Seaport Museum in the small town of Mystic CT. The museum was not a typical museum housed in one building. It was a collection of older buildings located along the seaport of the Mystic River. They are configured to resemble an authentic period coastal village. There is a store, church, drug store, doctor’s office, reading room, school house, dwellings, boat repair/storage buildings, a rope making building, a bank, a printing shop, a cooper shop, a blacksmith shop, a small river lighthouse, etc. Some are original to the location and some have been moved from other New England towns.
The whaling ship The Charles W. Morgan was also there and open to tour. A guide was on board to provide information and answer questions about the ship. It was a fair size ship. It lacked one inch being 114’ long. The mainmast was 110’ above the deck. It made 37 voyages between 1841 and 1921. The average voyage ranged from 2 to 5 years. The shortest was 262 days. They averaged catching 60 whales per voyage. It took the oil from about 60 whales to fill the 75,000 gallon whale oil holding tank.
A tall person would have trouble getting around on the lower decks. I had to walk stooped over to walk around the deck. I think that would be bad on the back doing that for 2-5 years.
This was a very interesting museum. We had walked 2 miles by the time we got around to everything in the outdoor museum and had worked up an appetite. We were ride sharing with Gregg and Judi so we drove down the street a short distance and had a good lunch at The Engine Room restaurant. Jerry and Claire from our group joined us. Lena and I had Fish and Chips. It was a large peice of Cod fish and a large serving of French fries.
Then we drove to Old Town Mystic. This is an area with about 60 shops selling a large variety of items. We saw an ice cream shop but you had to order at a window and there was no place to set down so we decided to go back to the Museum to the Mystic Cafe and Sweets.
We got there 15 minutes before closing. Lena and I ordered a banana split to share. They were out of most of the toppings so we should have got a discount but we didn’t. Then Gregg ordered the same thing and the clerk said they were out of bananas so we got their last banana. When the clerk handed me our banana split at the cash register he turned and walked away. So I asked him did he want me to pay for it. Duh! The two clerks seemed rather disorganized.
Day 16 Saturday September 19, 2026
The temperature today was a few degrees cooler than the previous days but it was a good day of touring around the area.
We boarded the bus with Daniel our driver for the past several bus trips. Our first stop was near the draw bridge in Mystic. We got off the bus and walked over the draw bridge to the dock beside the sail boat Argia.
The draw bridge is very unusual. It has two massive concrete blocks that act as counter weights to raise the bridge up when it is opened. We didn’t get to see it open, but sure would have liked to.
The group boarded the sailboat and one of the crew gave a safety briefing and we were on our way after the crew members untied the boat from the dock. For safety reasons the Captain had to use the engine until we were out of the boat harbor. The Captain and the two crew members raised the 4 sails with the help of some of our tour group.
Fantasy had arranged for coffee, lemonade, muffins and fresh fruit. One of the crew told a funny story about the owner of an island that we could see from the boat. I am not sure but I have a feeling it was embellished just a tad to make it funny. It was a tad cool on the water but a beautiful day for a two hour sailboat ride.
We boarded the bus and headed for Newport for lunch on our own. Six of us went to an Irish Pub for lunch. I had a great bowl of clam chowder and Lena had cottage pie (similar to shepherds pie).
Then it was back on the bus for the short ride through town to The Breakers. The Breakers was built between 1893-1895 by Cornelius Vanderbilt II and his wife Alice. It was their grand Summer residence. It is a 70 room Italian Renaissance-style palazzo.
Cornelius Vanderbilt II and George Washington Vanderbilt II ( the owner of the Biltmore Estate) were brothers.
We had been told to bring headphones for our phones and to download an app so we could tour the house and the app would guide us through the house and explain how the rooms were used.
The house was beautiful inside to the point of being gaudy. Lots of very expensive building materials were used. It is amazing they could built it in two years.
The family sold the house in 1972 to The Preservation Society for $375,000 ($2.81 million in 2025 dollars).
This was our last stop so Daniel took us back to the campground where we had our drivers meeting for tomorrow’s trip to Newburgh KOA in Wallkill NY. This was our last bus trip with Daniel as our driver. He was a great bus driver.
