The trouble with vacation is it always has to end

Well, I did it. No cars and no planes through an entire trip.

Even up to the end, there was always a chance I would have to cab it. Of the three trains going south from Mystic yesterday, I went for the latest one, the one that left at 7 p.m. and was due to arrive at Union Station at 1:30 a.m.

With Metro's late Friday and Saturday hours, that should have given me plenty of time to get home. But any major issues on Amtrak's or Metro's ends, or both, and I'd be taking a cab back to Silver Spring. And indeed, there was one moment where I thought I might be screwed.

I checked out of my hotel Friday morning and looked outside to see a downpour. My plans had been to go back over to Mystic Seaport for awhile (I bought a membership, which allows unlimited visits and other discounts, so I think it paid for itself), do a little shopping downtown, and then go back to the Captain Daniel Packer Inne.

Plans at least temporarily thwarted, I walked the short distance to Bartleby's Coffee Cafe to wait it out with a cappuccino and a close eye on weather.com. It was a cute little coffee shop, and obviously had a regular clientele. By 12:30 the rain was letting up, so then I headed over to Mystic Seaport. I wanted to grab a light lunch and check out the Seaman's Inne, the Seaport's restaurant.

I ate in the pub, and at the Seaman's Inne it's a nice place for a respite from outside, although not as great a space as the DPI. More importantly, after realizing that I couldn't remember the last time I'd had a serving of non-coleslaw vegetables with any meal, I got a delicious spinach salad, loaded with spiced pecans, cranberries, apples and cheese. Yay, nutrition.

Seaman's Inne.

I wandered the Seaport for awhile, checking out a few things I'd missed, and went for a ride on the historic steamboat SS Sabino. It just goes up and back the Mystic River for half an hour, so it's not an extensive ride, but it is a good way to see things from the water and check out the Sabino's historic steam engine.



It was, unfortunately, overrun with kids — some well-behaved, some out of control. I understand increasingly why my mom is in such demand as a substitute teacher — she would have had the out of control ones in line, I'm sure.

I wandered my way back downtown, checking out shops as I went. In Mystic, there are a lot of eccentricities, nautical items, organic items, jewelry, clothing, and art, with the occasional oddity like an army navy store thrown in.

Then it was fish and chips time. I'm beginning to develop this theory that the closer you are to the water, the better fish and chips taste. At the Captain Daniel Packer Inne, they featured a huge piece of really fresh North Atlantic cod, fried to crispy, flavorful perfection. The fries were good but not great, and many were fish greasy because they'd put the fish on top of them. But I mostly judge fish and chips on the fish, and it was very, very good.

I collected my bag from my hotel, and walked the few blocks back to the train station. I'd noticed when I came in that Mystic's train station was small, but it really sank in as I was waiting there, and, for a time, was the only person there. There's an Amtrak ticket machine in the station, but the station closes at 4 p.m., so Amtrak had mailed me my ticket in advance.

The tiny Mystic train station.

This is the only time I've taken a train where there's no announcment, and no one from Amtrak to direct traffic. Not that there was really traffic to direct — just myself and one other woman who came by later were waiting to take the train. At 7 p.m., an electronic voice announced, "Train approaching, stay behind the yellow line," in a continuous loop. I was already familiar with this, as it had happened three times previously, for two Acelas headed in opposite directions, and a regional train headed to Boston (not all of the regional trains stop in Mystic).

The woman and I gathered up our luggage and headed up the ramp to the train. Far more people got off than on — what looked like a mix of businesspeople coming back from Boston, locals coming back from trips, and vacationers headed in, perhaps for a weekend. One of the Amtrak people on the train helped us up the steps — no high-level platform here — and we were on the train and rolling.

I sat in the quiet car by accident at first, as it was the closest to where we got on. But all I was planning to do was edit photos and listen to my iPod, so I decided to try it out, and really liked it. It was very quiet except for some cell phone and other chatter when people got on in New York. The cafe car is available, too, if you need to make or take a cell phone call.

When I went to the cafe car, I did make a rookie mistake by forgetting to take my little seat ticket with me. This is the one thing Amtrak does not and should explain better — they put it overhead on the luggage rack by your seat and mark it with where you're getting off. And you're supposed to take it with you if you go somewhere like the cafe car as proof that they've already taken your ticket. The conductors also use it as they walk through the train to know who they should inform (or wake up) about upcoming stops.

As we rolled along, there were periodic points where we kept moving, but the overhead lights and outlet power would go off and then back on in the train. I had my laptop plugged in with a surge protector, so it wasn't a big deal, just kind of weird. It even felt a little classic, like we were part of a bygone era, as we rolled in to New York city, slipping dark and quiet through the night with the city lights off in the distance.



And then the train stopped, and the power was out for good. They announced that, as we could see, we didn't have power, but that the engineer thought he knew what the problem was, and it could be fixed in a few minutes. They'd make another announcement if it wasn't a few-minutes-fixable type thing.

Bullshit, I thought. I've flown enough times to know that things that cannot be fixed in a few minutes. We were going to be stranded on those tracks for hours. Or they'd tow us in somehow, as we were blocking the approach to Penn Station, and you probably can't do that for long. We'd have to switch trains, or get a new power car. I would have to take a cab home from Union Station — failure at the very end of my trip.

The lights came back on. They announced things were fixed. We started moving again.

Okay, apparently they really can fix things in a few minutes. The lights didn't turn off for the rest of the ride in to DC.

By about midnight, I was too tired to do anything else on my laptop. I dozed on and off all the way in to DC, got off the train, and headed for the Metro and home.

Today, I'm uploading lots of pictures. Everything from Sunday in Salem and Quincy is up at Flickr now.

I take the wheel, briefly

I wasn't quite sure what to expect from Mystic. I had started to think about it as a possible destination after seeing it in a National Geographic Traveler article on well-preserved historic places. But would there be enough to do for three days and two nights? Would there be great places to eat?

Downtown Mystic.

Yes, and yes. Mystic has turned out to be a lovely little town, not built up at all (I doubt there's a building over four stories), yet filled with lots of shops and restaurants. And Mystic Seaport, my main purpose for coming here, has enough attractions to easily fill a day or more.

The Seaport is particularly impressive. Basically, it has been buying up historic seaport buildings and ships from various locales over the years. The buildings get reassembled within its 19th-century seaport village, while the ships sit on the Mystic River alongside the Seaport, or in a preservation area. The result is one of the best and most extensive historic areas I've ever seen.

While I saw plenty of historic sites in Boston, Salem, and Quincy, they were all anomalies. Even along the Freedom Trail, most of what you see is modern buildings. The historic sites have been preserved, yes, but you have no sense of what it was like to walk along the streets of revolutionary Boston, for example. But in Mystic Seaport, as you walk along the paths lined with a 19th-century bank, grocer, chemist, press, shipsmith, and much more, and then look over to the water, filled with masts of historic vessels, you can really get a sense of what it was like to live during that time.

Part of Mystic Seaport's 19th century village.

Many of the buildings are manned by people who will take the time to give you an extensive explanation of these 19th-century skills. I spent quite awhile in the carver's building, learning about how ship lettering, decorative work, and figureheads were carved — and how, as demand dropped for that art, they transitioned into things like furniture and carousel horses. The shipsmith, meanwhile, explained that since you can't exactly go out and buy the tools required to maintain Mystic Seaport's historic vessels any more, he just makes whatever they need.

The only difficult thing about going through Mystic Seaport has been the kids. It's the end of the school year and therefore school field trip time, and so there are packs of kids running around everywhere. I can see how this would be a great learning experience for kids, so I understand them being here, but if I were planning another visit, I'd be sure to come during the summer, when school is out. Also, I don't know who I write to recommend this, but I'm increasingly convinced that if schools made kids run about 15 minutes of wind sprints prior to any field trip, everyone involved would be much better off.

But anyway. The showpiece of Mystic Seaport is the Charles W. Morgan, the last remaining wooden whaler. As has been the case with so many ships on this trip, the Morgan is currently hauled out for restoration. However, although the ship currently has no masts, it's very interesting to see her hauled out — the ship has a much, much, deeper draft than I ever would have expected if I'd seen her in the water. It makes sense, thinking about it — a whaler out for years at a time collecting whale oil needs a huge hold to put all of that oil in. But it was very unexpected based on other ships I've seen.

The Charles W. Morgan, mid-restoration.

Today, in the afternoon, I took a break from the Seaport-going for a ride on the schooner Argia. I knew I wanted a chance to ride in a ship under sail at some point during this trip, and the Argia, a short walk from my inn, the Whaler's Inn, seemed like the perfect opportunity. And, although there wasn't much breeze in the morning, and there was a threat of rain for the afternoon, the wind picked up and the rain held off, so the ship got to go quite a bit on sail power alone.

There's a peacefulness to a ship under sail that I'd sort of expected — with no motor, the main sounds you hear are the wind in the sails and the water whooshing along the side. I took tons of pictures as we breezed along, until I took one of an island along Long Island Sound, and the following ensued:

Captain: Did you just take a picture of that island?
Me: (Thinking: I've been taking pictures this whole sail. I know the houses on that island look big and very expensive, but is there some sort of law against taking pictures of them? We're in public waters, aren't we?) Uh, yes?
Captain: You're going to have to give me that camera.
Me: Do I have to delete the pictures?
Captain: Just give me the camera. I promise it will be good. And hold this — that's most important. (Points to the wheel.)

I gingerly take one spoke of the wheel, and then the captain walks off with my camera. I grab the whole wheel, and I can feel it humming in my hands.

And that is how I have a picture of myself behind the wheel of an 81-foot schooner.

Me, steering the Argia.

After a great sail on the Argia and last night's lobster roll redemption at Abbott's Lobster in the Rough, it might have been best just to pack it in on the lobster roll and get some fish and chips or something. But I had checked out the Captain Daniel Packer Inne's pub menu, including its hot lobster roll "sautéed with a sweet sherry butter," and that intrigued me. First, HOT lobster roll. Second, butter.

So I headed over there, and I am so glad I did. First, the ambiance is great — it reminds me a little bit of the pub I had brilliant fish and chips in when I was in Portsmouth, UK. Perhaps it's that sense that centuries-ago sea captains dug in to a pie and a pint in the very same place you're sitting. At the DPI, the pub is in what's essentially the basement, with exposed stone walls and low wooden beams overhead. Housed in a building completed in 1756, it's historic without trying too hard. And the fire going in the fireplace felt great after being out in the cold wind on the Argia.

The Captain Daniel Packer Inne's pub.

As for the food, I was feeling maxed out on oysters and clam chowder, so I went for the shrimp, scallop, and roasted vegetable soup, and of course the hot lobster roll. The soup was good, but not too remarkable — pretty much like a minestrone with seafood in it. The hot lobster roll actually had the most plate appeal of any I've had so far, with its herbs and shallots mixed in with the lobster meat.

The lobster roll was probably the second best I've had on this trip (behind Abbott's), mostly on the strength of being hot. Where it fell short, oddly enough, was the bread. The DPI got a little too ambitious, and put it on better, but too chewy, bread. As a result, every bite involved too much effort to cut into the bread. There was buttered lobster flying everywhere — it was not pretty. Which is a shame, because the guts of the roll were quite good. And it still beat cold, hands down.

I think it's definitely time to switch off of lobster rolls now. I don't think anybody in this area is going to beat Abbott's. But I may well be back to the DPI tomorrow before my train to sample their fish and chips — the space is too great to pass up another chance to kick back with a beer and some pub food.