Category: Travel

On the Road: Greensboro, NC

JWF Leave a comment

We spent Thanksgiving week in Carolina visiting family in Greensboro and then Chapel Hill.  It was lovely to see fall colors and to scuffle and crunch along in the fallen leaves.  Thanks to Ann and Paul, in Greensboro, we enjoyed several outdoor attractions plus a museum. Here are some of the highlights.

ATTRACTIONS

Greensboro Arboretum

Chimes in Greensboro Arboretum

The 17-acre Greensboro Arboretum combines paved paths for easy walking and a host of special plant collections ranging from conifers to hostas to a rhododendron garden and a shade garden.  For us in late November, little was in bloom, so what was most appealing were the tall trees holding on to yellow gold leaves.  Adding to our enjoyment were several sculptures, one tall one with chimes.  It was quiet and serene on a Sunday afternoon, and we only passed one other visitor.

Fall foliage in the arboretum

Guilford Courthouse National Military Park

Guilford Courthouse, a small village, was the scene of a critical battle in the Revolutionary War in 1781.  Although the Americans were defeated, Major General Nathanael Greene lost only a few soldiers.  Nearly a quarter of British Lt. General Cornwallis’ troops died in this battle, resulting in a change in course for the Southern Campaign.  Cornwallis was reputed to have said, “Greene is as dangerous as Washington.  I never feel secure when encamped in his neighbourhood.”     

Continental Army camp follower

The park’s small museum has exhibits describing the key players in the battle, figures dressed in the uniforms of each side, and facts about life in this rural area.  We watched a 10-minute introductory film which provided a very helpful animated depiction of where the American and the British troops were positioned and how the battle played out.  

Outside we wandered around the battle site noting the occasional sculpture or memorial marker.  It was an informative morning and much more interesting than I had anticipated!

Golden woods at Guilford Courthouse

Green Hill Cemetery

Opened in 1877, this large city-owned cemetery is full of history.  Many prominent families in Greensboro purchased plots here.  Many of the family plots are circular ones, a popular style in the 19th century, which allowed for a central piece of sculpture such as an obelisk to be ringed by individual headstones.  

View in Green Hill Cemetery

At Guilford Courthouse, we noted a pedestal dedicated to one of the founders of the military park along with the names of two other men.  In the cemetery, we wandered, took photos, noted some exotic tree species (Chinese parasol tree, for one), and found the gravesite of one Guilford Courthouse’s founders.  It was a lovely afternoon with splashes of sunlight, and the surrounding trees were especially beautiful!

Glowing fall foliage

LUNCH OUT

Osteria

Osteria is in a small shopping strip.  We had eaten here before with my sister and brother-in-law and were delighted to return.  Their menu includes salads, homemade pasta, and more substantial entrees.  Several of us began with the house salad or the panzanella and both were very good and good sized.  Their mushroom soup was also pronounced excellent.  I really enjoyed the strozzapreti pasta with creamy tomato meat sauce while others sampled fettucine with peas and prosciutto and gnocchi pesto.  Not only was the food very tasty, but it was also a good value!

BOOK SHOPPING

Scuppernong Books

A visit to Greensboro is not complete without some time to browse and buy in Scuppernong Books.  An independent bookstore with a café (offering wine), it both feels and smells like a bookstore should!  In stock are the latest fiction and nonfiction hardbacks, newly released paperbacks, and an extensive and well-curated children’s section.  In the back are two walls of gently used books.  

We browsed and lingered and even bought!  For the curious, the store is named for a Southern grape used to make a sweet wine.

Interior of Scuppernong (downtowngreensboro.org)

Note: All unattributed photos ©JWFarrington. Header photo is of metal silhouettes of soldiers at Guilford Courthouse National Military Park.

Here & There: Lakes and Trees

JWF 5 Comments

FINGER LAKES

We spent Memorial Day weekend in Skaneateles, NY, a charming village on the northern edge of Skaneateles Lake. We were there for my niece’s outdoor wedding at Frog Pond.  Skaneateles is one of the eleven Finger Lakes in central New York State.   These glacier-created lakes are long and skinny, deep, and cold.  Sixteen miles in length and ranging from 148 feet to 315 feet deep, Skaneateles Lake is considered the cleanest, most pristine lake in the state. It is also the source of Syracuse’s water supply. 

Skaneateles Lake with pier

The Finger Lakes run north to south, and from east to west their names are: Otisco, Skaneateles, Owasco, Cayuga, Seneca, Keuka, Canandaigua, Honeoye, Canadice, Hemlock, and Conesus.  The larger lakes, Skaneateles, Owasco, Cayuga, and Seneca, are the better known ones.

Lakeside at the yacht club (owascoyachtclub.com)

I grew up in Auburn located at the northern end of Owasco Lake.   My childhood summers were filled with picnics and swimming outings at Owasco Yacht Club, a family club on the lake’s eastern shore.   Spring fed, the lake was often still cold in early July.  My mother never went into the water until after July 4th.

Ithaca, home to Cornell University is at the southern end of Cayuga Lake.  The campus is famous for steep gorges. Waterfalls are also numerous in this area with Buttermilk Falls and dramatic Taughannock Falls whose water plunges 215 feet.

Taughannock Falls (fairy burger.com)

Seneca Lake, 35 miles long, is the largest of the Finger Lakes and the deepest at 630 feet.  It moderates upstate New York’s temperate climate and is home to the largest number of wineries in this region. It is reported that once a century Seneca Lake freezes over.  The last time was in 1912, and some folks claimed they skated 35 miles from Geneva at the northern tip to Watkins Glen at the southern end.  

The town of Seneca Falls on Seneca’s northern shore was the site of the 1848 Women’s Rights Convention.  Today you can visit the Women’s Rights National Historical Park and the National Women’s Hall of Fame here.  

This area of New York is rich in history, and beautiful to behold with much to explore.  Best to visit in the summer, however, as even late May, witness last weekend, can be chilly!

GHOST FOREST

On one of our last days in Manhattan, we ambled into Madison Square Park and were greeted by sculptor Maya Lin’s latest outdoor work.  Called Ghost Forest, it’s a stand of forty-nine white cedar trees looming upward, but minus any leaves.  The trees are from a dead area in the New Jersey pine barrens.  It’s a haunting site, yet at the same time inviting.  Lone individuals and couples with toddlers made themselves comfortable on the ground midst the trees.  These trees will be in place into November.

Family enjoying Ghost Forest

Ghost Forest builds on Lin’s earlier climate change projects. One, called What is Missing, presents sounds of nature and animals that are endangered or have disappeared.  Missing exists both online and in several locations  The first site is a giant megaphone, The Listening Cone, installed at the California Academy of Sciences in 2009.  A treat for the Chief Penguin and me was getting to know Maya Lin a bit and visiting her in her Manhattan studio. 

TRAVEL PARTICULARS

In Skaneateles:

  • For historic charm, stay at the Sherwood Inn (1807) opposite the lake.
  • For a casual lunch or dinner, dine at Bluewater Grill overlooking the water.
  • For continental dinner fare, make a reservation for a table on the porch at Sherwood.
  • For a hearty lunch on a rainy day, indulge in a Reuben in Sherwood’s tavern, or hop a bar stool at Lakehouse Pub for local beer, quesadillas, or that regional favorite, beef kummelweck.
Lunchtime regulars at Lakehouse Pub
  • For some good Mexican food for lunch or dinner (no reservations), show up early at the Elephant and the Dove.
  • On the outskirts of town and walkable (sidewalk all the way), book at the popular Rosalie’s Cucina for generous portions of Italian meatballs, fried chicken and braciole.
  • Lastly, by car, dine at Auburn’s most sophisticated eatery, Moro’s Table.  Dishes include mussels, scallops, and sushi, along with beef sirloin, short ribs, salmon, and sea bass.
Smiles all around at the wedding reception

Note: Unattributed photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).

View of cove at Molly’s Point

Departing Maine & Arriving Florida

JWF Leave a comment

WINDING DOWN MAINE

Our airline threw us a curve when it changed our departing flight from a very civilized 12:45 pm to before sunrise at 6:00 am.  Thus, we left our rental house a day early, drove down to Portland and spent the night at the airport Hilton Garden Inn,.  We’d been told that the hotel was offering no services (no food, no shuttle) and that it was mostly empty.  Imagine our surprise, when we arrived and learned that they were sold out that night!  Granted, it was the Saturday of Labor Day weekend, but early in the week, the hotel gentleman had said everyone’s gone home, back to school and so on.  

We took an Uber to downtown Portland, the Old Port area, our first time there this summer, and wandered around a bit.  Many streets in that neighborhood are closed off and restaurants abound, offering food and drink outside in properly spaced tables and booths.  There were more people on the street than I’d seen anywhere.

Creative way to offer drinks and food

We had booked an early table on the patio (really in the street) for dinner at Petite Jacqueline, a bistro we’d frequented in the past.  The tables were appropriately distanced, and all the staff were wearing masks.  It was a treat to be waited upon and served.  We enjoyed a panzanella salad and roasted Brussels sprouts followed by lobster rolls with tarragon mayonnaise and a stack of sinful skinny fries.

FLYING IN THE AGE OF COVID

Maine is serious about social distancing and wearing masks and there were signs and announcements galore at the Portland airport.  It’s paid off because they have one of the lowest numbers of cases and deaths of any state in the U.S.  

American Airlines was also serious.  Although they don’t block off any seats on the planes, they required everyone to be wearing a mask. The flight attendants on both flights went up and down the aisle several times checking.  They also warned that noncompliant passengers could be denied the right to fly with them in the future.  No food or drink was offered.

In the Charlotte airport, there were also announcements about masks, but they didn’t sound as forceful as those in Portland.  I did see a couple of individuals without masks.  And I was struck by how busy this airport was—-many more people traveling than when we’d flown on a Tuesday in mid-July!  

Both our flights boarded efficiently, left on time, and arrived on time or few minutes early.  Deplaning was done by rows from the front.  Passengers were requested to wait seated until the row in front of them had been vacated, and folks seem to cooperate with this instruction.  All in all, I felt as safe as was possible given everything.

FLORIDA RE-ENTRY

mangroves along the bay
Mangroves overlooking Sarasota Bay

When we left home in July, the state of Florida was a Covid-19 hotspot.  Our area wasn’t as bad as Miami-Dade, but still far too many new cases each week and very spotty mask requirements or enforcement.  Now, there are more signs about masks and, it seems more people are being observant.  Before we left town, Fresh Market required masks to enter, but Publix supermarkets did not.  We are pleased that now masks are required for entering a Publix.

The Hannaford stores in Maine made their grocery aisles one way with green arrows on the floor on one end and red exit signs at the other.  I’d gotten so used to this that I kept expecting to see a green arrow in Publix allowing me to proceed down the aisle, but not so.  

It was 57 degrees when we woke up in Maine on Saturday, 82 the afternoon before in Portland, and 80 this morning here in Florida with a predicted high of 94!  Boy, did I love the cool pleasant air of the Maine coast!

VIEWING

Radioactive (Amazon Prime)
Rosamund Pike (the guardian.com)

I didn’t realize until this film was almost over that it is based on Lauren Redniss’ 2010 graphic novel of the same name.  That’s a colorful arty book chock full of information.   I had read it with science book club I facilitated at the Academy of Sciences in San Franciso. 

Marie Curie, its subject, was a passionate, arrogant, brilliant, driven woman.  She loved science and was determined to do science no matter who or what might get in her way.  The film recounts her struggle to get lab space, her attraction to and then marriage to Pierre Curie, and their joint work on radium.  That same radium sickened them both and he died an early death.  Madame Curie was passionate in her personal life also. Her later affair with a married man sullied her somewhat suspect reputation as a “dirty Pole.”  

The film is gripping and full of emotion.  It is less successful with the interjection of more contemporary events, such as the use of radiation to treat cancer or the tragedies of Hiroshima and Chernobyl.  While these events highlight the positive and negative sides of the Curies’ discoveries, they are jarring interruptions in the arc of Marie’s life.  Nonetheless, definitely worth watching! (~JWFarrington)

Note: Header photo and other unattributed photos ©JWFarrington (some rights reserved).
  

Florida Frolic: St. Augustine

JWF Leave a comment

FLORIDA FROLIC:  ST. AUGUSTINE

In our quest to become better acquainted with our home state, we’ve been taking short trips to cities not that far from us.  For the last two years, we and good friends made a December trip to Winter Park to visit the museums, cruise on the lake, and sample the local eateries.  This year, our destination was St. Augustine, the oldest city in the United States, located on the east coast, and about four and half hours away.  Christmas was the theme and there were several decorated trees in the square, plenty of holiday lights, and an overall festive feel.  

St. George Street is pedestrian only and the main drag in the historic district.  To be frank, our initial impression was a negative one.  Too many souvenir shops, too many hokey “historic” sites, and a plethora of pubs and bars.  It seemed a combination of Lake George Village and the worst of the Jersey Shore.  Add to that our inauspicious lunch at the Bull & Crown marked by glacial service and, with the exception of the delicious sausage rolls, food that was just average.

With a bit more poking around, life improved.  We discovered some attractive shops and galleries, we toured the main Flagler College building which was formerly the very luxurious Hotel Ponce Leon, and we signed on for an Old Town Trolley excursion around the city.  

Fountain in courtyard at Flagler College

This hour and a half ride (you can get on and off at any stop all day long, but we didn’t) gave us a good feel for what’s here—from the Fountain of Youth Park to the first Ripley’s Believe It or Not museum, to the distillery, to the historic fort, to several architecturally distinguished churches, to the Lincolnville Neighborhood with its distinctive frame houses.  Our trolley drivers made too many references to discounts and which attractions were free, but otherwise they were informative.  

Given that we like good food, we selected restaurants ahead of our arrival.  The two dinners and our second lunch were all delicious.  Here’s where we ate. We’d happily return to any one of these restaurants.

Collage.  I’d call their food continental, rather than French.  In any case, the small dining room is an elegant coral-walled space and the dinner service was most professional.  Several of us had the yummy carrot datil bisque to start followed by bronzino on a bed of spaghetti squash and couscous with cherry tomatoes.  Others enjoyed the superb black grouper and the diver sea scallops.  Datil peppers, hot like Scotch bonnets, are grown locally. 

Black grouper entree

Sangrias Wine & Tapas Bar. We were the only diners at Sangrias at lunchtime, but the food exceeded expectations.  We ordered the chicken pesto wrap and the crab cakes with salad along with a few beers. Our food appeared quickly and everything was tasty.

Catch 27.  This is a casual place that serves excellent food, all very fresh.  We dug into the trio of dips (guacamole, pimento cheese fondue, and pico de gallo) with chips to start.  The guys began with Minorcan seafood chowder, and then we were on to flounder with risotto and sherry cream and red sorrel that was amazing, buttermilk fried chicken, and fish tacos with a house salad.  Everything was supremely good!

Penguin cheer

St. George Inn.  We stayed overnight here (this hotel consists of six buildings around the historic area) and found their wine bar, Bin 39, most inviting in the evening.  It was also the breakfast room each morning. We were pleased that the small buffet included bagels, croissants, bread, cheddar cheese, sliced ham, and salami with a selection of jams and spreads.  Just about perfect to begin a day of sightseeing!

Note: Photos and text ©JWFarrington.