Town #37 Manchester

January 1-3, 2009
Mansion Inn B and B * Hartford Road Café

Bob gave me a two-night getaway for Christmas. He’d done some research and had a place in mind and we decided together to go to the Mansion Inn B&B in Manchester. It was formerly one of the Cheney family mansions, all of which are clustered on the south end of town, where silk mills were once in existence, thus giving Manchester its nickname “Silk City.”

One main purpose of the trip was to unwind after the holidays. A second purpose was to work on a couple projects requiring a computer. I’d given Bob a netbook (a baby laptop with a 10-inch screen) for Christmas, so we wanted to use it to work on the projects without being distracted by other household tasks. So we mostly computed and read, and visited with Bruce Hamstra, our host. Each room has a large selection of books from which to choose and many more in common areas, but as usual we are each in the middle of at least one, so we brought our own. On Friday we used the wifi for the first time in the living room, since our room was too far from the router. We got a lot done on the projects and reading. Bruce’s breakfasts were excellent and we shared them with different couples each morning. Both nights we had a fire in the fireplace in our room and we thoroughly enjoyed our visit.

The only time we went out was Friday night for dinner. We wanted casual, so we chose the Hartford Road Café, less than a mile away, and casual we surely got; it's a bit rough around the edges. It’s mostly a bar but has a few tables, and we were the only customers at first. Bob was very pleased with his steak except for an herb rub that he didn’t remember seeing on the menu. I wanted the chicken cordon bleu if it was made on the premises and not frozen (I can do that at home). The waitress said it was made there, and it was the best I’d ever tasted.

This was a relaxing couple of days and with snow having come just before New Year’s Day, holing up in a big, old, warm house was perfect. ($__ for B and B; $33.12 for dinner) (Jan)

Town #31 Madison (visit #2)

November 15, 2008
Open Studios Tour * Linda Zimmerman's quilts * Lenny and Joe's Fish Tale

Next we headed for Madison to see handmade quilts by Linda Zimmerman, Quilt Artist. She is very talented and had some very unique, meticulously detailed design ideas. We had supper at Lenny and Joe’s Fish Tale on Rt. 1, clam chowder and fried whole belly clams. The place is a food factory and the fare was only “pretty good,” typical cafeteria style—order at the counter, wait for your number, then eat in or take out. We were mildly disappointed. ($41.) (Bob)

Town #36 Branford

November 15, 2008
Martha Link Walsh Gallery, cut paper artist * Artists Open Studios tour

We continued on the Open Studios tour, taking I-95 into Branford and visiting the Martha Link Walsh Gallery. She is a cut paper artist and her work is intricate and beautifully done. She has created many different products--all beautiful--to display her craft. All artists for the Open Studio are juried and their work meets high quality standards and originality. All were friendly and willing to explain their work to us. (Bob)

Town #35 Guilford

November 15, 2008
Guilford Arts Center * Open Studios Weekend

Our real purpose for this trip was the Shoreline Arts Trail ’08 Open Studios Weekend. We started in Guilford, so we headed there along a very scenic Rt. 77, south through Durham and into Guilford. We arrived at the Guilford Art Center where all the artists were represented and where we picked up a map and list of artists. We first visited Alan Davidson, maker of contemporary stained glass. We purchased a cross section of a real chambered nautilus shell mounted in the center of a circular stained glass assembly. It is meant to hang, and is now on display in a window of our home. We would have liked to have purchased more of Davidson’s work, but we showed restraint. We visited several other artists, some sharing a common facility on the Green (Rob Bunting, sculptor, CT Coppersmiths; Rebecca Bunting, Goldsmith; Barbara Shulman-Kirwin, Goldsmith; and Chroma Gallery), including one not involved in the Open Studio, Greene Art Gallery. They featured sea paintings as well as other themes, and had a nice sculpture and kinetic sculpture area outside. (Bob)

Town #12 Portland (visit #2)

November 15, 2008
Eggs Up Grill

After reading about the Hartford Courant’s review of the Eggs Up Grill on Rt. 17/66 in Portland, we just had to test it out. By the time we arrived and were seated (there was a line to get in, a good sign), it was almost 10 a.m. Jan had homemade cinnamon French toast with sweet cinnamon butter. I had real, homemade hash (not from the can!) and fried eggs, lightly over. Both were excellent. $20. (Bob)