13-June-2024 Newport RI

I had one final day of official Adventuring left and couldn’t resist a quick dip south to Newport, Rhode Island:

During the Gilded Age of the late 19th century, Newport gained prominence as wealthy aristocrats built ever larger “summer cottages” there and enjoyed a glamorous life of dinners, parties and sports. Today there are lots of mansion tours, a beautiful cliff walk, and lots of restaurants and chops along the waterfront. I found a hotel for only $100/nite that was in a restored mansion a few blocks out of town and couldn’t resist staying there.

The first few pictures below with the cranberry colored walls were my bedroom – high ceilings, large windows and period furniture. Just beautiful! And the rest of the mansion was just as gorgeous. I only wish I would’ve had more time to just stay there and hang out.

I decided that no visit to Newport would be complete without a tour of the famous Breakers Mansion, known to be the grandest of all Newports “summer homes”. This is an incredibly gorgeous and over-the-top mansion built in the late 1800s for the Vanderbilt family. I’ve been to lots of European castles and churches and other fancy places and this ranks right up there with the best of them! Gold guilding everywhere, incredible ceiling art, lavish decorations and furnishings, indoor fountains, intricate wood and stonework …. Just incredible. They have a great audio tour that guides you through the mansion room by room and points out all of the special features and sites. And not only is the interior gorgeous but the exterior is stunning as well; 180° ocean views and a sprawling lawn were only made more beautiful by abundant blue skies and sunshine. What an amazing place!

I left Newport mid afternoon and headed back up to Boston to have dinner with Eric, Trevor and Hannah. Trevor got out of work first so we headed over to the Charles River and found a nice beer garden – it was a toasty summer day but it was just gorgeous along the waterfront.

We walked over to Newberry Street and had an awesome Italian dinner. Couldn’t resist a photo with the” forever young” wine on my birthday. 😂

Let the record reflect that even though I’m getting up there in age, I took the Wii challenge when we got back to Trevor and Hannah‘s place and it says my fitness age is 35 so I’m going with that!