New England, Day Three and Four

Tuesday was a relaxing day at the coast, and Wednesday was an adventure filled day up in the mountains!

Tuesday July 5th was a beautiful summer day in New England.  We went for a jog in the morning with Avery through Livingston Park around the lake on the trail and boardwalk.

After cleaning up we headed out to the Seacoast and Portsmouth again (after a quick stop at The Bagelry again in Durham!).  We first stopped at the Seacoast Science Center in Rye
http://www.seacoastsciencecenter.org/
It is a great location right on the coast and is a real bargain at $5 a person.  They have information on the geological history of the east coast bays and harbors, biological information on the sea life, information on how ships navigate, on how lobster and fishing catches are done, and interactive exhibits where kids can touch starfish, muscles, etc.

Avery loved the lobster traps

and the buoys

And the row boat

She also loved the interactive exhibits where she could feel starfish and look at seahorses

And of course trying on the lobster hat at the gift shop

Then we sat on the rocks overlooking the coast.  Avery loved playing in the rocks

And waved at all the boats that were going past!

It was perfect weather with a great sea breeze for hanging out and relaxing

Then we headed into Portsmouth and walked around the shops before dinner.  We had coffee at our favorite coffee shop:  Breaking New Grounds, and we stopped at multiple toy stores including G. Wilikers, Macroscopic, and Marco Polo.

Captain Avery loved trying on hats at the toy store

Captain Avery with her lobster catch:

With the hat on she started walking and the hat fell over her eyes, she couldn't see where she was going and was stumbling all the over the place and finally fell down.  The workers were cracking up, they said she looked like a drunken sailor!  It was so funny and cute we wish the video was on at the time!

We really love Portsmouth, the downtown is so neat and walkable, and the town was settled in 1623, the buildings are so historic and the streets are narrow, and everything is brick with the classic New England church steeple:

We then ate dinner at The River House.  We sat on the deck overlooking the harbor and the tug boats!

Avery was very patriotic overlooking the harbor at dinner:

The lobster rolls were awesome there, we definitely recommend it if you are looking for dinner out on a deck overlooking the river if you are in Portsmouth.
http://www.riverhouse53bow.com/

Then we headed over to the Portsmouth Brewery for a nice blueberry beer.

The blueberries they put in that beer are like a lava lamp, they float up and down as they fill up and release bubbles!

After the beer, we headed over to the harbor and took a great sunset cruise

We saw a lot of neat sites and they narrate a lot of the history of the harbor from the first Europeans, to the Revolutionary war, and all the way up to present time.  This old prison is the "Alcatraz of the east coast"

It was used as a prison on an island in the harbor where the water is really cold and tidal currents are very dangerous making it impossible to escape from.  It is abandoned and creepy now, but we think would make a great hotel if they refurbished it with the great view!

Coming back into the Portsmouth harbor you can really see how neat it is, it is a classic beautiful New England town on the water

After we got off the boat, we found out that the Portsmouth fireworks were that night (on the 5th) because they were cancelled the night before due the rain in the area.  We walked over to a viewing spot and watched them.  Avery actually loved them, she wasn't scared at all, she just pointed to them!


We finally drove back to Manchester at 10:30pm with Avery (and us) worn out from such a busy day.

Wednesday July 6th we drove up to Lincoln, NH to do the zip line tour there.  It was ranked 4th best in the nation in a Top 10 zip lines in the country.  We don't have any pics (since we obviously couldn't take our nice camera on the ride), but it was a great time.  There were a few really high zips that went over valleys between peaks, and a "yo-yo" style zip where you drop straight down and then go up the other side, then back down and up again until you finally stop at the bottom.  You get up to 60mph on that one!  If you are ever up in that area during spring, summer, or fall, definitely check it out!  (They are opening up 7 new zips farther up the mountain this year with a faster "yo-yo" style!)
http://www.alpinezipline.com/

Then we headed over to Polar Caves in Rumney, NH.  At the park, before we entered the caves, we let Avery feed the deer, she loved it!  She giggled a lot while the deer ate corn from her hands!

The caves are neat formations in the granite.  Even to this day there are miles of unexplored caves to unknown depths.  We obviously followed the mapped tour.  One cave is called the ice cave because ice stays in until August

It was so cool in there compared to the 80s outside!

There were other neat caves where native Americans used to have council meetings (and arrowheads are in there), another cave was used for bootlegging during prohibition, another cave was used for slaves heading north to Canada on the underground railroad.  Some of the passage ways into the caves were very very narrow:

Colleen carried Avery the whole way (even ducking, crawling, etc) and Avery never once got scared in the dark or cool areas.  She is a real trooper for a toddler, we haven't found anything she doesn't like (except diaper changes!).

Jan followed behind, she was the only grandma to do all the caves that day we thought!  She was great too!  Jim followed behind with the camera to take all the pictures and guide everyone with the map.

To get to the caves there was a series of trails, boardwalks, and staircases through the forest and up a mountain, we all got a great workout:

We then headed down to the outlet malls at Tilton (no sales tax in NH after all), then back to Manchester for some more much needed sleep!

Thursday we are going to Portsmouth for a "date night" while Avery is babysat by her grandma, and we are going to dinner and the outdoor play at Prescott Park on the harbor.  Friday we are going to be up in the lakes region to go river tubing, an Alpine slide  at Attitash Mountain (the longest in North America), then possibly down to Boston for the evening.  We'll catch back up with you all on the blog this weekend.