gettin' witchy wit it

we picked up the first of our two rental cars the next day, after checking out of bulfinch hotel.  do you love our hyundai sonata (or some shit like that)?

whatevs.  it was comfortable, cheap, and even had an auxiliary jack so we could listen to music from one of our iPhones.  yay!

originally, we'd hoped to backtrack a bit and drive up to maine, just so we could see it, but after looking at our super-ambitious schedule, we ended up having to scratch it off the list.  cape may/the jersey shore was a casualty, too, which was a bummer.  oh, well.  next time. 

instead, we set off for salem to visit the witches.  it was a quick drive through some fun and interesting back roads, and in roughly half an hour we were there.

we parked the car right next to this vintage clothing store that the teen was drawn to like a moth to a flame.

we walked around a bit, had lunch, sweated a lot, and checked it all out.  it was a mixture of eerie, bizarre, cheesetastic, and morbid.  i was still sad not to have time to explore it more in depth, though.

we decided to do a quick drive-by to see the house of seven gables, a non-witch-related area attraction that was the inspiration for nathaniel hawthorne's novel.

and then we took off again - destination: newport, rhode island.  it was only about an hour away, and folks i'd polled online had assured me that it was a gorgeous stop, totally worthy of our precious time. 

per the tips i'd gotten, we followed the signs towards bellevue avenue and the mansions.  and it was awesome - we were pretty blown away at the beauty of the area.

this is where the bean decided that she wanted her daddy to buy her a boat.  "i want a sailboat, daddy.  pweeeeeeeeese?"

after dinner, we headed towards goat island, where our home for the night was.  we'd scored on a night at the hyatt via priceline, and it was lovely to spread out into a large room with - *gasp* - two beds!

not bad for under $100, eh?