New England Road Trip - Day 3 Plymouth and Hyannis

[Libby]

New England Road Trip – Plymouth and Hyannis
Sunday 12th August

We had a better night’s sleep and didn’t go to breakfast until 7.30am. It wasn’t raining but it was very misty this morning.
Our original plan was to visit the Heritage Gardens at Sandwich but as we still had things we wanted to see in Plymouth and the weather was very moist and misty we decided to stay in Plymouth for the morning instead.

After eating we managed to pack all of our things out of sight into the tiny boot of the car. We checked out at about 9am and asked if it was OK to leave our car in the hotel car park for the morning. After that we walked back to the town centre.

We walked to Burial Ground Hill. This has a very old cemetery on it but is also the location of the original Plimoth Plantation. (I believe it is also the end point of the parade we saw on Friday.) It was interesting looking at the memorials and seeing the markers for the location of the fort back in the 17th century.

Once it was late enough for the museum to be open we walked back to the Pilgrim Hall Museum. DH was getting obsessed with finding out why the 1620 pilgrims are considered the founding fathers when they are definitely not the first settlers in America. (It seems they were a symbolic/romantic choice and have just become adopted as the Founding Fathers – if anyone knows differently please comment below.)

The museum was quite small but very interesting. There was a small video presentation (always a good start) and some actual artefacts from the Mayflower. There was picture on the wall depicting the people that landed and also those that had survived the first year (only half of them.)

There were also artworks and replica costumes – both realistic and as depicted in film and books. One room was dedicated to the Native Americans of the area.

Behind the ticket deskwere some beautiful stained glass windows that, if I remember correctly, were made to celebrate the 300th anniversary in 1920.

We then walked back to collect the car and drive to our next hotel just outside Hyannis in Cape Cod.

The journey was very quick and easy but, being a Sunday, the traffic leaving the Cape was nose to tail with weekend visitors returning home.

We arrived at the Hampton Inn far to early to check in but were given a key to the communal areas. We had a look around the hotel and enjoyed a complimentary coffee. We still had a few hours to kill so we drove to a nearby mall for lunch.

On the way we were amused by the warning signs for the roundabout and all the directional signs on the roundabout itself.

It was very difficult to find a parking space at the mall. We afterwards found out that it was tax free weekend in Massachusetts (if we’d know we might have bought more things!) We’d thought about going to Chipotle for lunch (DD tells me it’s pronounced Chipotlay but I enjoyed annoying her by calling it Chipotl for the fortnight) but ended up in the food court.

After lunch we had a quick look at the shops thinking we’d wait until Boston at the end of our trip to actually purchase anything. We didn’t know then that this would probably have been a nicer shopping centre and it would have been tax free too. We particularly enjoyed Barnes and Noble and did buy a couple of books there.

The weather had changed for the better and we returned to the hotel to check in and change into something cooler.
The view from our window was mostly flag.

After a while DH and I decided to walk into Hyannis to find the ferry port we’d be using in the morning. We left DD reading and enjoying some parent free time.

The hotel did offer a shuttle service but as we had a set ferry to catch we thought we’d prefer to be masters of our destiny and walk the 20 minutes to the port.

It was a pleasant walk with a sidewalk all of the way which is always a bonus in America. It was a mixed area with hotels and industrial units near the hotel (it looks like this might be a new hotel overspill area as a lot of building work seems to be taking place or about to) as we got nearer to the town we passed residential houses and medical centres and a big hospital.

The walk to the terminal took exactly 20 minutes. But as we looked closer we realised that this was the Steamship terminal and we had booked with HyLine ferries. We followed the quayside path for another 5 minutes before finding our terminal.

We were glad we’d come here to check it out as I’d hate to be running to catch the boat in the morning. We spent some time looking at the harbour and taking photos.

We tried to walk into the town but our path was blocked by a ticket only event. Now we were very hot and starting to get hungry so decided to miss out the town and walk back to the hotel. We enjoyed walking and chatting.

We collected DD and drove to an Olive Garden restaurant near the shopping mall. In all our years visiting WDW we’d never been to one. We were very impressed with both the food and the service.
It was dark by the time we had finished and drove back to the hotel. We were asleep quite early as we have an early start tomorrow.

[Melbatb]

You did well in Plymouth! They are certainly proud of their Founding Father heritage

We liked Hyannis - we were only there a couple of hours but it had a great vibe!

[anji]

Great day! Very interested in your report as we're staying there next year in May and also catching the ferry

[gtown]

We will be visiting these places at the end of our roadtrip, so good to see what's worth a visit.

[klr15]

I am another who finds the history interesting, but a little difficult to learn. I wish they’d taught us this in school.

[disney owl]

another good day