Mesmerizing Mystic, Part 2 – Sun, Sand and Surf

I’ve got blog fodder stacking up in my head and in my camera!  Mystic Part 2, What’s Blooming -mid May and Scott’s photo assignment are all waiting to be written up!  What should I post tonight? Hmmm… I’ll finish what I started first, I guess.  I’ve noticed that as I’ve gotten older I seem to start a lot of stuff but not necessarily finish it.  Some call it multi-tasking, I call it A.D. O. S! (attention deficit OOH SHINY!)  So lets get to Mystic Part 2 before I get distracted again…

After the aquarium on Saturday morning, we headed to Downtown Mystic to find a spot for lunch.  My lunch and the spot where we ate was unremarkable to me.  Again, I’ll leave the food details to Jennifer.

As we explored Downtown Mystic, we came across a fascinating drawbridge.

I took this one as I walked across the bridge – there’s Jennifer at the left of the shot!  I didn’t notice you there when I first took the picture! Hi!  The bridge has these enormous counter-weights:

When we saw those, we knew we wanted to be back when the bridge went up.  It was pretty cool to watch:

After some browsing, window-shopping and sight-seeing downtown, my companions decided it was time for a snack! We went to a tiny little bakery and selected some treats.  Here’s mine, “the Mystic Cookie”:

The Mystic Cookie was  jam-packed with all sorts of goodness: chocolate chips, oatmeal, macadamia nuts, walnuts and I can’t remember what else, but it was delicious!

After our snack in the sun on this lovely Saturday afternoon, we decided to find a place to enjoy the warmth of the day near the soothing sight, scent and sound of the ocean.  We found it at Stonington Point:

Stonington Point claims to have views of three states: its own home Connecticut, plus Rhode Island and New York.  Not knowing the geography of the area all that well, I can’t be sure that I saw Long Island, NY, but I’m pretty sure that this is near-by Rhode Island that I captured with my zoom fully extended:

After a lovely afternoon of lounging and reminiscing, we sought out a place for dinner. I forgot to bring my camera to dinner, but luckily, my sister did not.  After checking into a few different places, we found a spot but were told there would be a 30-40 minute wait.  They said we could get some drinks and sit “out back” while we waited for a table.  What a hardship this was! :

This wonderful sight was found at the Dogwatch Cafe in Stonington.  We thoroughly enjoyed our meals here.  I was charmed by the “mascot” of the place, so I asked Jennifer to take this picture:

On Sunday morning, we decided to take a ride to near-by Rhode Island in search of nice walk on the beach before we had to head home.  We ended up at Misquamicut State Beach.  (Can you believe they were charging for parking this early in the season? $14 for out-of-staters like us!) We took a breezy walk in the sand and sat back and soaked up some early-season sun.

As we made our decision that it was time to go, I stopped to grab one more unusual shot:

Lady bugs on the beach? Not a normal sight, but this one seems to be missing its head! I wondered about the circumstances that brought this funny little sight to Misquamicut.

After our visit to the beach, it was time to get some lunch and head home.  I feel very lucky to have enjoyed this beautiful weekend with two great people!