Day 15 - Queens, NEW YORK to Essex, CONNECTICUT

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Well here we go setting off on another road trip and this one will be an extended road trip of 16 days which is easily the longest we have done on our travels and will see us reach our goal of having been to all 50 states (we currently sit at 44) once completed. It’s a sunny day starting out at 14 degrees with a little breeze making it feel quite cool and will reach a top today of only 20 degrees.

We don’t have any breakfast included here so we did some googling last night to find a diner nearby that was generally on our route and eventually decided on a place called the Classic Diner. It took a bit of an effort getting here with lots of traffic, driving in school zones with narrow streets and a little bit freaky parking the car in a tight spot underneath the railroad tracks in their tiny car park but we got here and it was indeed a classic experience. The place was full of locals going about their daily business talking to each other. We noticed a sign inside explaining the procedures to follow for emergency care for choking which was not the best thing to see first up and a bit of a worry but all was good and I had a nice meal with 2 sunny side up eggs with hash browns and Kerry had some french toast. We also had some orange juice which was so fresh and coffee (they pronounced here as cor-feeee). Staff had really strong New York accents just like good old Don Lane.

We always set google maps to avoid tolls and most of the time this enables us to get on the roads to enjoy some less travelled places as we enjoy driving through small town America and on this occasion the route wanted to take us onto Manhattan Island and we had shocking traffic getting across Roosevelt Island on the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge. One of the problems was that a ramp onto the main highway was closed off by police so google maps could not work out an alternative route very well as it wanted me to go around the block and use the same ramp again (not knowing it was temporarily closed !). We eventually got to Manhattan before heading north on the FDR expressway into the Bronx passing by Yankee Stadium on our way north and soon the traffic eased as we crossed the border into Connecticut (45th state visited and state # 5 on this trip).

Once we crossed into Connecticut we had a choice of travelling their “Gold Coast” on i95 but I chose the Merritt Parkway as I guessed it might be more scenic. Turns out this was a good choice as this road which runs parallel with i95 runs for about 60 kilometres and was built in the 1930’s and is one of America’s scenic byways well known for it’s fall foliage. It is also well known for the Art Deco architecture of the 69 overpasses you drive under (yes 69 bridges). I don’t think any two were the same design / style and they are generally arched bridges so the clearance heights on the side are quite low and as such the road is only allowed to be used by cars. I think some only had clearance of 10 feet.

The roads merged as we approached New Haven and we headed into downtown to look around but parking was impossible so we just drove around the blocks and got to see some impressive sights of Yale University but missed out on going to visit Louis Lunch which is said to have been the first place to sell a hamburger and was opened in 1895. They still make them the same way using two slices of bread instead of a bun.

We decided to keep on driving as it was only about 40 minutes to get to our destination being Essex. We were about 5 minutes away when we drove past this placed called the Scotch Plains Tavern. So we decided to stop and have a coffee and some clam chowder soup. It was a lovely outdoor setting outside a brewery and we saw a squirrel having fun on the lawn.

We arrived in Essex around 3pm and are staying at the Griswold Inn because I found it online and reminded me of Clark W Griswold on his famous movie vacations to Europe and Wally World. However this place has its own history which is far more impressive. When we checked in they were assigning our room and the lady said “you are on the 3rd floor”. As it has no elevators I asked if there was any other options to avoid carrying all our luggage up 3 flights of stairs and she said that would be tricky as I had requested a quiet room when I made the booking and they have a band playing live music until midnight. However by good fortune the lady’s boss was observing and whilst she did not seem to have real grasp of each available room’s specific location her boss soon made the call on where to place us and told her to apply the same rate we originally paid for.

As we found out later we were moved from The Griswold Inn to a 2 storey building across the road called Emma’s On Main which was one of several adjoining buildings they own which has 2 retail shops on the ground floor and 2 very roomy hotel suite rooms upstairs. The room is set in traditional period fittings of the era when this area and was in its prime and ours was one of only 2 that has water views of the Connecticut River. Likely we had been upgraded to the premium suite costing $325- per night which was a lot more than we paid !. But no TV or modern conveniences such as USB charging stations we have seen in most hotels.

We then took a stroll around this small quaint town and looked at a few shops but most were high end clothing boutiques rather than souvenir shops. We bumped into a lady who stopped us randomly whilst walking on a pedestrian crossing to say “Hello, where are you from ?”. Once she found out we were Australian she told us she had been there years ago and wanted to give us tips about the town including where to dine, what shops to visit and telling us we must go on the sunset cruise to see the Swallows. It was hard to get her to stop talking and she introduced herself and asked us our names. Unfortunately I missed the opportunity to use our alias names of Ruth and Archie for the first time ! I eventually bought a coffee and then a T-shirt as a souvenir where we enjoyed a long chat with the lady in the shop which was on the ground level of our building.

We were actually quite interested to hear some live music as entertainment so we headed back to “The Gris” as the locals call it. When we arrived at about 6.50pm there was a guy playing the piano playing I Love You Baby song by Frankie Valli and also by Frank Sinatra. He only played until 7pm. We found a table in the front bar (tap room) and ordered some pre dinner drinks. I did a sample of the Fiddlehead Brewing special with 8.2% alcohol but it was a bit hoppy so I went with the Revolutionary Ale @ 4.8% and Kerry had the Downeast Strawberry Cider which they have on Tap and only cost $13- for a very large glass size so it was a lot cheaper than Vegas prices.

It was not long before the headline act arrived to start setting up so we ordered our meals and Kerry chose some Potato Cakes which were served with sour cream and applesauce which was similar to a fish cake we would have at home and I chose the Fish and Chips and they gave me 3 big fillets to much into. The band was called Cherry Pie and it turned out to be rocking night where all the locals came to celebrate the 100th birthday of some young lady. The place was packed and the band had oodles of energy playing mostly older classics in a rockabilly style. They even had an old time machine making fresh popcorn for free which I got stuck into.

It was a good night out at “The Gris“ and when the band had an interval around 9.30pm we called it quits and headed across the road to our suite. when I got the check they only charged us for the first round of drinks (we had two rounds plus dinner) so I did the right thing and corrected them. It has been a very active start to the road trip and a great time has been had here in Essex. Most unexpected !

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