Quick tour of Providence

Thursday, May 27 - Before heading out of town, we wanted to do a quick tour of the city. We started off with a late breakfast/early lunch at Tazza, a couple of blocks from the Hotel Providence (photo left). Our server was Sarah, and she recommended a few places for us to go in Maine, including Peaks Island in Portand. Thanks, Sarah! We'll report back.

We took a swing around the Rhode Island Statehouse, and then drove up to College Hill to take a quick look at Brown University. This trip is starting to become a college tour of the Northeast. The architecture in College Hill is really beautiful, so we got out to take a walk down Benefit Street, which according to our guidebook, "has one of the most impressive collections of the colonial and federal style homes in America." Sandy liked the yellow house

Lunch at Yale

Wednesday, May 26 -- As we were about to pass by New Haven, we decided that we should make a quick stop to see Yale University, since neither of us had been there before and it was listed as one of the 6 highlights of Connecticut in one of our guide books. It was the state's first university, founded in 1716. As we were sitting on the Green having lunch, I remembered that the two oldest buildings on the campus of my alma mater, Miami University of Ohio (Elliott and Stoddard Halls), were modeled after Connecticut Hall at Yale. Connecticut Hall is also the oldest surviving building in New Haven, built in 1750. Turns out that CT Hall is also modeled after Massachusetts Hall at Harvard. Guess there was a lot of copying going on back then...

I was trying to figure out where the hall was, and realized that we were sitting there looking at it. Of course.