Mystic Pizza

Wednesday, May 26 - Yes, we did it. We ate at Mystic Pizza. The ultimate tourist destination in this tourist destination. But, we're tourists, so what the heck. It really is a real place, and was even before the 1988 movie. The pizza and pizza wraps are actually great.

It's a cute little town right on the water, and as we were admiring it's famous drawbridge, there was suddenly a flash rainstorm while the sun was still out. There was a rainbow as the rain let up, which Sandy thought was a great way to start the road trip.

We've decided that the word of the day is "Bascule," which is both the name and type of drawbridge which connects the two sides of Mystic's downtown across the river. Bascule is French for "seesaw."

After dinner, after it cleared up, there was this amazing cloud which was reflecting on the Mystic River.

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.

All Aboard!

Wednesday, May 26 - Road Trip 2010 kicked off at Grand Central Terminal at 9am -- not a bad place to start the trip. Took the train to Stamford to rent the car, since it was less than half the price than renting in NYC. Since we entered Connecticut via train, we didn't see a "Welcome to Connecticut" sign, so the Stamford train station sign needed to suffice.

Time to hit the road!