Cooperstown, New York

It's the final night of our Northeastern trip, and for the second night in the row, we are in Cooperstown, New York, the home of the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. We drove here yesterday, a quick drive from our previous stop of Norwich, Vermont. For breakfast, my mom went right down the road to King Arthur's Flour and picked up some tasty goody baked goods. I ate a cinnamon roll and a cinnamon muffin that tasted and looked just like ones that I have had before at Zingerman's.

On the way too New York, we drove five minutes away from the hotel to Hanover, New Hampshire (I know, didn't we just leave there?) to visit Dartmouth. We were under the impression that it had an engineering program, seeing as it does have a school of engineering, but after going on the tour and going to the admission talk, it seems like it does not - at least not a bachelor program. So that knocks it automatically out of consideration, even though the campus was pretty, which I could tell through the clouds and rain. One thing that I did find interesting was their language programs, which stress a verbal component and seem actually produce fluency in the students. That would be nice if our own programs were like that... Also, apparently, at homecoming they have a two-story bonfire and at winter carnival, a gigantic snow sculpture. Sounds unsafe, at least the former, but would be exciting to see. Still, per tradition, we bought a t-shirt at the Dartmouth Co-op. The one my sister got said "Thing 1," the Dr. Seuss character, in addition to a coffee cup with the same slogan. At first the abundance of Dr. Seuss paraphernalia confused us, but apparently, he went to Dartmouth. Their medical school is even named after him. Who would have known? We also learned that it was here where the pen name "Seuss" -which is actually his middle name - first appeared, after being banned from the school humor newspaper for drinking.

For lunch we went to Molly's, which was recommended by our hotel. For once, a recommendation that we got from our hotel worked out, for not only was the food tasty, but, after a brief wait to be seated (a busy restaurant is never a bad thing), they were incredibly fast. Not only was there an abundance of delicious bread served, but my maple-caramelized turkey burger was equally tasty. After finally leaving Hanover, which was a quintessential quaint New England town, we went back into Vermont and all went to King Arthur's Flour. Who knew there were so many types of flours and flavorings? Not I. After a drive of a few hours, we finally made it to our last leg of the trip - Cooperstown. It was 7 PM by the time that we got there and got everything unpacked, so the place where we planned to eat was closed. Instead, we walked around town - where almost everything is baseball related (I wonder why...) - and went to Stagecoach Coffee, which also had ice cream, and decided to skip dinner for dessert. Never a bad idea, in my book.

Today, I woke up, hoping for a hearty breakfast at the Inn at Cooperstown, where we are staying. My mom had billed it as reminiscent of the Metievier Inn, the place we always stay at on Mackinac Island, a place with delicious and homemade, but still self-serve breakfast. Instead, I was disappointed by the fruit, toast, and so-so muffins. I mean, who serves corn muffins for breakfast? Maybe I'm getting spoiled with all the homemade meals from the bed and breakfasts on this trip, but fortunately, my mom still had some goodies from King Arthur's Flour, so I supplemented my meal with that. Afterwards, we, of course, went to the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. Man, was there a lot of information there. I don't really follow baseball, so it was all a bit overwhelming, especially when the numerous players mentioned started to run into each other. Still, it was quite interesting and cool to see the actual Hall of Fame plaques of such famous people like Babe Ruth and Jackie Robinson. One of the things I noticed was everyone was wearing their home team paraphernalia - I mean, we know you like baseball because you are there, but do you have to flaunt it? After visiting the entire second floor, we tried to look up information on my grandfather - his contract, stats, and the like - but apparently there was another person with the exact same name, whose information might have been mixed up with the things we were looking for. In fact, the researchers weren’t that helpful at all, and my mom had to look through the record books herself. Needless to say, we didn't find much.

Even though we hadn't seen the third floor, we decided - since it was 2:30 PM already - to get lunch and see the Fenimore Art Museum. My mom had seen the porch where the cafe was located, looking out at Otsego Lake, and thought it was a good place to eat. While the food was good, it wasn't really a restaurant, for the food was more pre-made that she had believed. My dad dropped off my brother at the inn (he didn't want to go), we toured the museum. Though we had come there for the American impressionism exhibit - where my favorite paintings were "The Red Maple" and "Child in Sunlight", both by Willard Leroy Metclaf - the other exhibits were equally interesting and beautiful. My favorite were the modern-day linotype pictures of Gettysburg, which were hauntingly beautiful and captured the feeling of the place perfectly, and the intricate workmanship of the beaded and quill work in their extensive Native American exhibit. We were kicked out at 5 PM when the museum closed, but then went back to the Baseball Hall of Fame, which is open to 9, and finished the 3rd floor, which shows the many records made and broken throughout the years. I tried to read everyone, but my dad pushed me along. I could have been there for more than 3 hours. I did like the video they had of Abbot and Costello's "Who's on First" skit, which never gets old. In the gift shop, I was amused by a book of Yogi Berra quotes - those really are ridiculous, like "We don't know where we are going, but we are making good time" (the story of my life!) - as well as a baseball uniform that had the name "Who" and the number 1. Finally done with the day's activities, we once again went to the Stagecoach Coffee for ice cream and a sandwich. Tomorrow it's home for Michigan. I'm going to miss our travels!