Day 12: Falls and Flowers

Friday, October 16

It rained throughout the night and in the morning it was still raining, though it stopped by the time we were ready to roll out of the motel. We had breakfast at a small place called Renee's, then sought some good coffee at Tunnel City Coffee. It was a large, nice coffee house in a cool part of town and it was pretty busy, but the coffee and cappuccino were nothing special. 

Some unfriendly residents along the Mohawk Trail

We continued on State Road 2 through North Adams until it eventually became the Mohawk Trail, a scenic byway that follows the Deerfield River. This road climbs over the local mountain up to just over 2000 feet. At one point there was a great view looking down over a valley and the hills behind it, every bit of it covered in fall-colored trees. The view was breathtaking. We stopped a few times during the drive to get out of the car and get a better view of the gorgeous colors. Of course we were taking many pictures, but there is no way we could adequately capture what we were seeing with our eyes. At one stop along the Deerfield River, it smelled like pumpkin pie in the air. While it may have been someone baking, we were not very close to any buildings and it made me wonder if it wasn't just the natural smell of the autumn air in that beautiful place. 

The high point of the Mohawk Trail
(Photo: Sandra)

Looking along the flower bridge

The road took us into the town of Shelburne Falls, MA along the Deerfield River. This town is famous for an old trolley bridge across the river that is now kept as a pedestrian bridge and elevated flower garden, the Flower Bridge. The flowers growing on this bridge were unusual and beautiful, particularly for mid October. There is also a small hydroelectric dam on the river, which itself was interesting, but at the bottom where the water lets out, there are "glacial potholes," round holes of various sizes, formed when boulders got spun around by glacial movement, carving out a round hole. One of them is supposed to be 40 feet in diameter, though we didn't see one that large. After walking around the town for quite a while, we drove out. 

Dam, those glacial potholes!

Viewing the Flower Bridge from the cars-and-trucks bridge next door

Even the cars-and-trucks bridge was cool
(Photo by Sandra)

Copy pasted from real travelogue

Freshly inserted from Picassa

Copy pasted from real travelogue

Freshly loaded from Picassa

The local library with non-local kid

We missed the Mohawk Trail exit out of town and ended up on some backroad that was also quite beautiful. The road eventually became Highway 116 through a tiny town called Conway. Here was a beautiful library building, the Field Memorial Library, built about 1865. It looked like a miniature state capital building. The library was closed, but peeking in the window we could see it was beautiful inside. 

What are they using for fertilizer around here?!

We eventually came to Deerfield, which includes the Historic Deerfield district, an area of colonial era buildings that have been restored and may be walked through. It is a large area and we didn't have time to stop and go through any buildings as we needed to get to Northampton in time for Shabbat. We got into Northampton, MA and checked into our hotel, the Autumn Inn. It was a 2-star hotel, but the room (a suite) was nice and comfortable. Our friends Cheryl and Max were in Northampton visiting their daughter Samantha, who goes to Smith College. We were supposed to meet up with them during our stay, but they declined once they heard we had been sick. 

We had to go out and get food for Shabbat. David didn't want to go, so we left him in the room while Sandra and I went out to Trader Joe's. The TJs turned out to be in the next town (Hadley). Traffic was terrible and we burned too much time getting there. Sandra was not feeling well again, so she waited in the car while I finished the shopping. The TJs did not carry wine, so we needed to make another stop at a Whole Foods to get wine for kiddush. We had planned to eat dinner before Shabbat came in and then just do kiddush and challah, but we were out of time to get David and go out again, so we picked up some burritos and brought then back to the room. When Sandra went to light Shabbat candles, she realized she hadn't brought matches and the hotel didn't have any either. Our suite had a stove, but it was electric. I finally solved the problem by tearing a strip of paper and rolling it into a small tube, then holding it to the electric burner on the stove until it caught fire so Sandra could use it as a match.