Mass #7

Phew!
On Saturday July 11th Roger, Kathy and I set off in a northerly direction. Our first stop was Salem, famous, or indeed infamous, for the Witch Trials of 1692. We went to the Tourism Centre and saw an excellent video which played down the Witch Trials and played up the rest of Salem's history, such as its seafaring past and present. The reality is of course that Salem is associated with witches and that's that. Briefly, the Witch Trials were early examples of 'witch-hunting' and required a scapegoat for something which was difficult to explain. Intolerance was rampant - what has changed I wonder? To read about what actually happened and how innocent people can be so terribly vicimised by the power of gossip and lies, try this site. http://www.salemwitchmuseum.com/
We visited the Witch Museum which had good tableaux and provided an excellent overview of events. It wasn't slickly organised but it was certainly interesting. The photo of me being a witch is a bit silly I guess, as Grimm Brothers witches and the like weren't anything to do with the nonsense that went on, but I need to lighten up as it happened a long time ago! :-) So here I am being a witch!
In fact I was terribly tempted - in the Gift Shop, where else? - to buy a wonderful door stop which was in fact a pair of legs wearing red shoes. I loved it, but it was VERY expensive!
We went on to Gloucester where we had lunch - beautiful fish and chips. We just happened to be there at the same time as a large tour group and it was interesting to watch the dynamics as they sorted out where to sit. One woman didn't settle for at least half an hour while she tried to accommodate all her friends with her at the same table, despite the fact that there were just single and double spaces left. Like, she was going to be separated from them for... how long? Anyway, in another one of those serendipitous moments, the restaurant owner had obviously been asked to speak to the group. So we got to listen too. He was hugely entertaining and had a wonderful knowledge of the local history. Frozen foods began in Gloucester, when a local man by the name of Clarence Birdseye noticed how food didn't spoil when he left it outside in the winter! I won't recount all the tales, but they were very interesting and well told.
We then drove to the lovely little town of Rockport. It is quite charming and has a great atmosphere, despite being full of tourists just wandering up and down. As we were!


I'm tired just writing all this, so as you can imagine we were pretty tired too after a very full day. Lots to see, and lots of driving. Roger and Kathy really went out of their way to provide so many interesting experiences for me over the week and a bit, and I had to work hard to convince Kathy that I was very happy to stay at home some days! She would have rustled up a further schedule had I wanted that. I thought that I was probably staying a bit too long, but Kathy was disappointed I hadn't booked to stay another week or two as there is so much to see. True! Another time perhaps. In fact Kathy is already saying, "When you come next time...." :-) Can you just imagine New England in the autumn? Glorious.